First-place Padres continue trek with trip to Chicago

Baseball Betting Lines

08/16/2010 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - After winning a tough series against their division rivals over the weekend, the National League West-leading San Diego Padres will resume a 10-game road trip tonight with the first of four straight games against the Chicago Cubs from Wrigley Field.

San Diego just won two of three matchups in San Francisco to push its lead atop the division standings to 3 1/2 games ahead of the Giants. In Sunday's 8-2 victory at AT&T Park, Wade LeBlanc limited the hosts to a pair of runs and four hits in seven innings for the win, while both Joe Thatcher and Ernesto Frieri tossed a scoreless inning of relief.

Yorvit Torrealba homered and Miguel Tejada ended 3-for-4 with two RBI and a run scored for San Diego, which has won six of its last seven games and outhit the Giants by an 11-4 margin.

"Before we came here, we told each other that no matter what happens in this series we still have to keep playing good ball," Tejada said on the team's website. "We're going to keep playing the way we're playing."

The Padres will also visit Milwaukee for three games on this trek and are slated to send Kevin Correia to the mound on Monday. Correia has won two straight and four of his last five starts. and is coming off last Wednesday's 8-5 win over Pittsburgh in which he gave up four runs over 6 1/3 innings with seven K's. The right-hander improved to 9-7 to go along with a 4.86 ERA in 22 starts.

Correia is still searching for his first career win over the Cubs, as evidenced by his 0-2 record and 7.50 ERA in seven games (3 starts). He's 4-2 in nine starts away from the Petco Park mound this season.

Chicago just completed a seven-game road trip through San Francisco and St. Louis with a 3-4 mark and won the last two portions of a three-game set against the Cardinals over the weekend.

The Cubs, who will now begin a seven-game homestand versus the Padres and Braves, recorded a 9-7 win in yesterday's series finale in St. Louis. Derrek Lee homered twice and Koyie Hill knocked in a pair of runs for the Cubs, who posted six runs in the fourth inning and won for only the fourth time in the past 18 tries.

Chicago starter Ryan Dempster lasted 6 2/3 innings and yielded two runs on five hits. He also struck out six and walked two to improve to 7-7 over 44 career appearances (18 starts) against St. Louis.

"To be able to come away with a 'W', it was nice," Dempster said. "It was a good series, it was a good road trip for us. We went 1-3 in San Francisco and had a chance to win every single game, and we came here and won two of three against a really tough team."

Marcos Mateo was roughed up for four runs in two-thirds of an inning in relief of Dempster, but Carlos Marmol got the final two outs of the game for his 21st save.

Tom Gorzelanny draws the start for the Cubs in Monday's series opener with San Diego and is 0-1 with a 5.59 earned run average in his last three starts -- all Chicago losses -- since a personal four-game win streak. Gorzelanny did not figure into the decision of last Wednesday's 5-4 loss at San Francisco, as he was reached for four runs and eight hits in six innings to remain at 6-6 in 23 games (17 starts) in 2010.

Gorzelanny, a left-hander, will face San Diego for the fourth time in his career tonight and is 1-2 with a 4.24 ERA over the previous three starts.

The Padres and Cubs are meeting for the first time since San Diego took five of nine matchups a year ago. San Diego, however, was swept in three games at Wrigley Field from May 12-14, 2009 and is winless in its past five visits to the Windy City.

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Horse Betting

(This is an update of a sportsbook for the May 4th issue of ESPN The Magazine).

The Kentucky Derby's post-position draw happened on Wednesday. And, as is always the case, shortly afterwards, a buzz raced around Churchill Downs. It was a low rumble at first, nothing that the squares in the mint julep crowd pick up right away. But by the time the sun set over the twin spires, the chatter was impossible to ignore. Everyone -- sharps, trainers, owners -- was talking about one thing: the wise guy horse, the pre-draw long shot us mopes didn't have on our radar until it was too late.

"You think you're hearing the scoop," says handicapper Lane Gold. "Then you get to the window, the odds are short, and you missed it."

Recognizing a wise-guy horse early is as hard as picking a Derby bonnet. That's because handicappers don't like hype (see ya, I Want Revenge). They want Thoroughbreds who look good losing prep races like the Santa Anita Derby. They eye horses who ate up the field after starting wide or made an easy transition from synthetic tracks to dirt. They look for ponies who showed muscle gain race to race and those who ran hard after several weeks' rest.

"A wise guy," says John Avello, a bookmaker at Wynn Las Vegas, "looks for a horse who can improve."

When I first wrote Horse Betting for The Mag, which I turned in a three weeks before Wednesday's draw, I predicted these three horses had wise guy potential:

CHOCOLATE CANDY (15-1 in mid-April, currently 20-1 according to Avello): His second-place finish at Santa Anita, following a seven-week layoff, proved two things: He can run after resting, and -- by losing a high-profile prep race -- he wouldn't be overhyped.

