Woods to play with Rose in first two rounds of British Open

Golf Betting Lines

07/12/2010 - St. Andrews, Scotland (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Tiger Woods and Justin Rose, the world's top-ranked player and one of the hottest players in golf, respectively, will be paired together for the first two rounds of the 2010 British Open.

The 150th Anniversary Open will tee off from historic St. Andrews on Thursday.

Woods has won the last two Open Championships staged at St. Andrews, but has struggled for most of the 2010 season on the heels of his off-the-course issues that first surfaced last November. His two best finishes in just six starts this year came in the first two major championships -- tying for fourth at both the Masters and U.S. Open.

Rose, meanwhile, won Woods' tournament two weeks ago, the AT&T National in suburban Philadelphia, and also captured the Memorial Tournament last month with a tie for ninth in between at the Travelers Championship.

Joining Woods and Rose for the first two rounds will be Camilo Villegas. The trio will tee off at 9:09 a.m. local time (4:09 a.m. et) on Thursday and 2:20 p.m. local time (9:20 a.m. et) on Friday.

The first group of the tournament, starting at 6:30 a.m. local time (1:30 a.m. et) on Thursday, features 1999 Open champion Paul Lawrie, who came back from 10 shots on the final day to win at Carnoustie, as well as Thomas Levet and Steve Marino.

Defending Open champion Stewart Cink, who beat Tom Watson in a playoff last year at Turnberry, is paired with 2002 Open winner Ernie Els and Ian Poulter. They are scheduled to start at 8:42 a.m. local time (3:42 a.m. et) on Thursday and will play at 1:53 p.m. local time (8:53 a.m. et) Friday.

Watson, the five-time winner of the Claret Jug, is back again and will play the first two rounds with 2007 and 2008 Open winner Padraig Harrington and Japanese teenager Ryo Ishikawa. The group will tee off Thursday directly after Woods' group at 9:20 a.m. local time (4:20 a.m. et).

Reigning Masters champion Phil Mickelson will try for his first British Open title and will play his opening two rounds with two-time U.S. Open winner Retief Goosen and European Ryder Cup captain Colin Montgomerie. They have a 2:20 p.m. local time (9:20 a.m. et) start on Thursday.

Graeme McDowell, who captured the U.S. Open title last month, will play with fellow U.S. Open champs Jim Furyk and Geoff Ogilvy, starting at 1:53 p.m. local time (8:53 a.m. et).

Steve Stricker, coming off his win at the John Deere Classic this past weekend, is paired with Sergio Garcia and Hiroyuki Fujita. They'll start at 2:09 p.m. local time (9:09 a.m. et) on Thursday.

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What Is the Point Spread?

What are Sports Betting Point Spreads?

In any football or basketball game (the main sports that use point spreads) there are two teams playing against each other.

Those teams, though, are rarely exactly evenly matched – meaning that typically one team has a better chance than the other to win the game. If bettors were allowed to bet on who was simply going to win the game, smart ones would obviously bet on the better team (likely winning more than 50% of the time in the process).

If winning were that easy the Las Vegas and online sportsbooks would stop taking any bets! This is where the point spread comes in: the basic function of the point spread is to balance the likelihood of each team “winning” by adjusting the final score by the point spread. After this adjustment is made you get the Against The Spread result (ATS result for short).

Let’s look at Super Bowl XXXIX, New England Patriots vs. Philadelphia Eagles. Most people believed the defending champ Patriots to be the better team – so if betting were simply based upon which team would win the game, an uneven majority of people would have wagered on New England. But, by using the point spread, the bookmakers adjusted the terms of the bet, evening the proposition so about half the people believed the Pats to be the smart bet, while the other half considered Philly to be the smart bet.

How to Read Point Spreads

New England Patriots -7 vs. Philadelphia Eagles

The better team, called the Favorite, is expected to win the game and must “give” or “lay” points to the weaker team. The favorite is listed with a minus sign and the number of points they are favored by (e.g., New England -7)

In the case of our example, New England must not only win the game, but they must win by more than 7 points for Pats bettors to have a winning ATS result. An Eagles bettor wins his bet either if:

To visit this internet sportsbook go to MySportsbook.com for all your football betting and World Series odds.

