This Week in Sports Betting, A-Z
by Nicholas Tolomeo - 6/18/2012
A – Arrests. In the most telling sign that nobody gives a shit about hockey, the Los Angeles Police Department reported only six arrests after the Los Angeles Kings won the Stanley Cup. No word on if those fans even watched the game or if they were just standard Los Angeles Monday night arrests. The six "rioters" were about 40,000 less than when the Lakers won the NBA Finals and probably even fewer than any future Los Angeles Sparks WNBA title celebration.
B – Bro Bryce. Bryce Harper was asked if he had a celebratory beer in Canada after a recent win over Toronto. Toronto is the only major league city where the 19-year-old Harper could legally drink, so it was a valid question. However, Harper came back with possibly the quote of the year, "That's a clown question…bro."
C – Charlie Villanueva. In 2009 the Detroit Pistons tossed $40 million at Charlie Villanueva. Now Villanueva cannot even make the Dominican Republic National Team. John Calipari cut Villanueva after two exhibition games, saying he was overweight.
D – David Stern. David Stern became the coolest commissioner in pro sports with one gem of a quote in an interview with Jim Rome. When Rome asked Stern about the NBA Draft Lottery being rigged, Stern fired back, "have you stopped beating your wife?"
E – Euros. The European Championship ratings on ESPN are triple this year compared to 2008 with an average 1.3 million viewers on ESPN through the first six matches. Look out hockey, you're about to be passed up by freaking soccer.
F – Fireworks. In the US they have firework night at some baseball games. In Europe fans have firework night by bringing in actual fireworks and throwing them on the field. Polish and Russian fans have been accused of smuggling in fireworks for Euro 2012 games and setting them off.
G – Golden Inn. It is a bad year for the Philadelphia Phillies. The $140-million Phillies are below .500 and well out of first place in the NL East and now their mascot is getting sued. A woman from Abington says she was thrown into a pool while sitting on her lounge chair at a wedding at The Golden Inn in Avalon in 2010. Since the mascot tossed her into the shallow end of the pool, the women had injuries to her "head, neck, back, body, arms, legs, bones, muscles, tendons, ligaments, nerves and tissues." Wouldn’t saying “body” just have covered all of that? The best part about the lawsuit is that nobody knows which actor was in the costume at the time so the lady is suing three different entities, Tom Burgoyne, Matt Mehler or any other unnamed individual who was portraying the mascot.
H – Hemorrhoid. Argentine soccer player Leo Ponzio suffered a ruptured hemorrhoid during a soccer game. He somehow played through it. The worst part of the situation was that his team was wearing the road whites in that game and his shorts were visibly soaked in blood. I imagine he was left unguarded.
I – Implants? A bikini-clad Erin Andrews was recently photographed and her breasts looked freaking enormous, almost spilling out of her red strapless bikini top. This led to the obvious question posed by many, are they real? A frame-by-frame comparisons I did between the naked Andrews hotel peep video and the recent bikini shots does not reveal a definite answer, but it was fun research.
J – Jorge Soler. The Cubs have said screw trying to win now as they continue to build for the future. The Cubs signed outfield prospect Jorge Solar this week to a nine-year, $30 million deal. Soler is 20 years old and 6-foot-3 and from Cuba, meaning he is probably closer to 20, but Cubs GM Theo Epstein went ahead and took a chance.
K – Kim Kardashian. A naked picture of a woman who looks strikingly like jock chaser Kim Kardashian from behind, made its rounds on Twitter on Wednesday and it was quickly tied to Kanye West, with people assuming he had tweeted it and deleted it quickly from his Twitter feed. Turns out the women is Amia Miley, who looks like Kim Kardashian from behind, which is a good thing for her.
L – Losers. The oddsmakers have spoken and the Indianapolis Colts, Jacksonville Jaguars and Cleveland Browns are expected to be the biggest losers in the NFL next year. The posted totals for all three teams is ‘over/under’ 5.5 wins. I think all three teams will be hard pressed to combine for over 5.5 wins.
M – Mayweather, Floyd. Just 13 days into his 87-day sentence, Floyd Mayweather wants out of jail. The boxer who beat his ex-girlfriend, has complained about his living situation. He is under lock down in his cell for 23 hours a day, segregated from the general population and unable to use the training facilities in the gym and oh yeah, he wasn’t even able to order the Pacquiao/Bradley fight on pay-per-view!
