Improved Clippers aim for another win over Nuggets

Basketball Betting Lines

02/02/2012 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Los Angeles Clippers seem to grow more imposing by the day and will aim get the best of Denver for the second time in less than a week when the two teams square off at Staples Center.

The Pacific Division-leading Clips invaded the Rockies last Sunday and escaped with a 109-105 win behind ex-Nugget Chauncey Billups' 32 points. Since then LA has disposed of the Western Conference's top team, the Oklahoma City Thunder, and earned a very rare win in Utah on Wednesday night.

It wasn't easy, but the Clips picked up their first triumph in Salt Lake City since 2003 and only their second in the last 44 trips to the Beehive State. Los Angeles had lost 15 straight against the Jazz overall in Utah, but got a season- high 34 points and 11 assists from All-Star point guard Chris Paul in a game which featured 12 ties and 14 lead changes

Blake Griffin added 31 points and 14 rebounds and executed a key three-point play in the final minute for the Clippers, who have won a season-high four straight overall.

"We really wanted this game," Paul said. "I think we did a great job of showing a lot of patience and fighting through."

On the injury front for LA, veteran forward Caron Butler was a late scratch on Wednesday with a sore lower back and remains questionable for tonight.

The Nuggets, meanwhile, followed up their setback to the Clips over the weekend with another heartbreaker in Memphis on Tuesday.

After a pair of missed shots and two offensive rebounds, O.J. Mayo rose up from the top of the arc and nailed the go-ahead three-pointer with 35.1 seconds remaining in overtime, helping the Grizzlies snap a four-game losing streak with a thrilling 100-97 win over Denver.

Al Harrington netted 23 points to go with 10 rebounds for the Nuggets, who have lost the two in a row since winning six straight. Andre Miller, who is set to play his 1,000th regular season NBA game tonight, had 20 points, six rebounds and six assists for Denver but Danilo Gallinari was just 1-of-10 from the field and finished with eight points.

After Mayo first missed a jumper, Mike Conley came down with the offensive rebound and found himself open for a three-pointer. But he missed and Tony Allen then corralled the second offensive rebound. Conley hit a wide-open Mayo and his three-pointer from the top of the arc went down for a 98-97 Memphis advantage -- the first lead change since the opening quarter.

"In overtime, they outhustled us on many misses with the lead and made a big 3," Nuggets coach George Karl said. "We made them take two or three shots before they got it, but we ran out of gas."

Aaron Afflalo turned the ball over on Denver's ensuing possession and Conley nailed a pair of free throws to seal it.

Despite the loss Karl was happy with the bigger picture.

"We've had a great month of January," the coach told NBA.com. "It might have been the best month I've ever had in Denver in my mind."

Denver, which will be kicking of its second three games in three nights stretch this season, has dropped three straight to the Clips. LA, meanwhile, is a more than solid 10-2 as the home team this season.

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SPORTS BETTING - Tennis is an underrated and under-utilized bettors' sport.

Ten years ago, at just about this time, I called Alan Boston in Vegas and left him a voicemail that went something like this (abridged version): "Hey Alan, Chad Millman from ESPN The Magazine calling. I want to do a book about wise guys, you in?"

A couple weeks later I got a message back (abridged version): "I don't know, maybe," Boston said. "Call me and we'll talk about it. But not later today. I got $1,000 on Andre Agassi to win the French Open at 40-1, and he's in the finals."

Here's what happened next (abridged version): Agassi won his tourney. Boston won his $40,000. I wrote sportsbook.

In the ten years since, how much has been wagered on the big-time tennis events? Put it this way: The Nevada Gaming Commission doesn't even track the number year by year because it's so small.

"Tennis makes up about one-tenth of one percent of our take," says Lucky's bookmaking boss Jimmy Vaccaro. "The last big golf major we probably had $100,000 worth of bets. In tennis, we might have written two big tickets."

Tennis' lack of popularity amongst the American bettoratti is no surprise, really. For starters, the biggest sports betting holidays -- the Super Bowl, the NCAA tourney -- are must see TV. People, at least the degenerates I know, plan vacations around watching those events in Vegas sports books.

But Wimbledon? Doesn't exactly reel in the whales. "Seriously, it's the nuts as an event," says Boston. "But who even knows when it's on?"

Here's another reason that helps explain why golf gets traction, something I call "The Bubbe Theory." My Bubbe is pushing 95 and has cataracts so bad that, to her, even the most crystalline Chicago day is mostly cloudy. But she still listens to the Cubs games, and she still calls me in a fit if she disagrees with something Rick Telander writes in the Chicago Sun Times. She's a sports fan. If she doesn't know you, you're just filling a niche. And niche players, even historically good ones like Roger and Raf, don't drive betting volume. Only the highest profile names attract square money, which inflates wagering totals like a shot of saline to the lips. Bubbe, and the public, loved Agassi, tennis' last cross-the-rubicon, mainstream draw. She also has a crush on Tiger. She's given me standing orders to put a sawbuck on the big cat whenever I walk through a sports book (or mistakenly tap into one via my Internet machine.) That explains why the Masters is getting $100K in action at some books while the four tennis majors might not get that combined this year.

This isn't a case of tennis being a difficult sport to bet. In fact, in Europe, it's probably the second most popular sport for gambling after soccer. Granted, as the WSJ football betting last week and The Mag's Shaun Assael examined in even greater depth last year, that might be because gamblers across the pond see it as an easy game to fix. But it could also be because, over there it holds the kind of sway the big two do over here.

Street corners in Spain are peppered with public courts and kids doing their best Raffy impressions. In some war torn parts of Eastern Europe poverty-stricken kids view tennis as an escape route, like football or basketball here. A couple years ago The Mag's Lindsay Berra wrote a great piece about Belgrade's Jelena Jankovic, Ana Ivanovic and Novak Djokovic. They learned the game as kids while bombs were raining down on their homeland. They practiced in drained swimming pools. Not exactly Nick Bolletierri conditions.

In the United States, casual fans think tennis is played four times a year. But on the tightly packed European continent, national interest in homegrown talent runs deep every weekend. Of the ATP's current top 20 players, only two, tennis betting and James Blake, are American. Fourteen are from Europe, representing six different countries.

No wonder fans from Lisbon to Bhudapest get jacked up for the net game, whether it's Wimbledon or a low-level tourney like the Estoril Open in Portugal (congrats to Spain's Albert Montanes for winning that one, btw). Chances are good that someone representing their flag will not only be playing, but have a shot at winning.

And that's all any bettor can ask for.

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