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07/11/2010 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Paula Creamer squeezed one final par out of prickly Oakmont and threw her hands over her face. The left hand was bandaged thumb-to-wrist, something else to absorb the tears.
She cried, yes, but this time the source of her waterworks was victory, not defeat. This time the sight of her on-course sighs was endearing, not frustrating.
This is the Paula Creamer we've been waiting for all along. And boy did she arrive at the right time.
Creamer broke through for her first major championship Sunday, winning the biggest one of them all, the U.S. Women's Open, with a steely two-under 69 in the final round.
Just four months after surgery to repair ligament damage in her left thumb -- four months after she wondered if she would ever play golf at a high level again -- Creamer was the only player to finish under par on a course that was built 107 years ago to confound the game's best.
Never shooting worse than a 72, Creamer posted a three-under 281 for the championship to beat Suzann Pettersen and Na Yeon Choi by four shots.
"It's incredible," Creamer gushed soon after the final round -- and it was.
Consider that Creamer played her last 52 holes in under 36 hours after the tournament was suspended early on Friday because of storms. Also consider that long-hitting Argentine Angel Cabrera won the men's U.S. Open at Oakmont in 2007 with a five-over 285.
How did Creamer do it? By being the player we all thought she would be five years ago when she became the youngest winner in the history of the LPGA as an 18-year-old who hadn't yet walked in her high school graduation.
Down to the last hole, Creamer never buckled. This wasn't the player who huffed and puffed her way to an out-of-sorts 79 in the third round of last year's U.S. Women's Open at Saucon Valley.
Creamer hit out of a bunker on a third of her holes that day, including one shot that sailed over the green and onto the trampled grass of a pedestrian path.
She chunked three chip shots and walked off with a triple-bogey, handing her ball to a young girl in the gallery. She sighed her way through the round that day, playing herself out of contention for the second year in a row.
There were sighs at Oakmont, too, but of a different kind. Creamer stepped away from an approach shot late in the final round, took a deep breath, then lined it back up and knocked it safely onto the green.
A television camera caught her shaking out the jitters and flashing a smile that stretched all the way to the Pennsylvania Turnpike.
It was in the bag.
With no traffic ahead of her on the leaderboard, and no one close in her rearview mirror, Creamer kept her foot on the pedal all the way to the end, making two late birdies and three straight pars to finish off her ninth career LPGA title.
It was, finally, the first of what should be a career full of major championships.
"I can't even describe what I feel," Creamer said. "It is just amazing to have my name on this trophy with some of the best players that have ever played the game."
Creamer's victory gave American women two majors in the same season for the first time in three years. (Cristie Kerr won the LPGA Championship last month to become the No. 1 player in the world.)
More important, perhaps, is this: We finally got another glimpse of the Paula Creamer who once dared to challenge Annika Sorenstam on a ruling at the season-ending ADT Championship. That was in 2005, when Creamer was a rookie and Sorenstam was only the best player in the world.
Oakmont saw the gutsy, get-out-of-my-way Creamer who won seven titles by the time she was 22 years old. It was the steady, laser-focused player who once shot a 60, the second-lowest score in LPGA history.
Her victory on Sunday should finally allow us to forget the gum-snapping Paula Creamer who appeared in those Precept commercials with Nick Price a couple of years ago, blowing bubbles and talking about puppy dogs and crushes.
She'll always be the Pink Panther, for sure, but any notion that Creamer is a less-than-serious competitor disappeared with those butterflies in her stomach on Sunday.
Creamer is a major champion now, bandages and all.
<< Spain triumph caps tournament of firsts
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - When the 2010 FIFA World Cup was awarded
to South Africa on May 15, 2004, the tournament promised to be a history-
making event.
The 19th edition of the competition would be the first to be play
<< Manuel hopes to see bit more of this All-Star game
ANAHEIM, Calif. (AP) -To Charlie Manuel, the whole All-Star experience whizzed by last summer. He's hoping to change one thing this time - the result.The Philadelphia manager is set to guide the National League for the second straight All-Star game.
<< Wilcox fends off Stockton to win in Saskatchewan
Saskatoon, SK (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Will Wilcox closed with a six-under 66 Sunday
to hold off Brady Stockton and win the Dakota Dunes Casino Open.
Wilcox finished at 25-under-par 263 to shatter the tournament scoring record.
Josh Geary owned
<< Cahill helps A's down Angels
Oakland, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Trevor Cahill threw seven innings and Jack Cust
hit a two-run homer as the Oakland Athletics took a 5-2 win over the LA Angels
of Anaheim in the finale of a three-game set.
