[BangTheBook]

This past weekend's action from a bookmaker's point-of-view

By Jimmy Mason
This weekend was back and forth with Saturday going the way of the player and the dogs barking loud on Sunday to even the score.

Saturday saw heavy action on big name pitchers Randy Johnson, Mark Buehrle and Johan Santana. Buehrle opened at -108 and closed at -125 so you can imagine the results weren’t great for us when the White Sox won 7-5 at Cleveland. It’s not surprising when we have a flood of money on Randy Johnson and the Yankees, but what is surprising is that they were playing their arch enemy Boston Red Sox and they were on the road to boot! There was a large move on the Red Sox taking the Yanks from -125 down to a pick, and we were buried with Yankee money and took a beating. The last of the three AL bloodbaths was Johan Santana and the Twinkies beating Bartolo Colon and the Angels. Again I was surprised by the lack of two way action on this game, but as one player I spoke to told me “I see Santana at -140, I make a bet, period!”

Sunday things turned around big time as Dontrelle Willis and the Marlins opened at -132 and reached -150 by game time. Philly got to Willis in a big way tagging him for 8 runs in 5 innings and tearing up many a ticket. Later in the afternoon our players were all over the Orioles and Sidney Ponson getting money against the lowly Mariners. Gil Meche threw a gem though in allowing only one run in nearly seven innings and the bullpen held on for the win. In the late game, unlike Saturdays match up the Red Sox favored at -170 and we saw everyone moving the line down. The line went all the way down to the high -150’s at many places and we were still at -165 because we were taking all Boston money. Final score Yankees win the late game 5-3 and we recoup our Saturday losses and come out about even for the weekend.

Until next week, may all your wagers be winners…..
Jimmy Mason