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10/26/2011 - Martinsville, VA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Series: NASCAR Sprint Cup. Date: Sunday, October 30. Race: Tums Fast Relief 500. Site: Martinsville Speedway. Track: 0.526-mile oval. Start time: 1:30 p.m. (et). Laps: 500. Miles: 263. 2010 Winner: Denny Hamlin. Television: ESPN. Radio: Motor Racing Network (MRN) /SIRIUS NASCAR Satellite.
With four races to go, Carl Edwards is in pretty good shape to win his first Sprint Cup Series championship. Edwards survived last Sunday's Chase "wild card" race at Talladega with an 11th-place finish. His lead is now 14 points over Roush Fenway Racing teammate Matt Kenseth, making it the largest points separation so far between 1-2 in this year's Chase.
But Edwards has another big hurdle facing him this weekend -- Martinsville Speedway. Martinsville is the only short-track race on the Chase schedule. It's also one of Edwards' toughest tracks.
Edwards has scored just four top-10 finishes in 14 starts at Martinsville. His best performance here is third place, which came in October 2008. Edwards has led only three laps at this 0.526-mile track -- all of them coming in April when he finished 18th.
"I am a little nervous about Martinsville," he said. "I think if we can pick up just a tiny bit of speed there we will be good. Otherwise, that will be one of the tracks we go to and just fight and claw for a top-10, and that is how it usually is for me there."
Martinsville has not been one Kenseth's better tracks as well. He has just two top-five finishes and seven top-10s in 23 races here. Kenseth did finish sixth at Martinsville earlier this season.
"Probably the most challenging part for me at Martinsville is being calm, thinking through things and not doing something because you are mad," he said. "I don't like getting run into, and I don't like running into other people, and it's bound to happen there since it's such a small track. There is no room to move, and there is not an outside groove where you have another choice to pass."
After finishing 34th at Charlotte and then 26th at Talladega, Jimmie Johnson's hopes of winning a sixth straight series championship are slipping away big time. Johnson is now a distant 50 points behind Edwards. He's not on the brink of elimination just yet, but a disastrous finish at Martinsville could put him out of the game.
"We've just got to keep fighting and keep working on getting every point we can at every race," Johnson said. "We have no clue what's going to happen to all the Chase drivers, and I want to finish as high as I possibly can in the Chase. That does mean the championship. If it's not there, I want to finish as high as I possibly can."
Johnson has notched six wins and 17 top-10 finishes in 19 races at Martinsville. After finishing 35th in his first start here in April 2002, Johnson had a string of 17 straight top-10 runs at this track before placing 11th in this year's spring event.
"Quirky tracks have always worked for me, and this track certainly is that," he said.
If Johnson does not win on Sunday at Martinsville, it will be the first year since 2005 that he has not won a short-track race during a season.
Heading into Martinsville, Brad Keselowski is 18 points behind Edwards, while Tony Stewart trails Keselowski by a single point.
Keselowski continues to be very impressive in his first Chase year. He was the highest finishing championship contender at Talladega with a fourth-place run.
Stewart kept his title hopes very much alive with a seventh-place finish at Talladega.
"I don't think there's anybody that's mathematically out of it with four races to go here right now," Stewart said. "With the old [points] format of the season-long-standings with four races to go, you only had a handful of guys that still mathematically had a shot to win the championship. And you were really racing two to three guys at the most at this point, where there's nobody that's really eliminated from the opportunities to win this championship with four races to go. All 12 guys are still in it."
Kevin Harvick took a big hit in the Chase after finishing 32nd at Talladega. Harvick trailed Edwards by just five points before Talladega. He is now 26 points out of the lead.
Harvick won a Sprint Cup race at Martinsville for the first time in April. He denied Dale Earnhardt Jr. an opportunity to snap his lengthy winless streak when he passed Earnhardt Jr. for the lead with four laps to go. Harvick finished third in last year's fall race here.
"Over the first several years, we didn't get a lot of the finishes [at Martinsville] that we probably deserved, whether it was from a mistake on the racetrack or just dumb luck," Harvick said. "The last couple of years, we've gotten good finishes, and our cars have run fast. To finally get that check mark in the win box was important for us."