DESERT PARTY (15-1; 15-1): He was upset in the UAE Derby by a horse he had beaten twice. The public remembers his loss, but the wise guys his wins.

PIONEEROF THE NILE (8-1; 4-1): The big favorite at Santa Anita struggled to win, so he initially got less hype than Quality Road and I Want Revenge.

You may have noticed that the odds on Pioneerof the Nile have been cut in half, from 8-1 to 4-1. Which means the wise guys took a shine to him long before the post-position draw. But, to be honest, this is one of those years with four elite horses getting everyone's attention, squares and sharps alike.

"You're not gonna get a lot of chatter about a horse that isn't in that group, which includes Pioneer, I Want Revenge, Dunkirk and Friesan Fire," Avello told me Wednesday. "We don't have a group of horses behind those top four who look like real legit contenders."

Come Derby week, the final two elements in picking a wise guy horse are how he's working out and what gate he's coming out of.

(By the way, picking a Preakness favorite is a whole different bale of hay, partially based on how horses finish in the Derby. You can see my analysis of who has the best shot at Pimlico on Insider Sunday morning.)

Well, early in the week I Want Revenge, Pioneerof the Nile and Friesan Fire were working out better than anyone. Some thought Friesan Fire, currently 6-1, might have run too fast, burning a five-furlong run in :57 4/5. "When you are running that fast you have the sense that it took something out of him," says Gold. "The Derby is longer than any horse has run, and if they need that extra surge you worry they won't have it because they burned it in the workout."

But, Gold points out, Friesan Fire's trainer is Larry Jones, Two years ago his horse Hard Spun did a five-eighths workout in :57 3/5 and then went on to finish second, behind Street Sense, in the Derby. "Every trainer has different methods," says Gold. "And clearly he knows what he's doing."

Now, as for starting position, Gold says to remember this: Churchill Downs traditionally has 14 starting gates. For the Derby, it brings out auxiliary gates and between the original 14th gate and the new 15th gate, there is a little more space than there is between gates 1-14. "That 15 position will give you a precious second or two to sort out what's happening to your inside," says Gold. "Sixteen is also okay because you can follow the horse in front of you."

Dunkirk, one of the race favorites, is coming out of gate 15. In 16 is Baffert's Pioneerof the Nile. I Want Revenge drew 13, where Smarty Jones won from in 2004, and Friesan Fire picked the sixth position. "He doesn't have a lot of speed to the inside of him," says Gold. "So he will get a clear shot to be near the front."

All the jibber-jabber means this: Pioneerof the Nile has leapfrogged from 8-1 to being the second favorite, along with Dunkirk, behind I Want Revenge. Meanwhile, Friesan Fire, with a good trainer, a strong week of training and a decent post position, is still at 6-1. "By Saturday, it's possible he could go from fourth to the favorite," says Gold.

In other words, meet Friesan Fire, your 2009 wise guy horse.

"Now," says Avello, "it's time for action."

To visit this horse betting site go to MySportsbook.com for all your horse racing betting needs.

What Is the Point Spread?

What are Sports Betting Point Spreads?

In any football or basketball game (the main sports that use point spreads) there are two teams playing against each other.

Those teams, though, are rarely exactly evenly matched – meaning that typically one team has a better chance than the other to win the game. If bettors were allowed to bet on who was simply going to win the game, smart ones would obviously bet on the better team (likely winning more than 50% of the time in the process).

If winning were that easy the Las Vegas and online sportsbooks would stop taking any bets! This is where the point spread comes in: the basic function of the point spread is to balance the likelihood of each team “winning” by adjusting the final score by the point spread. After this adjustment is made you get the Against The Spread result (ATS result for short).

Let’s look at Super Bowl XXXIX, New England Patriots vs. Philadelphia Eagles. Most people believed the defending champ Patriots to be the better team – so if betting were simply based upon which team would win the game, an uneven majority of people would have wagered on New England. But, by using the point spread, the bookmakers adjusted the terms of the bet, evening the proposition so about half the people believed the Pats to be the smart bet, while the other half considered Philly to be the smart bet.

How to Read Point Spreads

New England Patriots -7 vs. Philadelphia Eagles

The better team, called the Favorite, is expected to win the game and must “give” or “lay” points to the weaker team. The favorite is listed with a minus sign and the number of points they are favored by (e.g., New England -7)

In the case of our example, New England must not only win the game, but they must win by more than 7 points for Pats bettors to have a winning ATS result. An Eagles bettor wins his bet either if:

To visit this internet sportsbook go to MySportsbook.com for all your football betting and World Series odds.