The MLB season is starting this Sunday with the Indians facing the White Sox. Monday has a full slate of games. I hope you are excited, because this MLB season is going to be great and full of super opportunities to make money. The White Sox are opening the season as a $1.45 favorite over the Indians. The over/under is 7.5. The line is, to my knowledge, only live in Las Vegas, but expect other sports books to allow action as the game approaches.

I thought we would take a quick preview of the upcoming game. Make sure you check back as I will have a more detailed review and pick on Saturday or Sunday. The Indians are sending top pitcher C.C. Sabathia to counter Buehrle of the White Sox. Here’s a couple notes from spring training to think about.

1. Mark Buehrle pitched 29 innings. He struck out 14, walked 2 and had a 3.10 ERA.
2. Sabathia pitched 24 innings. He struck out 28, walked 13 and had a 6.66 era.
3. Cleveland had two batters hit 5 or more home runs (Jim Thome and Jermaine Dye).
4. Chicago had one batter hit for 5 home runes (Travis Hafner).
5. Cleveland had 4 batters hit for over a .350 avg with at least 40 AB’s.
6. Chicago had 2 batters hit for over a .350 avg with at least 40 AB’s.
7. Cleveland batters hit 70 doubles and 8 triples and 39 homes runs.
8. Chicago batters hit 69 doubles and 6 triples and 35 home runs.

As mentioned, the game is being played in Chicago. First pitch is scheduled for 8:35pm PST.

It’s time to get excited. The No Fun league (NFL) is coming back. In a ridiculous move against the entertainment factor for us fans, the NFL has ruled against excessive end zone celebrations. Last year was a blast, partly due to players coming up with their own end zone celebrations. You just never knew what Chad Johnson was going to do from week to week. In fact, the end zone celebration took on a culture of sorts. Well, that’s gone now.

The NFL owner vote came out 29-3, a landslide, for the new regulation. Since it’s the NFL, we have to have confusing rules subject to interpretation. For example, Chad Johnson’s proposal to a Cheerleader last season would not be allowed and would result in a penalty. However, if he were to do the river dance, which is excessive, it would be ok. The ultimate judge is the official. If you watched last year’s Super Bowl, you know that officiating in the NFL is grossly inaccurate and the officiating leaves something to be desired. So now we get to give officials another weapon in their arsenal to directly affect the outcome of games. Perhaps we can just pay to watch the officials tell us who won.

The apparent reasoning behind this is the youth football leagues. Kids, as can be expected, were imitating players like Chad Johnson when they scored. Rather than educating and punishing them for unacceptable behavior, NFL fans get to suffer in an attempt to mask problems. Like it or not, the No Fun league is back—at least for a year.

Most of the major sports associations, like the NFL, work hard to stay away from anything gambling related. According to them, sports betting is bad and leads to corruption. What does that say about the players themselves? You mean to tell me that NFL players, who make millions of dollars, are so corrupt that they would throw their performance for thousands of dollars or more? The NFL won’t even allow commercials for visiting Las Vegas in the Super Bowl—even though Las Vegas only accounts for an estimated 2-5% of all sports betting action annually.

Recently the Boston Red Sox announced plans to sell a lotto scratch card branded for them. The lotto scratch card is loaded with Boston Red Sox logos and will no doubt have Red Sox fans lining up to buy the tickets. This brings up an interesting predicament. How can a professional organization, like Major league baseball, be against sports betting (see: Pete Rose), but be for a form of gambling that has the worst probability of winning and is basically a cash cow? The probability of losing your money in lotto is almost guaranteed.

Commissioner Bud Selig was adamantly opposed to putting one of the best hitters to ever play the game—Pete Rose—in the hall of fame—even though Pete Rose never bet against his team. Yet, the lotto of all things is ok? Should we now ban every Boston Red Sox player from the hall of fame, if they qualify? Something to think about.

The 1st legs of Champions league quater finals is finally upon us, on first glance I seems to fancy all the home teams to pull a win or a draw. Suprisingly all look very underish to me! You can’t win a tie in the first game but you can lose it, that sentence is probably hovering in each manager’s minds. The home team will try to defend as to not concede an away goal while the away team might play a counter attack tactic and try not lose in a big margin!

I like the looks of Arsenal as they finally found their scoring abilities, Thierry Henry is always a joy to watch even though I’m not an Arsenal fan! Missing from today’s linesups on the Gunners camp are Sol Campbell, Freddie Ljungberg, Jose Antonio Reyes, while Emmanuel Adebayor is cup-tied. Juventus on the other hand is missing Alessandro Del Pierro (key striker) while influential midfielder Pavel Nedved is suspended. Patrick Viera will make an emotional return to Highburry after quitting the Gunners to join Juventus last season, I’m sure the sentimental feeling will end once the whistle is blown at the start. Arsenal were lucky to get a few extra days of rest after their match against Portsmouth during the weekend was postponed due to a waterlogged pitch. Fresh and ready to roll, I see an Arsenal victory at -1/4 Asianhandicap 2.19.

Tonight’s NBA schedule is pretty light. There is one game that is interesting to me though and that’s the game between the Phoenix Suns and the New Jersey Nets (home team). Perhaps, it’s because I just watch the Soprano’s. The line currently has the Suns as a 3.5 point favorite and this seems a little low. My guess is it is low, because the Nets are one a pretty good win streak and they are at home tonight. Given the fact that the Nets have just basically locked up the number three seed, I look for them to be a little lax and for the public to jump on Phoenix. This line, which opened at 2.5 at some sports books, could very well climb to 4 or 5.

In their last head to head meeting, which was in Phoenix, the Suns beat up on the Nets—winning by 11. Not a whole lot has changed since then, except for the fact that the Nets are at home this time, have a playoff spot basically wrapped up and the Suns are on a road trip—where they are 2-1 so far. As mentioned earlier, the Nets are on an 8 game winning streak. During that streak, they have beaten: New Orleans, Houston, Portland, Dallas, L.A. Lakers, Washington, Minnesota and Detroit—by 5 last night. All of those teams, except for Detroit, are pretty mediocre at best. Detroit, who had won four in a row, simply had a flat night. The Suns are looking very good and could run the court on the Nets.

Pick: Phoenix Suns -3.5

If you have been following the MLB exhibition season at all, you have probably heard about the situation in Washington with Alfonso Soriano (WAS). The Nationals need him to play in the outfield and he’s not too happy about it. The other day it was evident that Soriano has a lot of work to do if he wants to be at least a decent outfielder. However, sources from the Nationals say that Soriano is not trying hard to get up to pay in the outfield. He’s mad as heck that he can’t play second base and he probably figures that poor outfield play will land him back at his old position.

Many are quick to point out his lack of team spirit and self-centeredness, but is there more at stake here? Think about this for a moment. What do you call a second baseman who can hit in the upper .200’s and go yard 36 times? You call him a superstar and that player is worth a truckload of cash. Now, what do you call a left or right outfielder who can hit upper .200s and go yard 36 times? You call him decent to good. How many outfielders in MLB can you name that have similar stats (or perhaps less homers, but higher average) or better? You should have a list of many. On the flip side, how many second baseman can you name with those stats? Not too many, right?

The Washington Nationals are not just asking Soriano to play a different position; they are asking him to greatly reduce his value. Rather than blaming Soriano, we can blame MLB, the lack of a salary cap and the way things work.