Dodgers beat up Lilly, Cubs

Baseball Betting Lines

07/10/2010 - Los Angeles, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Russell Martin clubbed a three-run homer, while Andre Ethier delivered three hits and two RBI as the Dodgers held off the Chicago Cubs, 9-7, in the second installment of a four-game series.

Casey Blake also knocked in two runs for Los Angeles, which won for the eighth time in 11 games.

Chad Billingsley (7-4) broke his five-start winless skid by fanning nine batters over seven-plus innings. He yielded seven hits, four runs and walked four batters, but managed to record his first victory since May 26 against the Cubs at Wrigley Field.

"I was aggressive in the strike zone tonight," Billingsley said. "I was able to get quick outs in the middle of the game, which allowed me to go back out there in the eighth. I was able to make pitches when I had to."

Marlon Byrd had four hits and knocked in three runs for the Cubs, who lost 3-2 in the opener Thursday after coming into the series off a three-game sweep of Arizona.

Ted Lilly (3-8) was pounded for a second straight start, giving up seven hits and seven runs -- five earned -- over 3 2/3 innings. The lefty has given up 18 hits and 14 earned runs over the last two appearances.

"Ted wasn't sharp at all. He's gotten the ball up in his last couple of starts," Cubs manager Lou Piniella said. "The key to the game was we had ample opportunities early and we didn't take advantage of it and they did."

The Cubs have fanned 26 times in the first two games of this series.

Chicago nearly rallied from a six-run deficit. Justin Miller's wild pitch scored Byrd in the eighth and Koyie Hill followed with a sacrifice fly for a 9-5 difference.

Kosuke Fukudome singled to start the ninth. The Dodgers then went to Jonathan Broxton, who retired the next two batters, but Aramis Ramirez tripled before scoring on a Byrd base hit. Byrd was in scoring position when Tyler Colvin struck out to end the game.

Chicago loaded the bases with nobody out in the second, but got just one run - on Mike Fontenot's groundout. Billingsley fanned Hill and Lilly to escape the inning.

James Loney singled and Blake walked in advance of Martin's homer to left in the bottom of the second.

After Byrd singled in a run in the third, the Dodgers added three more in the bottom of the frame. Ethier had an RBI single and Matt Kemp added a run- scoring double. Ethier came home on Blake's sacrifice fly.

Ethier's single to right scored Xavier Paul in the fourth for a 7-2 margin.

The teams traded runs in the fifth with Byrd's groundout plating Derrek Lee in the top half and Blake's two-bagger scoring Loney for the Dodgers. Loney's RBI double in the sixth made it 9-3.

Game Notes

LA has won seven of its last nine regular season meetings with the Cubs at Dodger Stadium...Ramirez had three hits...Blake went 1-for-2 at the plate. He entered Friday just 2-for-25 in July.

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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.

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