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2010 Big 12 Conference Tournament PreviewNCAA Basketball Betting Lines03/09/2010 - Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Another year and another championship for Kansas, which captured its sixth straight Big 12 regular-season crown with a 15-1 finish. The No.1 ranked Jayhawks are the top-seed for the sixth time in the 14-year history of the Big 12 Tournament and they received a bye in the first round. Also earning first-round byes are Kansas State, Baylor and Texas A&M, as they all finished tied for second at 11-5. After the tie-breakers were worked out, the Wildcats landed the second seed followed by the Bears and Aggies. The Missouri Tigers will begin their title defense in the first round, as they placed fifth in the conference at 10-6. Texas and Oklahoma State tied for sixth at 9-7, with the Longhorns grabbing the sixth seed and the Cowboys the seventh. The bottom five teams all had losing records in the conference and were seeded accordingly. The winner of this annual event moves on to the NCAA Tournament with an automatic bid. The 14th-annual Big 12 Tournament gets underway at the Sprint Center on Wednesday, with the ninth-seeded Texas Tech Red Raiders clashing with the eighth-seeded Colorado Buffaloes. This is a rematch of Saturday's regular- season finale in which Colorado won a 101-90 shootout in Boulder. The Buffs won their last three games of the regular campaign, while the Red Raiders have dropped seven in a row heading into the postseason. Neither of these teams have won this tourney, and Texas Tech has captured both prior meetings with Colorado in the event. The fifth-seeded Missouri Tigers defend their title against 12th-seeded Nebraska in the second game of the first round. The Tigers, as the third seed, won their first-ever Big 12 Tournament championship last season and went on to the Elite Eight of the Big Dance. Missouri, which has posted back-to-back 10- win campaigns in the Big 12 for the first time since 1999-00, is 15-12 all- time in this event. This is the sixth time Missouri and Nebraska are meeting in the Big 12 Tournament, with the Huskers winning the last two encounters. The Huskers though, finished with a league-worst 2-14 mark and they are just 1-9 over their last 10 outings. Bitter rivals come together in the third game, as the 10th-seeded Oklahoma Sooners tussle with the seventh-seeded Oklahoma State Cowboys. One year removed from an outstanding campaign, the Sooners disappointed big time due to injuries and inconsistency, finishing just 4-12 within the conference. Oklahoma enters the postseason riding an eight-game losing streak and will need to win this event in order to avoid its first losing campaign since 1981. The Cowboys meanwhile, were the only Big 12 team to defeat Kansas, as they knocked off the top-ranked Jayhawks, 85-77, on February 27th. Oklahoma State features the Big 12 Player of the Year in James Anderson, who will try to carry the program to its first title in this tourney since 2005. First-round play wraps up with the sixth-seeded Texas Longhorns taking on the 11th-seeded Iowa State Cyclones. The Longhorns soared to No.1 in the nation at one point this season, but fell on hard times down the stretch and finished the regular campaign outside the Top 25. Still, Texas had enough to reach the 20-win plateau for the 11th straight season at 23-8 overall. The Longhorns are 17-13 all-time in this event and despite five championship game appearances, they have never won the title. Iowa State meanwhile, is coming off another poor showing with just a 4-12 mark within the conference. The Cyclones, however, ended a 21-game losing streak to ranked opponents with a triumph of Kansas State on Saturday. In 2000, Iowa State won this tourney, but it hasn't had much luck since. The top-ranked and top-seeded Kansas Jayhawks will make their tourney debut in the quarterfinals on Thursday, as they await the winner of Texas Tech/Colorado pairing. The Jayhawks are the face of the Big 12, having won or shared 10 of the 14 regular-season titles while capturing this tourney on six occasions. Kansas has won at least 11 games each season since in the inceptions of the Big 12 in 1996-97 and they have notched 15 league victories on four occasions. The Jayhawks, who are 29-2 overall, own a 25-7 record in this event, but had their run of three-straight titles stopped last season. Once the doormat of the Big 12, the fourth-seeded Texas A&M Aggies are now consistent contenders for a top finish. The Aggies earned a first-round bye for the third time in five years following a run in which they were never seeded higher than seventh. Texas A&M though, has only three wins in this event and that ranks last of any member. The Aggies, who have registered six straight 20-win campaigns, will tussle with the winner of the Nebraska/Missouri matchup. The quarterfinal round continues with second-seeded Kansas State hooking up with the survivor of the Oklahoma/Oklahoma State pairing. The No.2 seed is the program's highest in the Big 12 Championship, as Kansas State earned a first- round bye for the fourth straight season. The Wildcats 24 overall wins and 11 conference victories are their most since the 1987-88 campaign. The team, though, is just 7-13 all-time in this event and has yet to even reach the finals. The third-seeded Baylor Bears had a terrific run in this tourney last season and will collide with the victor of the Iowa State/Texas clash in the quarterfinals. As the ninth seed last season, the Bears played the role of giant-killer, advancing all the way to the finals before losing to Missouri. Baylor took that experience and applied it to this season, capturing 11 conference wins for the first time in Big 12 history. With that came the program's highest seed and first bye in this event.
