Bowyer edges Truex Jr. for pole in first Chase race

Autoracing Betting Lines

09/15/2007 - Loudon, NH (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Clint Bowyer won the pole for the opening round of the 10-race "Chase for the Nextel Cup" at the New Hampshire International Speedway. The No.07 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet driver will start out front for Sunday's Sylvania 300 after posting a best lap of 29.206 seconds (130.412 m.p.h.) around the 1.058-mile oval.

It was his second pole victory of the season and second of his Cup career. He also won the pole at Darlington in May. Both poles were in races where the COT was used.

"I wasn't a big fan of these things (Car of Tomorrow) starting out, but I'm becoming a fan," said Bowyer. "Our track record is pretty good with this car and it's going to be a big part of the Chase."

Starting alongside Bowyer will be Martin Truex Jr., who put up a time of 29.241 seconds.

"The car was really, really good in race trim, better than the car we had before," said Truex Jr., who finished third in the July race at NHIS.

Kurt Busch (29.296) and series points leader and defending series champion Jimmie Johnson (29.344) will start in row two. All four drivers in the first two rows are "Chase" drivers.

There are 12 drivers in the "Chase" and all 12 could realistically be champion.

Johnson, who finished the regular season in fourth place, will begin the 10- race "Chase" with the most points by virtue of his series-leading six victories. The defending series champion started the season strong, slumped a bit in the summer, but has returned to form with two consecutive wins at California and Richmond. He appears ready in every phase of the game.

"It's a great feeling to be able to go into the Chase leading the points," said Johnson. "That's something you obviously want to do, not only from the points standpoint, but from a psychological standpoint it's a benefit for sure."

Johnson's Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jeff Gordon, the four-time series champion, will start with the second-most points - 20 less than the No.48 Chevrolet team. Gordon, starting 18th, has led the series for 21 of 26 weeks and his 21 top-10s are by far the best in Nextel Cup.

Two-time series champion Tony Stewart will start with 30 points fewer than Johnson, but that shouldn't matter if Stewart continues to run as he has for most of the summer and into the fall. The No.20 Joe Gibbs Racing Chevrolet driver began the season with a 43rd-place finish in Daytona and didn't get his first win until July, but since that point he has been a force to be reckoned with. Since the race in Chicagoland, Stewart has earned three wins among seven top-10s in eight races. He will start sixth on the grid.

Carl Edwards (starting 11th) and Busch will begin the "Chase" 40 points behind Johnson, but both drivers have the ability and the teams behind them to win it all. Edwards and his No.99 Roush Fenway Racing Ford team have come on strong winning twice since mid-June. Busch was in danger of not making the "Chase" at all before the team came together in June. While others saw their chances melt away in the summer heat, Busch has not finished worse than 11th in a race in two months. Included in that streak are wins at Pocono and Michigan.

There are six drivers who will start 50 points behind the leader. Denny Hamlin (starting 14th), Truex Jr., 2003 Nextel Cup champion Matt Kenseth (30th), Kyle Busch (12th), Jeff Burton (23rd) and 2007 Daytona 500 winner Kevin Harvick (eighth). All six could win the title if things break their way. Hamlin, Stewart's teammate at JGR, has been the most consistent with one win, 10 top-fives and 15 top-10s.

Even Bowyer, the only driver in the "Chase" without a win, has the team, talent and speed to win it all. Bowyer will have two teammates in the "Chase" with him in Burton and Harvick which should help all three challenge for the championship.

The green flag is set to drop on Sunday at 2 p.m. (et).

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Online Sportsbook Football Betting

Why Sports Betting is so much fun?

Betting Sports

The most popular sports to bet on are NFL and college football along with NBA and NCAA basketball. There are multiple betting opportunities within those sports, beginning with the basic wager on a game’s outcome (also called betting the side). College Football Point spreads are used in both football and basketball in an attempt to even the attractiveness of each team in a match-up. ( See our article detailing how and why point spreads are made)

But you could also simply bet on the money line, or straight-up winner of the game. Oddsmakers use the money line so that more money must be risked on the favorite or expected winner and less money on the underdog to balance the action on both sides. While money line gambling is an attractive option for football and basketball bettors who only care about picking a winner, it is the primary option for those bettors who enjoy wagering on MLB baseball and individual sports like boxing, tennis, golf and racing events such as NASCAR. ( More details on playing the Money Line)

Points (or Runs) Scored

Another bet across all major team sports including football, basketball, baseball, and hockey involves wagering on the amount of scoring in a game, called an Over/Under total. For example, the Over/Under total on Super Bowl XXXIX was 48, which means a bettor could wager whether there would be more or less than 48 points scored by both teams combined in the game.

The final score of Super Bowl XXXIX was 24-21; the scoring of both teams added up to 45, which means the game went Under . So Under bettors won, and Over bettors lost.

Future Bets

Sports gambling doesn’t end there. Betting sides and totals are the most common wagers available everywhere, but many sportsbooks also offer future bets on big upcoming events like who will win next year’s Super Bowl and what movie will win Best Picture at the Academy Awards.

The main advantage of futures is that you can get appealing odds by betting far in advance. For example, with NFL futures you often can get much higher odds on a team by betting before the season even starts. A NFL future bet on a team to win the Super Bowl odds might be 20/1 in the preseason; but by midseason, their odds might decrease to 10/1 if they turn out to be legitimate championship contenders.

Proposition Bets (or Prop Bets)

Proposition bets , also known as prop bets, focus upon the more exotic aspects of a game and are generally reserved for events that are widely televised. Prop bets are extremely popular when it comes to wagering on the Super Bowl in Las Vegas. The Imperial Palace Casino’s sportsbook is well-known for the enormous number of prop bets offered. For example, you can bet on:

Types of Bets

Straight Bet

Involves one individual wager, whether it be on your team to cover the point spread, to win the game straight-up on the money line, or to go over/under the total.