Earnhardt Jr.'s winless drought in NASCAR's premier series now stands at 125 races.
Forty-seven teams are on the preliminary entry list for the Tums Fast Relief 500.
<< Senators send top pick Zibanejad back to Sweden
Ottawa, ON (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Ottawa Senators general manager Bryan Murray
announced Wednesday that 2011 first-round pick Mika Zibanejad is being
returned to Djurgarden, his team in the Swedish Elite League.
The sixth player ta
<< Del Potro lands in Vienna quarters
Vienna, Austria (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Former U.S. Open champion Juan Martin
del Potro was an easy second-round winner Wednesday at Vienna's $790,000 Erste
Bank Open.
The second-seeded Argentine del Potro handled 2008 Vienna titlist P
<< This Week in Auto Racing October 29 - 30
Martinsville, VA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Round seven in the Chase for the Sprint
Cup championship takes place this weekend on NASCAR's shortest track --
Martinsville Speedway. The Camping World Truck Series is also at Martinsville.
Formula
<< Redskins sign TE Byrd, OL Compas
Ashburn, VA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Washington Redskins signed tight end
Dominique Byrd and offensive lineman Jonathan Compas to the active roster
Wednesday.
Byrd began the season with the Seahawks but was released after the first
Devils add F Ryan Carter off waivers >>
Newark, NJ (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The New Jersey Devils on Wednesday claimed
forward Ryan Carter off waivers from the Florida Panthers.
The 28-year-old will join the Devils on their road trip in Phoenix.
Carter was scoreless in seven
Texas Southern sets 2012 schedule at new stadium >>
Houston, TX (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Texas Southern football will begin play in the
new TSU/Dynamo Stadium in 2012 with at least six home games, the SWAC
university announced Wednesday.
The 22,000-seat stadium is scheduled to open in May. The Tige
Azarenka, Li post wins at WTA Championships >>
Istanbul, Turkey (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Fourth-seeded Victoria Azarenka and
French Open champion Li Na recorded round-robin wins Wednesday at the
prestigious season-ending $4.55 million WTA Championships.
Azarenka (1-0) made her first acti
Chargers put LB English on IR >>
San Diego, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The San Diego Chargers placed linebacker
Larry English on injured reserve Wednesday.
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Mayweather picked to beat De La Hoya
LAS VEGAS, NEVADA -- Golden Boy Oscar De La Hoya and his rival Floyd Mayweather Jr. arrived at the MGM Grand here Wednesday amid the pomp and pandemonium befitting two of the biggest stars in the sport who are about to duke it out for the WBC super welterweight crown this Saturday (Sunday in Manila).
As of Wednesday, MySportsbook.com closed its book with Mayweather a favorite to defeat De La Hoya at -170 (a $100 bet wins $70), while De La Hoya is a +140 underdog (a $100 bet wins $140).
Mayweather arrived at about 11:30 a.m. on a big truck with his face and a big "World's Best Pound-for-Pound" sign scribbled across the vehicle. He was accompanied by his entourage made up of rappers and his training team.
A crowd of close to 3,000 eager fans packed the MGM Grand lobby, with their cameras in tow, all trying to vie for position to get a good angle at Mayweather, who is acknowledged as the world's best fighter pound-for-pound.
Eric Gomez, Golden Boy Promotions vice-president, described the fan turnout as "amazing" and swore he had never seen anything quite like this event.
"The crowd was fantastic. Everybody was just too eager to see the two fighters," said ALA manager Michael Aldeguer, who was among those who waited at the lobby together with his ward Rey "Boom Boom" Bautista and AJ Banal.
De La Hoya made his own grand entrance at the hotel lobby at around 12:30 p.m. accompanied by GBP chief executive officer Richard Schaefer and trainer Freddie Roach.
The same group of fans who trooped to see Mayweather also lingered around to get a close look at De La Hoya, who has been secretly working out at a Las Vegas gym for days after arriving from his main training camp in Puerto Rico.
The golden boy then took part in a closed-door afternoon workout with Bautista and Banal. The two, along with Aldeguer and wife Christine, as well as an HBO crew were the only ones allowed inside the gym.
De La Hoya and Mayweather take part in today's final press conference before the official weigh-in this Friday.