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Mens NCAA Basketball Tournament odds Right behind the Gators are the 5th ranked UNC Tar Heels at 9-2. The Heels (21-3, 7-2) are absolutely loaded with top notch talent and are as deep as any team in the country. A concern for the Tar Heels might be inexperience. Of their top four scorers/ minute earners, three are freshmen and the other is a sophomore. The rest of the regular season, the Tar Heels play only one team that is currently ranked (Duke). Their remaining opponents do combine for an impressive 107-58 record though. Arizona 20-1 To visit this online sportsbook got to MySportsbook.com for all your Sportsbook betting needs.
FOOTBALL BETTING : Crabtree's base deal: six years, $32 millionIn the wake of the news that the 49ers have signed receiver Michael Crabtree after an extended holdout, there has been not a hint of the dollars to be paid to Crabtree. And since this means that his agent hasn't leaked the numbers, it means that his agent feels no specific motivation to do so. Possibly because his agent isn't all that thrilled to have his name on the deal. So the numbers will come from sources other than Crabtree's agent. And we've gotten our mitts into them. Per a league source, Crabtree has signed a six-year, $32 million contract. (The total includes guaranteed money, base salaries, and the one-time incentive based on achieving minimum playing time.) The deal also includes $17 million in guaranteed money. As reported elsewhere, the deal can void to five years based on performance triggers, wiping out a final year base salary of $4 million. But they won't be easily reached. The source tells us that, in his first four seasons (including 2009), Crabtree must either qualify for two Pro Bowls, or he must qualify for one Pro Bowl in one year and he must participate in 80 percent of the offensive snaps in a separate year in which the team makes the playoffs. In other words, if in 2010 he qualifies for the Pro Bowl and the team makes the playoffs and he participates in 80 percent of the snaps, he'll still need to make it to the Pro Bowl or achieve the 80-percent/playoffs in another season. Since the chances of Crabtree making the Pro Bowl or participating in 80 percent of the offensive snaps this year is roughly zero percent, he'll have three years to get it done. And it won't be easy. Frankly, he'll be hard pressed to make it to one Pro Bowl in three years with the likes of Larry Fitzgerald, Calvin Johnson, Anquan Boldin, Steve Smith, the other Steve Smith, Hakeem Nicks, DeSean Jackson, Johnny Knox, Percy Harvin, Greg Jennings, Roddy White, T.J. Houshmandzadeh in the same conference for sportsbook betting. So, by all appearances, it's a six-year deal. And at $17 million in guaranteed money, the per-year guarantee is a tepid $2.83 million per year. There's another problem with the deal -- it has no mid-tier incentive package. Instead, the additional $8 million that Crabtree can earn (pushing the max value to six years, $40 million) requires the kind of unrealistic, mega-star performances that no rookie is likely to ever achieve. So while the contract paid to Packers defensive tackle B.J. Raji covers five years and pays $22.5 million, he has the ability (if he's a solid player) to make up the difference between his base deal and Crabtree's five-year, $28 million haul via the mid-tier incentive package in Raji's deal. And unless Crabtree meets the performance thresholds necessary to void the sixth year, he'll be stuck under contract for another year at a base salary of only $4 million. There's one other area of concern with the deal. Crabtree, per the source, received no option bonus. Instead, he has significant money tied to a fairly new device known as a "discretionary salary advance," which unlike an opition bonus is subject to forfeiture if Crabtree decides in a year or two that he wants to hold out for a better deal. (We're also told that the 49ers have included language that would make certain escalators subject to forfeiture, too.) Meanwhile, the deal falls well short of the mark for which Crabtree and agent Eugene Parker were aiming -- the five-year, $38.25 million contract paid by the Raiders to receiver Darrius Heyward-Bey, the seventh overall pick in the draft. Even if Crabtree successfully voids the final year, he'll make more than $2 million per year less on average than Heyward-Bey. Thus, as we explained earlier in the day, this is a deal that Crabtree could have done in July, which would have given him a much better chance of making a contribution to the 49ers during his rookie year. So while the final outcome can be described as win-win, the broader view suggests that it's really a lose-lose situation. To visit this sportsbook go to MySportsbook.com for all your college football betting needs. |
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