Chivas aims to rebound from midweek loss vs. FCD

Soccer Betting Lines

04/24/2009 - Carson, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Chivas USA and FC Dallas square off in a Major League Soccer Western Conference tilt on Saturday at The Home Depot Center.

Chivas USA is coming off a midweek loss at Toronto, its first loss of the season, and will be aiming to get back on track at home on Saturday.

"[Toronto] just seemed to want it more than us, created a couple more opportunities and in the end got the result," Chivas coach Preki said. "It was a tough game under difficult conditions - with strong winds, cold and played on an artificial surface as well. In the end we came up a little bit short - they may have worked harder than us on the night and got the three points."

The Goats still hold the top spot in MLS with a 4-1-1 record, but Seattle is right on their heels.

Dallas (1-3-1) , on the other hand, is second-to-last in the West, with just one win this season. it is aiming to get a result in an effort to move up the table, although it is coming off a 3-2 win over Toronto last weekend.

"I thought our players played well, to pick up three goals," Dallas coach Schellas Hyndman said. "Defensively, we're still victims of little mistakes, which I think will just take time to get better, but I think all in all that the players were very inspired to get a win. We felt that we should have more than one point in these last few games, and the players were very focused this week in training, I think it was very upbeat. I thought they did a good job on the field, and I'm pleased with the outcome, obviously."

Dallas is relatively healthy heading into the game, with the only injury being to defender Steve Purdy, who is out with a hamstring.

It's a different story for Chivas USA, which will be without forwards Justin Braun, Ante Razov and Maykel Galindo and defenders Bobby Burling, Claudio Suarez, Lawson Vaughn and Ante Jazic and, midfielder Sasha Victorine, and goalkeeper Dan Kennedy.

Sporstbook Soccer Betting News

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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.

NFL Betting Lines

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