Angels top Rangers to break out of slide

Baseball Betting Lines

07/25/2010 - Arlington, TX (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Ervin Santana was on top of his game in eight solid innings on the hill, as the LA Angels of Anaheim pulled out a much- needed 6-2 win over the Texas Rangers in the third meeting of a four-game series between the American League West rivals.

Santana (9-7) came in with a 6.06 earned-run average in 16 career starts against the Rangers but silenced the division leaders to two runs on five hits and two walks, finishing with eight strikeouts.

Erick Aybar went 3-for-4 with a run scored and an RBI, Jeff Mathis went 2- for-4 with a solo homer and Alberto Callaspo drove in two runs for the Angels, who recorded 13 hits to help snap a three-game slide.

Michael Young and Nelson Cruz each belted a solo home run, while Scott Feldman (5-9) was touched for three runs on seven hits and a walk in 5 1/3 innings to take the loss for the Rangers, who had won consecutive one-run contests to start the series and still lead the Angels by six games.

The Angels left a pair in scoring position in the fourth, but broke a scoreless tie with two runs in the fifth. Mathis got things started by getting just enough of Feldman's 3-1 offering to clear the wall in left-center. Reggie Willits followed with a single and scored on Aybar's triple to right.

Feldman was pulled with one out and two on in the sixth, and Callaspo, in his second start with his new club since coming over from Kansas City in a trade, greeted reliever Alexi Ogando with an RBI single.

Young got the Rangers on the board with his third home run in as many games in the bottom half, but the Angels pulled away in the seventh.

Darren Oliver gave up three straight singles to start the seventh, the last a Maicer Izturis RBI hit to right. Bobby Abreu followed with a run-scoring double just inside the first-base bag and later scored on Callaspo's sacrifice fly.

Cruz's 13th homer of the year in the bottom half accounted for the final margin, as Fernando Rodney polished off Santana's gem with a scoreless ninth.

Game Notes

Santana came in with a 2.79 ERA in nine road starts this season...Feldman has not won since June 18, a span of six starts...The Angels had lost 10 of 13 at Rangers Ballpark since the start of last season...Texas still leads the season series, 5-3...The Angels will go for the series split on Sunday with Trevor Bell squaring off against undefeated Tommy Hunter.

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FOOTBALL BETTING : Crabtree's base deal: six years, $32 million

Football Betting

In 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.

NFL Betting Lines

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