Saints officially hire Spagnuolo
Football Betting Lines
02/07/2012 - Metairie, LA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The New Orleans Saints officially hired Steve Spagnuolo as their new defensive coordinator on Tuesday.
Spagnuolo spent the last three seasons as head coach in St. Louis, but was fired on January 2 after the Rams finished the 2011 season with a bleak 2-14 record.
He finished his brief tenure with a mark of 10-38. The Rams were 1-15 in his first year, then took a big step forward at 7-9 in 2010 before regressing this past season.
His Rams team was expected to contend in the NFC West in 2011, but started with six straight losses and never recovered. The Rams' only wins came against New Orleans and Cleveland in a three-week span. They finished the year on a seven-game losing streak.
He will replace Gregg Williams, who left New Orleans on January 16 to become defensive coordinator of the Rams under new head coach Jeff Fisher.
Prior to becoming the Rams' head coach, Spagnuolo spent two seasons as defensive coordinator for the New York Giants, calling the defensive plays for a New York squad that won Super Bowl XKII after the 2007 season against the previously-undefeated New England Patriots.
Gijon, Spain (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Sporting Gijon named Inaki Tejada its manager for the remainder of the season Tuesday, days after he guided the struggling side in a 1-1 draw against Osasuna. Gijon fired former coach Manuel Preciado last
<< Yanks ink INF Hall to minor league deal
New York, NY (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The New York Yankees signed infielder Bill
Hall to a minor league deal with an invitation to major league spring training
on Tuesday.
The deal was confirmed on the team's website and Hall also posted the
<< Owen Nolan announces his retirement
San Jose, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Former San Jose captain Owen Nolan officially
announced his retirement on Tuesday.
Nolan disclosed his decision during a press conference at HP Pavilion, the
home of the Sharks, the team for which he spen
<< Wichita's Perez named MISL Player of Week
Tampa, FL (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Wichita Wings midfielder Bryan Perez was named
the Major Indoor Soccer League's Player of the Week on Tuesday for Week 14.
Perez scored the match-winning goal in overtime to cap a five-point night, as
Wichita
<< Owen Nolan announces retirement
San Jose, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Former San Jose captain Owen Nolan officially
announced his retirement on Tuesday.
Nolan disclosed his decision during a press conference at HP Pavilion, the
home of the Sharks, the team for which he spen
Cleveland, OH (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Los Angeles Clippers guard Chauncey Billups will miss the rest of the season after tearing his anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee on Monday. The injury occurred with 5:48 left in the fourth qua
A's extend Beane, Crowley through 2019 >>
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Oakland Athletics owner Lew Wolff says general manager
Billy Beane and president Michael Crowley have reached agreements to remain
with the team through the 2019 season.
Wolff told Bloomberg Television on Tuesday
Billups done for season with torn Achilles >>
Cleveland, OH (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Los Angeles Clippers guard Chauncey Billups
will miss the rest of the season after tearing his left Achilles tendon.
The injury occurred with 5:48 left in the fourth quarter of an overtime win
against
Giants TE Ballard tore ACL in Super Bowl >>
East Rutherford, NJ (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - New York Giants tight end Jake Ballard
suffered a torn knee ligament in the Super Bowl, the team said Tuesday.
Ballard tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee during the fourth
quarter of
Memphis to join Big East in 2013-14 >>
Memphis, TN (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The ongoing game of musical chairs in college
athletics has its newest player.
Memphis is expected to join the Big East in all sports for the 2013-14 season,
completing the conference's goal of having 12 foot
Huskers' Lucky hospitalized for undisclosed reason
LINCOLN, Neb. -- Nebraska running back Marlon Lucky was hospitalized Monday for undisclosed reasons after Lincoln police responded to a call at his residence.
The Nebraska athletic department said in a release Monday that Lucky was admitted Sunday night.
MySportsbook.com has the Cornhuskers listed at +2500 to win the BCS National Championship odds.
A nursing supervisor at the hospital said all questions about Lucky were being referred to the athletic department. The athletic department said there would be no further comment from the department or Lucky's family.
A Lincoln Police spokesman said officers responded to a call at Lucky's residence 11:30 p.m. Sunday. The spokesman said he didn't know Lucky's condition at the time he was taken to the hospital.
Lucky, from North Hollywood, Calif., started six games last season as a sophomore and was the team's second-leading rusher, with 728 yards and six touchdowns. He also caught 32 passes for 383 yards. He averaged 19.1 yards on eight kickoff returns.
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FOOTBALL BETTING : Crabtree's base deal: six years, $32 million
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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