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Insider Sports Report

4* Chicago White Sox (Danks) -120 over Detroit (Porcello)
Range: +100 to -140

3* Cincinnati (Arroyo)/Milwaukee (Parra) OVER 9
Range: 8.5 to 9.5

3* Toronto (Romero)/Minnesota (Perkins) UNDER 9
Range: 9.5 to 8.5

Elite Sports Picks

St. Louis (Carpenter) -140 over Arizona (Scherzer)

Discount Sports Picks

10* N.Y. Yankees (Burnett)/Tampa Bay (Garza) UNDER 9

5* St. Louis (Carpenter)/Arizona (Scherzer) UNDER 9

MONEYLOCKOFTHEDAY

2 Units Reds +125

SportsBetCapping

2 Units Marlins +140

Steve Merril

Daytime Grand Slam!

White Sox (RL) at Tigers (RL)
PICK: Tigers (RL)

Detroit looks to bounce back after losing to the White Sox last night. Chicago sends John Danks to the mound who threw six shutout innings against the Royals on Thursday, only to leave with a no-decision. Danks is 2-1 against the Tigers with an ERA of 4.00 and a WHIP of 1.222. Danks is very friendly to Magglio Ordonez who is hitting .588 against the left-hander, while Brandon Inge (.400), Miguel Cabrera (.300), and Carlos Guillen (.444) also have had success against Danks.

Detroit sends rookie phenom Rick Porcello to the mound. The Tigers top pick in 2007 lost his major league debut allowing four runs in five innings while striking out four. Porcello got eight ground ball outs in the game against Toronto and should perform better in his home debut today as none of the White Sox hitters have ever faced the young right-hander.

Chicago had a strong offensive showing last night, but the White Sox struggled in their first six games this season as they averaged just 4.0 runs per game and batted just .232. Meanwhile, Detroit has been strong offensively this season as they scored six runs last night and entered the game averaging 5.9 runs per game and batting .284, including 8.3 runs per game at home with a .327 team average.

Play TIGERS (+1½ run line) as a 1 unit play.

JIM FEIST

Inner Circle

BOSTON CELTICS / PHILADELPHIA 76ERS
Take PHILADELPHIA 76ERS

The defending champs are coasting down the stretch, more concerned with getting healthy and resting their key veterans. That was evident in Sunday's blowout loss at Cleveland. For the Sixers, now 40-40, only two regular-season games remain: against the defending champion Boston Celtics and at Cleveland, the top-seeded team in the Eastern Conference. About this killer end-of-season schedule, Sixers point guard Andre Miller said, "Most likely, they'll be in the conference finals, so we'll see what happens." The Sixers are now tied with the Chicago Bulls for the sixth playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. Miami clinched the fifth spot yesterday. Sixers coach Tony DiLeo worried is concerned about the team's free fall: "We're not playing good basketball, that's what worries me," he said. Philly always gets up when the Celtics come to town, especially as defending champs. Play the 76ers.

NEW YORK YANKEES / TAMPA BAY RAYS
Take NEW YORK YANKEES

You don't find the expensive/high profile Yankees as a dog very often. For this game, ace A.J. Burnett takes the hill, a guy who stopped the early losing streak with a big win at Baltimore, allowing 1 run while fanning 6. He has thrown very well against these Rays, aat 7-4 with a 2.98 ERA lifetime against them. Matt Garza is 1-2 all time against the Yankees with a 4.56 ERA, allowing more hits than innings pitched. A good spot for the underdog visitors with their ace. Play the Yankees.

HalfBets

6* Mariners -105

BIG AL

BIG AL's MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL B-L-O-W-O-U-T

ANGELS

BIG AL's MLB DIVISION GAME OF THE MONTH

BRAVES

Scott Rickenbach

Chicago Whitesox

DOC

2 units 76ers -5

Paul Leiner

100* Yankees +110
100* Indians +110
100* Tigers +115

Robert Ferringo

1.5-Unit Play. Take Texas (-145) over Baltimore
After losing four straight I gotta think that the Rangers get it back together tonight. In a game between these two offenses it’s really almost a toss-up. But Texas does have a slight advantage with Brandon McCarthy on the bump. His counterpart, Alfredo Simon, took a loss while giving up four runs in his first outing to the significantly lighter hitting Yankees. I don’t think that he’s going to be up to the task in his second career start, especially not on the road and really especially not in Arlington.

1.5-Unit Play. Take Minnesota (-130) over Toronto
How the hell do you lose to the same team 10 straight times? How? Minnesota had that game won three different times last night. I don’t think that they are getting swept at home – they can’t get swept four straight times; they’re not that bad – so I’m going to get on the Twins this weekend and see if they can pull their heads out of their asses. Ricky Romero is another guy that is making his second career MLB start and doing so on the road. I don’t think this outing will be nearly as smooth as his last, and the Toronto bullpen is getting burnt out pretty quickly.

