Heads up: Penny goes for 12th win as Dodgers take on Mets

Baseball Betting Lines

07/21/2007 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Brad Penny will try for his 12th win of the season this afternoon when the Los Angeles Dodgers continue their four-game series with the New York Mets at Dodger Stadium.

Penny has been outstanding so far this year, posting an 11-1 mark, and is tied with Oakland's Dan Haren for the third best earned run average in the majors at 2.33.

The right-hander is 6-0 over 10 starts since his lone loss of the season on May 18 against the Angels. He has allowed one run or fewer in eight of those outings, including Monday against the Phillies in which Penny posted a win behind seven frames of four-hit, one-run ball with eight strikeouts.

It was a good sign for Penny, who was hammered for six runs in four innings of a no-decision on July 5 against Atlanta.

Penny, who is just 4-10 with a 5.82 ERA in 17 career starts against New York, is trying to avoid a second-half letdown that ruined his season last year. He went 10-2 before the All-Star break in 2006, but went just 6-7 in the second half with a 6.25 ERA.

Jorge Sosa will start this afternoon for the Mets coming off a tough-luck loss at San Diego. Against the Padres on Monday, Sosa allowed only two runs on five hits over six innings, but got little run support in New York's 5-1 loss. The defeat dropped Sosa to 7-4 on the year with a 3.84 ERA.

The right-hander, who is 1-3 over his last five outings, has made six lifetime appearances against the Dodgers, with two of those being starts. In that span, he is 0-1 with a 5.63 ERA after allowing 10 runs over 16 total innings. Sosa started against the Dodgers on June 13 and took the loss after yielding six runs over 5 2/3 frames.

Sosa will try to secure a series win for the Mets, who captured the second game of this set on Friday, 4-1, after outslugging the Dodgers 13-9 on Thursday.

Carlos Beltran homered for the second straight game and David Wright had an RBI for the Mets, who have won five of seven and have stretched their lead over the Braves to 3 1/2 games for the top spot in the National League East.

Oliver Perez (9-6) threw 7 1/3 strong innings, allowing six hits and a run with eight strikeouts. Billy Wagner threw the final inning for his 21st save.

New York, though, lost the reliable Jose Valentin, as the second baseman fractured his right tibia after fouling a ball off his leg in the fourth innings.

Nomar Garciaparra homered for the Dodgers, just his third long ball of the season, while Juan Pierre extended his hitting streak to 13 games with a single in the first inning. He also stole his 40th base of the season.

Brett Tomko gave up five hits and an unearned run over six innings in the start. Roberto Hernandez (0-1) allowed two hits and three runs -- two earned -- in the eighth inning, as the Dodgers lost for the third time in four games and still trail the first-place Padres by just a percentage point in the NL West.

The Dodgers swept a three-game series against New York this season from June 11-13 at Chavez Ravine. The Mets went 4-3 against LA in the 2006 series and swept Los Angeles in three games during last October's NL playoffs.

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FOOTBALL BETTING : Crabtree's base deal: six years, $32 million

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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.

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