College Football Betting Tips From a Pro

While the NFL is the sport wagered on the heaviest, college football betting lines has become more and more popular as people realize it’s a game that can be beat. The NCAA football season gets longer each year with the addition of numerous bowl games and with that comes more opportunities for more money in your pocket, if handled correctly.

Betting on college football is not the same as with the NFL, so make sure you separate the two. Because of the vast number of teams, the parity between college football programs is slight and thus, you are going to see some high numbers in the NCAA. Teams favored by more than 40 points are not uncommon especially early in the season when teams playing their non-conference schedules.

The best advice when trying to tackle these enormous spreads and is to just stay away. A team that is favored by 40 points is favored by that many for a reason while teams getting 40 points are bad enough that they shouldn’t be touched. Set yourself a spread limit. Getting rid of these games will cut down on the number of contests that you need to handicap while staying away from backdoor or front-door covers.

What is a backdoor and front-door cover you ask? A backdoor cover is a team that is getting beat by more than the spread, but scores late to get within that number thus covering the spread. A front-door cover is just the opposite where the favorite scores late and covers the number they are favored by.

These front-door and backdoor covers are common when second and third string players enter games in college football and it can be the worst nightmare for some bettors. These players can also be your best friend, but ask any bettor and he will give you more instances on losing in this situation than winning. It just seems to work out that way even though everything evens out in the end.

College football betting has some of the softest lines of any sport and it’s being able to find these lines that will make you a successful college football handicapper. The NFL and NBA have the tightest lines around and while those sports can be beat by looking at situations and systems, college football doesn’t quite work that way. It’s much more manual, but when done correctly, it’s much more gratifying as well.

Getting into the nuts and bolts of college football means looking at the many stats in order to beat the number. As opposed to pro football, college football is less dependent on situations and angles and more on certain statistics. Rushing offense and defense, pass efficiency offense and defense and turnover margins are huge. These are vital in the NFL, but even more so when it comes to college football.

Being able to run the ball in college football has always been a key factor in the overall success of a team. The same adage also goes for teams who have the ability to stop the run. Putting these two factors together can produce some positive results in a team’s record both straight up and against the spread. These numbers show huge differences in teams and the spread may not take those into effect, which is where the value comes into play.

Passing yardage numbers both for and against can be a misinterpreted statistic. However, pass efficiency has always been one of the best ways to look at a teams’ passing game ability both offensively and defensively. But is it really a true indication of how they perform? I wouldn’t say so since they are raw passing numbers with nothing else taken into consideration.

I use pass efficiency ratings when doing my handicapping but I adjust my numbers based on a number of factors including power ratings, strength of schedules, personnel and injuries. This gives a much better picture of a team’s ability to pass effectively and also being able to defend the pass. Tweaking pass efficiency stats instead of raw passing yards is the key.

Turnovers are the single most frustrating, and at times the most gratifying, aspect of a college football lines, mostly because they are so unpredictable. They are part of the game and most of the time nothing can be done to control them. However, turnovers are contagious and they can carry over from game to game and season to season.

It’s important to know how to forecast these unforeseen events and how to use them to your advantage. You can find ways to give yourself an edge by looking at past histories of teams and coaches and how they have fared in turnover wars in the past. Instead of turnovers hurting you at the wrong times, find ways to use them to your advantage.

As you can see, college football handicapping is very labor intensive and isn’t just based on where teams are ranked in the AP and coaches polls. Experience, coaching and match-ups are all important since unlike the NFL, college teams turn over much more often with new personnel at most positions every single year. Keeping current on this information is vital.

Betting NCAA football can be lucrative if done correctly, but more importantly, it’s just plain enjoyable because it can be beat. College football is one of the best sports to watch with some of the best rivalries taking place in all of sports. The only downfall is that a championship isn’t decided on the field but on a computer-based system that is the Bowl Championship Series. That will change someday and we will all be better off for it.

To visit this online sportsbook got to MySportsbook.com for all your NCAA college football betting needs. Mysportsbook.com online sportsbook accepts Visa and Mastercard credit cards.