Brewers bash their way back into first

Baseball Betting Lines

09/10/2007 - Cincinnati, OH (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Rickie Weeks, J.J. Hardy and Ryan Braun belted consecutive home runs to start the game, making Milwaukee just the third team in major league history to accomplish the feat, and the Brewers never looked back in a 10-5 rout of the Cincinnati Reds in the finale of a three-game set at Great American Ball Park.

Weeks crushed a 2-1 pitch off Reds starter Phil Dumatrait (0-4) into the Cincinnati bullpen in left-center field for the fifth leadoff homer in his career and second of the season. Hardy then drilled a homer into the Brewers' bullpen in right, his 24th of the season, and Braun followed with a bomb into the seats in center, his 29th homer of the year, breaking the team record for homers by a rookie set last season by Prince Fielder.

Braun and Weeks each added another homer and Johnny Estrada also went deep for the Brewers, who have won seven of their last nine. Milwaukee moved one game ahead of the Chicago Cubs, who dropped a 10-5 decision to the Pittsburgh Pirates, in the NL Central.

Milwaukee starter Ben Sheets (12-4) went six innings, allowing five runs on six hits with three walks and six strikeouts to earn the win.

Juan Encarnacion homered for the Reds, who have dropped seven of nine.

After allowing the barrage of homers to start the contest, it got no better for Dumatrait. Fielder and Corey Hart then hit consecutive singles to center before Tom Shearn entered in relief. Shearn was greeted by a Kevin Mench single to left, loading the bases with nobody out for Estrada, whose sacrifice fly to left put the Brewers ahead 4-0. Shearn avoided further damage, inducing Hall to ground into a double play.

Cincinnati got on the board in the home half of the first on Ken Griffey Jr.'s sacrifice fly to center, scoring Norris Hopper, who led off with walk.

Milwaukee, though, continued its power surge. With one out in the second, Weeks walked and scored on Hardy's double to center. Braun followed with his 30th homer of the season, a shot to left.

Weeks led off the fourth with a homer to left, his ninth of the year to make it 8-1.

In the fifth, Cincinnati pinch-hitter Ryan Hanigan doubled to left, moved to third on Hopper's single to right and scored on a wild pitch.

Encarnacion pulled the Reds within 8-5 in the sixth. Brandon Phillips singled to center and stole second. With one out Javier Valentin walked, setting up Encarnacion's two-out, three-run blast to center, his 12th of the year.

After Mench walked to lead off the eighth, Estrada extended the Brewers lead with his ninth homer of the year to right.

Dumatrait allowed four runs on five hits without recording a single out.

Game Notes

San Diego's Marvell Wynne, Tony Gwynn and John Kruk were the first trio to start a game with consecutive home runs, doing so on April 13, 1987 in a 13-6 loss to San Francisco. Atlanta's Rafael Furcal, Mark DeRosa and Gary Sheffield also accomplished the feat in a 15-3 win against the Reds on May 28, 2003 at Cincinnati. Milwaukee last hit three straight homers as a member of the American League on September 12, 1982 when Cecil Cooper, Ted Simmons and Ben Oglivie did it in a 9-8 loss to the Yankees in New York...The six Milwaukee homers marked a season-high and were the most of any visitor at Great American Ball Park...Milwaukee activated pitcher Claudio Vargas off the 15-day disabled list and Cincinnati activated infielder Pedro Lopez from the 15-day disabled list before the game...Attendance was 21,534.

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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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