Bulls draw closer to playoffs with thumping of Philadelphia

Basketball Betting Lines

04/09/2009 - Chicago, IL (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Tyrus Thomas and Ben Gordon each scored 24 points as Chicago inched closer to a playoff berth with a 113-99 victory over slumping Philadelphia.

Derrick Rose added 16 points and eight assists, Brad Miller scored 15 points with six assists off the bench and John Salmons donated 14 points for the Bulls, who currently sit seventh in the Eastern Conference and can clinch a playoff spot with a Charlotte loss on Friday night in Oklahoma City.

Andre Miller led the Sixers with 20 points, Andre Iguodala added 19 points, 10 assists and seven rebounds and Lou Williams gave instant offense off the bench with 16 points. The Sixers have already made the playoffs but have lost three straight and five of eight overall.

Philadelphia clamped down defensively and spurted out to a 29-22 lead after one quarter following a Miller jumper and Green reverse layup to conclude the scoring. The Bulls deep bench and renewed defensive intensity flipped the momentum in the second stanza.

The Sixers held three 10-point edges in the period, but the Bulls took a two- point lead at 48-46 following 10 straight points in just over two minutes. Rose's slam and transition layup off a turnover bookended a scoring stretch that also included a Miller hook shot and a pair of Gordon threes.

The teams went into the locker in a 50-50 dead heat.

Philadelphia scored seven of the first nine points out of the locker room for a 57-52 margin but the Bulls charged back with a 13-4 stretch that included seven straight points at one point. A Gordon three followed by four points from Thomas opened the 65-61 advantage.

Chicago kept its foot on the accelerator, using some long-distance shooting from Salmons then inside buckets from Joakim Noah and Thomas to hold a 74-65 edge with 3:07 left in the period. Thomas calmly sank four free throws later in the quarter to make the difference 78-67 and the Bulls took an 82-72 lead into the final 12 minutes of game action.

Chicago ramped up its energy even higher and extended an already double-digit lead to 20 points at 105-85 on a Rose jumper that capped off a 14-3 stretch. The Bulls never looked back from there.

Game Notes

The Bulls shot 52.4 percent from the floor and made all 19 of their free-throw attempts...The Sixers connected on 52.1 percent of their shots, but made only 16-of-27 free throws...The clubs split four meetings this season.

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SPORTS BETTING - Tennis is an underrated and under-utilized bettors' sport.

Ten years ago, at just about this time, I called Alan Boston in Vegas and left him a voicemail that went something like this (abridged version): "Hey Alan, Chad Millman from ESPN The Magazine calling. I want to do a book about wise guys, you in?"

A couple weeks later I got a message back (abridged version): "I don't know, maybe," Boston said. "Call me and we'll talk about it. But not later today. I got $1,000 on Andre Agassi to win the French Open at 40-1, and he's in the finals."

Here's what happened next (abridged version): Agassi won his tourney. Boston won his $40,000. I wrote sportsbook.

In the ten years since, how much has been wagered on the big-time tennis events? Put it this way: The Nevada Gaming Commission doesn't even track the number year by year because it's so small.

"Tennis makes up about one-tenth of one percent of our take," says Lucky's bookmaking boss Jimmy Vaccaro. "The last big golf major we probably had $100,000 worth of bets. In tennis, we might have written two big tickets."

Tennis' lack of popularity amongst the American bettoratti is no surprise, really. For starters, the biggest sports betting holidays -- the Super Bowl, the NCAA tourney -- are must see TV. People, at least the degenerates I know, plan vacations around watching those events in Vegas sports books.

But Wimbledon? Doesn't exactly reel in the whales. "Seriously, it's the nuts as an event," says Boston. "But who even knows when it's on?"

Here's another reason that helps explain why golf gets traction, something I call "The Bubbe Theory." My Bubbe is pushing 95 and has cataracts so bad that, to her, even the most crystalline Chicago day is mostly cloudy. But she still listens to the Cubs games, and she still calls me in a fit if she disagrees with something Rick Telander writes in the Chicago Sun Times. She's a sports fan. If she doesn't know you, you're just filling a niche. And niche players, even historically good ones like Roger and Raf, don't drive betting volume. Only the highest profile names attract square money, which inflates wagering totals like a shot of saline to the lips. Bubbe, and the public, loved Agassi, tennis' last cross-the-rubicon, mainstream draw. She also has a crush on Tiger. She's given me standing orders to put a sawbuck on the big cat whenever I walk through a sports book (or mistakenly tap into one via my Internet machine.) That explains why the Masters is getting $100K in action at some books while the four tennis majors might not get that combined this year.

This isn't a case of tennis being a difficult sport to bet. In fact, in Europe, it's probably the second most popular sport for gambling after soccer. Granted, as the WSJ football betting last week and The Mag's Shaun Assael examined in even greater depth last year, that might be because gamblers across the pond see it as an easy game to fix. But it could also be because, over there it holds the kind of sway the big two do over here.

Street corners in Spain are peppered with public courts and kids doing their best Raffy impressions. In some war torn parts of Eastern Europe poverty-stricken kids view tennis as an escape route, like football or basketball here. A couple years ago The Mag's Lindsay Berra wrote a great piece about Belgrade's Jelena Jankovic, Ana Ivanovic and Novak Djokovic. They learned the game as kids while bombs were raining down on their homeland. They practiced in drained swimming pools. Not exactly Nick Bolletierri conditions.

In the United States, casual fans think tennis is played four times a year. But on the tightly packed European continent, national interest in homegrown talent runs deep every weekend. Of the ATP's current top 20 players, only two, tennis betting and James Blake, are American. Fourteen are from Europe, representing six different countries.

No wonder fans from Lisbon to Bhudapest get jacked up for the net game, whether it's Wimbledon or a low-level tourney like the Estoril Open in Portugal (congrats to Spain's Albert Montanes for winning that one, btw). Chances are good that someone representing their flag will not only be playing, but have a shot at winning.

And that's all any bettor can ask for.

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