Ring Magazine, the acknowledged bible of boxing, reported in its June 2007 issue that 12 out of 20 boxing experts it interviewed have favored Mayweather to defeat De la Hoya, with only 8 favoring the latter.
But Filipino ring icon Manny Pacquiao said in a recent interview with The Freeman's Emmanuel Villaruel that De La Hoya will win by unanimous decision over Mayweather.
To visit this online sportsbook got to MySportsbook.com for all your bet on boxing needs.
The 2007 college football rules changes that were implemented to shorten games are now history. The NCAA rules committee did what they set out to do; games were cut by an average of 14 minutes per game last season. There were also, on average, 14 fewer plays per game. We’ll get into how that did (or didn’t) affect games in regards to the pointspread a bit later.
While the NCAA rules committee may have had the betterment of the game in mind, they'll now “turn back the clock” for next season. Two key rules have now been overturned by the NCAA committee for the 2007 season, something definitely for the better.
For those of you who may not remember what those rules actually were, let us refresh your memory.
1) The first one was actually starting the clock on a kickoff as soon as the kicker touched the ball rather than waiting until the returner touched it. The problem here was near the end of the half (or game), if the team leading was kicking off, they could milk the clock by intentionally running offsides and then re-kicking. They could run 10-15 seconds off the clock each play while taking just five-yard penalties each time. They could run the clock down and simply cause the half (or game) to end on a kickoff, keeping the opposing offense off the field. In 2007, the clock will now start when the returner touches the ball as it had before last season.
2) The second rule dealt with starting the clock after a change of online football betting possession rather than waiting until the ball was snapped. This took a lot of time off the clock throughout the game as teams changed possession, however it caused the most problems late in games (or halves). Rather than huddling up and calling a play, the offensive team would have to rush onto the field as the clock started. This was a definite disadvantage to a team that was trying to come from behind late in the game. This year the clock will start on a change of possession, after the ball is snapped.
How did those rules affect the college game last year and will it make a difference this year when it comes to the pointspread? We commonly heard two theories when it came to these changes. First, it would affect scoring negatively. Second, it would hurt favorites as they would have less time and fewer plays to cover the number.
Did the rules hurt scoring? Yes. It seemed obvious that shortening the game by what amounted to 14 plays would push scoring downward. That was the case last year. Of the 119 Division 1A teams, 69 squads scored fewer points in 2007 than they did in 2005. Just 48 teams had a higher PPG scoring average and two stayed the same. Almost 59 percent of the teams in college football last year had a lower PPG average than they did in 2005. Expect more scoring in 2007 as we revert back to the old rules.
Did the rules hinder favorites from covering the number in 2007? Not really. Last year the favorites posted an overall spread record of 336-350-16 (48.9 percent). The year before, favorites were 316-326-13 (49.2 percent). In 2004, the favorites were 316-339-2 (48.2 percent). In fact, college football favorites have been above 50 percent for the season just once in the last seven years (in 2003). Last year’s numbers fell right in line with where they have been historically.
How about big favorites? The rules must have hurt them? Maybe a little bit. Double-digit favorites last year came in at a 47.8 percent clip compare with an average of just over 50 percent over the last seven years. Since 1980, favorites of -10 or more have covered at exactly a 50 percent clip (measured over 6,716 games).
Even bigger favorites must have struggled? Not really. In fact, it was just the opposite. Favorites of three TD’s or more were 59-54-2 last year (52.2 percent). Since 2000, those same favorites (-21 or higher) hit at 51.3 percent and since 1990 came in a clip of 50.3 percent. Stepping it up a notch to four TD favorites or higher, we actually see they've covered at a much better rate last season than before. Last year, favorites of -28 or more were 31-21-1, or almost 60 percent. Historically, four-TD-or-higher favorites have come in at a 50.7 percent spot since 2000 and only 48.9 percent since 1990. The “perceived” problem with the favorites covering at a reduced rate really never came to fruition.
Bottom line is, there might be some more scoring in 2007, but no real revelations when it comes to finding any pointspread golden nuggets.
To visit this online sportsbook got to MySportsbook.com for all your bet on college football needs. Mysportsbook.com online sportsbook accepts Visa and Mastercard credit cards.
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