Performance-enhancers and the NBA

Basketball Betting Lines

02/12/2009 - Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - I know we are on the eve of NBA All-Star weekend, a time that's supposed to be a celebration of the game, unless Pacman Jones happens to be in town.

But, as the resident negativo here at The Sportsbook Betting Lines, I'm going to have to take the time All-Star weekend affords to examine why the NBA gets a free pass on the steroids issue.

Most of it stems from lack of education.

In fact, "steroids" are just a narrow part of the performance-enhancing drugs trade. When most people think steroids, they picture a thickly muscled bodybuilder or pro wrestler. But, understand that athletes use different performance enhancers for different reasons.

In the predetermined world of professional wrestling, guys are training for a look. In cycling, perhaps the most tainted sport of them all, they are training for endurance. Heck, Human Growth Hormone, which is all the rage among Hollywood's elite and the sports world's highest-paid, isn't even a steroid.

People just don't understand how a skinny guy like Floyd Landis or an obese blob like NFL defensive tackle Grady Jackson could be using performance- enhancers.

So, while sitting through the torture of yet another "five-minute pit stop" at our local Pinewood Derby last Saturday, I was awakened out of my stupor by a series of rapid texts.

Everyone was trying to inform me that my old friend from Minneapolis, Selena Roberts, decided to play single white female...I mean Pedro Gomez...to Alex Rodriguez and released the results of the perennial All-Star's obvious chemical past.

My cell was blowing up, and most of the messages expressed utter shock.

Remember, Alex was the one with the cape that was going to clean up all of baseball's mistakes and make the home run record pure again. Of course, Ken Griffey Jr. would have gotten there first if he didn't tear a muscle every time he rolled out of bed, but I digress.

My thoughts were a little different.

It's not like I have a problem suspending my disbelief. I know Matt Damon isn't really Jason Bourne and Daniel Craig isn't 007 but for the two hours I am in that movie theatre, I believe. I'm even a big wrestling fan and there is nothing better than watching Adam "Edge" Copeland and Randy Orton at the top of their games.

But, Alex Rodriguez - clean?

I was always taught that if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck...it's probably a duck. The fact that A-Rod looks more equipped to play middle linebacker than, say, Ray Lewis, should have probably been a dead giveaway.

Everybody, and I mean everybody, is tied to some kind of performance-enhancer in Donald Fehr's world. In fact, I think you get a free cycle when you pay your union dues.

So, now we know...baseball is filthy and football isn't far behind but what about basketball?

Surely, the NBA is clean. I mean why would basketball players need to look like Triple H or be as powerful as Shawne Merriman?

Well, that thinking is rather specious and narrow-minded.

The great basketball players draw from a wide variety of athletic gifts. They need strength, speed, quickness and endurance to excel and guess what?...There are a whole host of performance-enhancing drugs able to deliver that.

Tune into NBA TV and watch some of those classic games from the 1980s. Look at players like Michael Cooper and Andrew Toney as opposed to their peers from today's game. The change in body types is every bit as striking as in Major League Baseball.

Cooper was a rail-thin defensive specialist, maybe the best pure on-ball defender of his generation. His thin frame would be abused on the low blocks today.

Toney, meanwhile, was a natural scorer that used a lethal combination of quickness and strength to morph into "The Boston Strangler." In today's game, "Android the Scoring Machine" would be an undersized two-guard.

The movie just ended for me.

The house lights are on and my eyes are wide open.

How about you?

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Betting the NFL preseason

Rule No. 1 in the gamblers' handbook states, "Avoid sports betting on meaningless games."

When you're drowning in a sea of baseball monotony, however, things change. Even a hint of pro football betting can persuade the most disciplined bettor to break a few rules. 

The NFL preseason is around the corner, with a tempting Hall of Fame match kicking off on Sunday. But bettors must stay vigilant. Wagering on NFL exhibition games is an entirely different beast than the regular season. Most fans don't recognize the players on the field because starters get as much action in August as Warcraft fans get on Prom night.

The only certainty about the NFL this time of year is uncertainty – and yet there are some who say betting in August can be a gold mine.

“I actually feel the NFL preseason presents solid profit opportunities for sharp bettors and handicappers,” Sports Expert Steve Merril explains. “My experience has been that the sportsbooks fear the preseason, which is evident by lower limits and massive moves.”

The line moves are attributed to the limited knowledge available regarding playing-time distribution. One team’s top unit out on the field for one more series has an impact on the pointspread. Setting lines in the preseason often is a shot in the dark.

“We base the betting lines mostly on public perception,” Pete Korner, founder of the Sports Club in Las Vegas, says. “It’s very tough to predict, almost a guessing game.”

The preseason is all about figuring out who’s in and for how long.

“It becomes a race between bettors and oddsmakers to find out how long the quarterbacks are going to stay in,” Korner admits. “If a sharp gets the information first, he could exploit an early line. I’m a full believer in moving the line in the preseason if the books find out something late in the week.”

Determining what each team’s motive is can help bettors handicap. To do this you must pay close attention to the philosophies head coaches employ in exhibition play.

“You need to know what a coach is trying to accomplish,” says Covers Expert Bryan Leonard. “Sometimes a new coach will want to instill a winning attitude. Others just want to make sure their starters don’t get hurt."

So how do you distinguish who’s playing scared and who’s playing for keeps?

“Head coaches on the hot seat or new coaches trying to implement a winning attitude usually try harder to win in the preseason,” Merril says.

Cleveland Browns head coach Romeo Crennel fits this criteria. He’s entering his third season as the sideline boss and has yet to lead the Browns to more than six wins.

Cleveland is an enticing bet as well because of the unresolved quarterback situation. General manager Phil Savage sacrificed the Browns’ first-round pick in next year’s draft for Brady Quinn, but the former Notre Dame quarterback hasn’t signed or reported to training camp yet.

Charlie Frye and Derek Anderson split time at QB last season and it looks like either player (or even Quinn) could be the opening-day starter.

“If a team has quarterback depth and the pecking order hasn’t been decided, it’s a big advantage,” Leonard says.

Even in the third week of the preseason when starters generally play the most, the final outcome of the game is in the hands of fringe players. A team's talent, all the way down to the last man on the roster, is something to consider.

The New England Patriots have long been considered one of the deeper teams in the NFL and coach Bill Belichick has said in the past he’s unafraid of stars getting hurt in games with nothing on the line. He shocked his colleagues in 2003 by playing some of his starters on special teams in the preseason.

“We want to have the team ready to play a tough, physical game and preparation has to go into that and I imagine a certain amount of injuries go with it,” Belichick told the Providence Journal in August 2003.

Bettors can only hope to find more teams that share the Pats' business-like approach to the preseason (New England is 17-9-3 against the spread since 2000) and take advantage of teams who detest the exhibition schedule.

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