Maddux Sports Blog

Olympic Bet of the Day – Yesterday didn’t go particularly well – the biathlon favorite limped to a pathetic 17th place finish. Unimpressed. That means that I am down $25 after two days based on betting $100 per day. Today we are going to go with the most powerful sprint of the games – the men’s 500m long track speedskating. These guys are beasts. This is a wide open field with eight or more guys that are potential winners. I’m going to split my $100 evenly between two racers this team. Canada’s Jeremy Wotherspoon is the home field hero, and he presents decent value as the favorite at 7/2. Two Koreans named Lee are the second choice at 4/1, but I’m going to look past them and take a Japanese skater as my second choice – Keiichiro Nagashima is at 11/2. A win from either would pay off nicely.

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I thought it was the Pro Bowl that was cursed with a ridiculous number of injuries, but now it seems as if it is just all-star games in general this year. The Pro Bowl had more than 30 players who were chosen but didn’t show up, and most were due to real or fake injuries. Now the NBA All-Star game seems to have almost as many. Today, both Allen Iverson and Kobe Bryant informed the league that they would be unable to play (incidentally, the loss of Bryant caused the line to move half a point – the West is now favored by 1.5). They join an impressive list of players on the sidelines, including two other Western guards besides Bryant – Brandon Roy and Chris Paul. Monta Ellis was originally going to replace Bryant, but he’s out with a leg injury as well. On the Eastern side Derrick Rose is questionable.  It’s a curse, I tell you.

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News of note as we head into an uncharacteristically slow weekend of sporting action:

Minnesota Vikings’ fans are not going to be happy. The NFL has admitted today that the play in which Favre hurt his ankle in the third quarter was called incorrectly. Favre threw an interception on the play, though New Orleans didn’t score on the subsequent play. The league has now said that the play should have resulted in a penalty because Favre was hit from behind, and that the Vikings should have had a first down on the New Orleans 19. At the very least, then, they would have wound up with a field goal, and that would have made all the difference. Though I don’t disagree with what the league said, I really have to wonder why they bother saying anything now – unless they have interest in driving Minnesota fans insane.

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I just was looking at the Stanley Cup future odds. The Chicago Blackhawks are at 12/1. They are obviously a long way from a lock, but I like that price. At least in comparison to the other power teams in the conference I do – the Sharks and Wings have both looked vulnerable at time (San Jose is in the tank right now), yet they are at 3/1. I like the young talent that Chicago has, I love their coaching, and I think that they are ready for a deep run. In the East I think it will be either Washington (9/1) or Boston (11/2) that makes it through.

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