Today's Totals
2.5-Unit Play. Take ‘Over’ 11.0 Baltimore at Texas

1.5-Unit Play. Take ‘Over’ 9.0 Toronto at Minnesota

1.5-Unit Play. Take 'Over' 8.0 Boston at Oakland

BEN BURNS

TNT GOY

I'm laying the points with PHILADELPHIA. I successfully played against the 76'ers in their most recent game, a 111-104 loss at Toronto. The majority of bettors favored Philly in that game which caused the line to move from pick'em to Philly -2 or -2.5. I believe that those bettors were just a game early though and that this will prove to be the spot in which to back the team from Philly. The 76'ers last game came against a Raptors team which was at full strength and which was playing its final home game. I thought the Raptors would treat the game seriously and they came through with their best home effort in April. Tonight's game is an entirely different situation though. This time, it's the 76'ers which are playing their final home game. This time, they'll be taking on a team which is not playing at full strength and which really shouldn't be all that concerned about winning. Sure, the Celtics would like to bounce back from the blowout loss at Cleveland with a win tonight. However, they're already locked into the #2 seed and they'd won six straight before that loss. Being the defending champions, they've got absolutely nothing to prove. Note that if the Celtics really want to close out the regular season on a high note, to gain some momentum for the playoffs, that they get to host the Wizards tomorrow night, the team with the worst record (by far) in the Eastern Conference. Let's take a quick look at the Orlando Magic game from last night, as it had some similarities to this one. The Magic were already locked into their playoff spot, just as Boston is. Like Boston, the Magic were coming off a loss. Also, like the Celtics, the Magic were dealing with some injuries and playing their final road game of the season. Already without Lewis and Turkolu, they also decided to give Howard the night off. The Magic responded by getting blown out by the lowly Bucks, getting scored 80-56 from the second quarter on. Orlando forward Tony Battie's post-game comments revealed the team's mindset, basically acknowledging that the loss meant nothing to them. "We got our starters some rest, we got our bench players some minutes. We'll be ready to go when it counts..." Orlando coach Stan Van Gundy didn't seem too concerned by the loss either. When asked about his decision to rest Howard, he responded: "I'm not kicking myself on the decision. I'm still convinced it was the best thing to do..." While teams always prefer winning to losing, I expect the Celtics, who are expected to again be without Garnett, to treat this game about as seriously as the Magic treated their game last night. On the other hand, this is a huge game for the 76'ers. For starters, they're playing with "triple-revenge," having lost all three games vs. the champs this season. The last one of those losses, the lone game here on Philly, came by a single point - so the 76'ers are itching for some payback. The 76'ers, currently in 7th, know that they could be facing the Celtics in the first round. They want to prove to the Celtics and to themselves that they can beat them. After all, if they can't beat them when the Celts don't even really care, what hope will they have of doing so next week. There are other factors which make this a very big game for Philadelphia. They've blown their shot at the fifth seed but the 76'ers could still finish in sixth. That's significant as they'd probably prefer to face the Magic instead of the Celtics. This is also their final home game of the regular season and all teams typically prefer to win those. Most importantly, the 76'ers badly need to get a win to restore their confidence. That's because they've lost five in a row. A loss tonight would give them a 6-game losing streak with their final game coming at Cleveland, a place where the Cavaliers own a 39-1 record. In other words, with a loss tonight, they could bring a 7-game losing streak into the playoffs. In fairness, a look at the 76'ers' 5-game losing streak shows that four of their losses came on the road. The only loss at home came against the team with the best record in the league(Cleveland) and the 76'ers played the Cavs tough for most of that game. I expect the 76'ers to be the "hungrier" team and I expect that to lead to them winning in convincing fashion. *TNT GOY

Blue Chip

I'm playing on the Hawks and Heat to finish OVER the total. These teams are both capable of turning up the defensive intensity and we're sure to see some quality "d" when they face each other in the playoffs next week. That said, they're also both very capable of putting up points and with tonight's game being essentially meaningless, I expect to see a bigger emphasis on offense than defense. The Hawks have seen three straight games finish above the total. Those games finished with 228, 218 and 240 points. The OVER is now 8-3 their last 11 games. The Heat have seen four of their last five games finish above the total. Their most recent game finished with 227 and their most recent road game finished with 197. Note that they've seen the OVER go 12-7-1 the last 20 times that they were coming off a game in which they scored 105 or more points. Even if some of the stars do get some extra rest, I look for tonight's final combined score to be higher than most are expecting. *Blue Chip

Personal Favorite

I'm laying the price with MINNESOTA. The Jays have gotten off to a better start than the Twins and they took yesterday's series opener by a score of 8-6. I expect the Twins to have an edge on the mound this evening though and look for them to bounce back and even up the series. Romero goes for the Jays and he's got a 1-0 record. He was solid (3.00 ERA) but not spectacular (1.50 WHIP) in his first start, which was also his Major League debut. He allowed two runs through six innings, giving up seven hits and two walks. While that was a relatively impressive performance, it came at home. This will be Romero's first road start. I won't be surprised if we see a bit of an 'emotional letdown' from the rookie, after having been so fired up for his first start. Perkins goes for the Twins and he's got an 0-1 record. That's deceiving though, as he gave up just one run and five hits in eight complete innings in his lone start. Only two Mariners reached second base and Perkins retired 14 of the last 15 hitters he faced. Note that Perkins went 12-4 last season including 7-3 with a 3.84 ERA in 14 home starts. The Twins have been great at home the past couple of seasons and they've gone 50-34 during that stretch when playing a home game with an over/under line of nine or 9.5. Look for them to get back on track here, improving to 14-7 the last 21 times that Perkins took the mound. *Personal Favorite.