N – NBA Finals. Game 1 of the NBA Finals drew a whopping 11.8 overnight rating, the best ratings for ABC since it started airing the Finals 10 years ago. The Thunder/Heat series could rank up there with Chicago Bulls NBA Finals ratings in the nineties. Everyone watched back then to cheer for Michael Jordan. Everyone watches now to cheer against LeBron James.
O – Ochocinco, Chad. Chad Ochocinco has signed a one-year deal with HBO “Hard Knocks”. I mean, the Miami Dolphins signed the deal. This is a major win for HBO, because after basically every other team said no, the Dolphins said yeah to “Hard Knocks” even though they might be the most uninteresting team in the NFL. That was, however, until Ochocinco came aboard.
P – Pacman. The NFL has asked Pacman Jones to speak to this year's group of incoming rookies. Yes, that Pacman Jones. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell is hoping Jones tells them to do everything exactly the opposite that Pacman did. I cannot imagine Pacman putting together an entire sentence let alone a presentation, but things he could talk about include how to make it rain, how to get a DUI, how to run over pedestrians on a sidewalk and how to get suspended for one entire year of football.
Q – Queers. Italian soccer player Antonio Cassano said he hopes there are no gay players on the Italian national team. Some Italian reporter told Cassano there might be some gays on the team and Cassano blurted out this gem, "Queers in the national team? That's their business. But I hope not."
R –Ratings. Add SpongeBob Squarepants to the list of things beating the Stanley Cup Finals in ratings. More people watched SpongeBob than Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Finals.
S – Skin on skin smacking sound. Mike McQueary took the stand in the Jerry Sandusky case this week and described seeing skin on skin smacking sounds when he walked in on Sandusky and a victim. The attorney got to ask McQueary the sarcastic question probably everyone in the world wants to ask McQueary…"You left an adult man and a boy in a locker room where you say you saw them in a sexual position." McQueary responded, "Yes."
T – Teke. The Pittsburgh Pirates film their postgame show on location near PNC Park with a glass window in the background behind the hosts. That might change after Wednesday night. After the Pirates 7-1 loss on the road, some guy dropped his pants and touched his toes right up against the glass window on live television during the “Ask Teke” segment of the show with former Pirate Kent Tekuvle. It was live television at its best and a fitting end to a Pirate telecast that featured another bad loss on the road.
U – UEFA. The governing body of European soccer is not taking kindly to the maniacal Russian soccer fans. UEFA fined the Russian soccer association $150,000 because their fans attacked stadium stewards after their opening game in Euro 2012. These techno-loving crazy Russians fight stadium stewards, run on the field, toss fireworks at the field and people, and chant monkey noises at black players. They make the Cleveland Dawg Pound look like the BYU student section.
V – Villa Della Pace. Former good pitcher Barry Zito is selling his house aka Villa Della Pace. The mansion sits on two acres of hillside overlook Phoenix Lake and it features four bedrooms and six full baths. The price tag is a monthly mortgage payment of $42,000. Zito probably bought the mansion back when he could pitch.
W – Wayne. Lil Wayne is not happy how he is being treated by stadium stewards in Oklahoma City. After his Miami Heat completed their second half meltdown in Game 1 of the NBA Finals, Wayne tweeted, "Again I was treated like sh!t by the Thunder arena staff…dam…I hope da Heat beat da dog sh!t out em!!"
X – XXX. Miami porn stars Sarah Jay and Angelina Castro are offering free blowjobs to all 300,000-plus Twitter followers if the Miami Heat win the NBA Championship. If they don’t win I guess you have to pay for them? I can't imagine the porn stars following through on these promises, but it would be fun to see them try. Oh, and by the way, Sarah and Angelina are not exactly what you would say, easy on the eyes.
Y – Yankees. Player surveys are always the most entertaining reads. A recent Men's Journal survey revealed that New York Yankees Alex Rodriguez and Nick Swisher are the second and third most-hated players in the league, respectively. Of course, they trail behind A.J. Pierzynski, who garnered 34 percent of the unpopular vote in the survey. Other survey findings show that Chicago has the best groupies followed by Spring Training destination Scottsdale, Arizona, and Toronto; Ozzie Guillen is the least respected manager; the Athletics are the team most would least likely to play for; and that Philadelphia has the most obnoxious fans, although I'm not sure we needed a survey to tell us that.
Z – Zack Greinke. Former Kansas City Royals pitcher Zack Greinke recently talked about how he was able to escape the baseball hell of Kansas City. Greinke said, "I was pretty rude on my way out. I felt like I had to, in order to get out."
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