Sports Betting Parlays

A parlay is a single bet that links together two or more individual wagers and is dependent on all of those wagers winning together. The benefit of the parlay bet is much better odds than placing each individual bet separately since the difficulty of hitting it is much higher.

Standard payoffs on a two-team parlay are 13/5; while a three-teamer pays 6/1; and a four-teamer 10/1.

Parlay cards are also fairly common in sportsbooks and popular with bettors, as they are released early in the week with set odds that do not change in return for a slightly lower payoff.

Round Robin Betting

Adventurous bettors who enjoy betting parlays sometimes put together a series of parlays called a Round Robin . A three-team Round Robin consists of one three-team parlay and three two-team parlays. For example, Joe likes teams A,B,C – with a Round Robin he has a three-teamer with ABC, and two-teamers with AB, AC, and BC.

Betting Teasers

Similar to a parlay, a teaser bet is a single bet that links together two or more individual wagers, but is different in that the point spread is adjusted to your advantage on each individual wager. In exchange for the points, you get less of a return on your bet compared to a parlay. For example, a 6-point teaser would move the line on a 7-point favorite from -7 to -1, meaning the team would have to cover 6 less points. Each of the individual wagers must win or the bet is a loss.

These are the main types of sports bets available today. But as sports betting continues to grow, sportsbooks will continue to develop new and creative ways to bet. We’ll continue to track these changes to the sports gambling landscape, so check back often and we’ll tell you all about it!

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SPORTS BETTING: NFL Football Sportsbook Betting

NFL owners, already life's biggest winners, want to try their luck with the lottery.


That was the news out of their meetings last week, where team bosses voted unanimously to allow stamping state and local lottery tickets with franchise logos, if, ahem, any governments wanted to do a deal.

A shocker: Within days the Pats announced they'd be sponsoring the Massachusetts state lottery, the Skins said they'd slap their sticker on Virginia scratch-offs and the Ravens admitted they were talking to Maryland lottery bosses. In all likelihood, it won't be long before every team is a presenting sponsor of scratch-offs or just plain old pick fives. "The change in policy was approved 32-0," said NFL spokesman Greg Aiello. "So you can expect to see more deals soon."

It's a branding opportunity too big for the owners to ignore, and one a couple of dozen baseball franchises have enjoyed for years. The fact the NFL has been slower to act than those slack-brained Seligites is indicative of its complicated relationship with all forms of gambling. Consider this: Last Thursday, as the Pats and the Redskins finalized their new lottery deals, a lawyer representing the NFL argued before Delaware's Supreme Court that the state's newly signed sports betting law should be repealed.

The NFL betting is the face of opposition to sports gambling . And as much as it would like to share that responsibility with other leagues, that's not going to happen as long as more than 40% of all money legally wagered on games is bet on football. That's why the Brewers can do a multi-million dollar deal with a local casino, or the Celtics can make their own pact with the Mass lottery, and the response is, "Sweet, let's play." But when the NFL does it the stakes are higher, and everyone from NPR's Frank Deford to the Associated Press to the guys blogging at Deadspin will line up to play gotcha.

So I asked Aiello, who surely knew there'd be piling on, how the league can rail against being bait for sports bettors, then allow its franchises to be just that for lotteries, the most insidious and addictive form of gambling around. He emailed me this response: "We are not moral crusaders. NFL personnel are permitted to engage in legal forms of gambling, except for betting on NFL games. We are making a distinction here between the spread of gambling on the outcome of our games and supporting state lottery scratch-off games, that have nothing to do with the outcome of our games."

Here's where I should rip him. But, the thing is, he's right. Not to get Obama on you, but this is a complicated, nuanced issue. As much as lotteries are considered a tax on the poor, the NFL isn't a socially obligated government program -- it's just a business. Scratch-off's help the bottom line, sports betting doesn't. Now, it's okay to call the league hypocritical when it releases injury reports, which players have told me only helps bettors … But when it supports other forms of gaming? Big Deal.

Now, it's okay to call the league hypocritical when it releases injury reports, which players have told me only helps bettors. And it's okay to mutter something obscene when the league pretends gambling doesn't help drive TV ratings and fan interest and put money in owners' pockets. But when it supports other forms of gaming? Big Deal. The Bears should put an orange "C" on every deck of cards dealt at Harrah's in Joliet; the Eagles should slap their logo on roulette wheels at the Borgata in Atlantic City; the Dolphins should hold training camp at the El San Juan in Puerto Rico.

Seriously.

The NFL's problem, when it comes to the gambling world, isn't hypocrisy, it's worse: The bosses lack vision. That's why the league is picking unwinnable fights in Delaware and taking pot shots from critics after making smart sponsorship deals. Roger Goodell and his gang are acting and thinking locally rather than globally, which is rare for them, especially compared to their professional (and amateur) counterparts.

The NBA held its All Star game in Las Vegas and David Stern's kingdom didn't crumble (although the town did bring plenty of players to their knees.) I'd say it's 6 to 5 and pick 'em that Lebron will make a road swing through Sin City before his career is over.

Even the NCAA College Football Betting is more progressive on this issue than the NFL. Several years ago Rachel Newman Baker, college sports' gambling czar, opened a dialogue with Vegas bookmakers to learn about how they do business. She's visited Nevada sports books, studied their operations and listened to how they regulate action. Now she knows she can expect a call from bookmakers, who lose money when sports are fixed, if they think something sketchy is going on in NCAA games. She's not in favor of sports betting, but, as she once told me, "I know it's not going away, either."

The NFL can't seem to accept that. And until it can find peace with the idea, it'll get flack, even when it's right.

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