Cahill (9-3) gave up just one unear
Dodgers option Ely, recall Link >>
Los Angeles, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Los Angeles Dodgers optioned struggling
starting pitcher John Ely to Triple-A Albuquerque and recalled pitcher Jon
Link from the same club on Sunday.
Ely went through his second straight poor outing
Hosmer, U.S. rout World in Futures Game >>
Anaheim, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Eric Hosmer went 4-for-5 with two RBI and two
runs scored, leading the U.S. Futures team to a 9-1 rout of the World Futures
team in the annual matchup.
Hosmer, 20, was the third overall pick of the 2008 d
Calvillo helps Montreal come back against Edmonton >>
Edmonton, AB (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Anthony Calvillo threw a pair of second-half
touchdowns as his Montreal Alouettes earned a come-from-behind 33-23 victory
over the Edmonton Eskimos at Commonwealth Stadium.
Calvillo completed 19-of-30 pass
Nets add G Farmar >>
East Rutherford, NJ (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The New Jersey Nets have agreed in
principle to a contract with free agent guard Jordan Farmar.
Per team policy, terms of the agreement were not released, but the Newark
Star-Ledger reports t
El Duque expected to throw Tuesday
PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. -- New York Mets pitcher Orlando Hernandez, sidelined at spring training because of arthritis in his neck, is expected to resume throwing on Tuesday.
Hernandez received a cortisone shot Thursday after leaving camp and returning to New York to have his neck examined. The 41-year-old right-hander is penciled in as the team's No. 2 starter behind Tom Glavine.
El Duque's health is a major issue for the Mets, who won the NL East in 2007 and came within one victory of the World Series. Their aging and unsettled rotation is a big question mark this year.
MySportsbook.com has the Mets as -110 favorites to repeat as NL East champions odds.
Hernandez went 11-11 with a 4.66 ERA last season, including 9-7 with a 4.09 ERA in 20 starts after the Mets acquired him from Arizona in late May. But he missed the playoffs because of a torn calf muscle.
New York already is without Pedro Martinez, out until at least midseason following rotator cuff surgery. Among those competing for starting jobs are prospects Mike Pelfrey, Philip Humber and Jason Vargas, plus veterans Chan Ho Park, Jorge Sosa and Aaron Sele.
Notes: Mets manager Willie Randolph is excited about two new utility players he could have on his bench: Damion Easley and David Newhan. ''Their value is really all over the place,'' Randolph said. Easley can play anywhere in the infield and could be used as an emergency outfielder, though Randolph said he would prefer to keep the veteran in the infield. Newhan, meanwhile, can play second base, third or any outfield position for the Mets. ''I love versatility,'' Randolph said. ''I love guys that can give me options when I need them to step in.''
Additional baseball lines and World Series odds can be found at: www.MySportsbook.com
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Ten years ago, at just about this time, I called Alan Boston in Vegas and left him a voicemail that went something like this (abridged version): "Hey Alan, Chad Millman from ESPN The Magazine calling. I want to do a book about wise guys, you in?"
A couple weeks later I got a message back (abridged version): "I don't know, maybe," Boston said. "Call me and we'll talk about it. But not later today. I got $1,000 on Andre Agassi to win the French Open at 40-1, and he's in the finals."
Here's what happened next (abridged version): Agassi won his tourney. Boston won his $40,000. I wrote sportsbook.
In the ten years since, how much has been wagered on the big-time tennis events? Put it this way: The Nevada Gaming Commission doesn't even track the number year by year because it's so small.
"Tennis makes up about one-tenth of one percent of our take," says Lucky's bookmaking boss Jimmy Vaccaro. "The last big golf major we probably had $100,000 worth of bets. In tennis, we might have written two big tickets."
Tennis' lack of popularity amongst the American bettoratti is no surprise, really. For starters, the biggest sports betting holidays -- the Super Bowl, the NCAA tourney -- are must see TV. People, at least the degenerates I know, plan vacations around watching those events in Vegas sports books.
But Wimbledon? Doesn't exactly reel in the whales. "Seriously, it's the nuts as an event," says Boston. "But who even knows when it's on?"
Here's another reason that helps explain why golf gets traction, something I call "The Bubbe Theory." My Bubbe is pushing 95 and has cataracts so bad that, to her, even the most crystalline Chicago day is mostly cloudy. But she still listens to the Cubs games, and she still calls me in a fit if she disagrees with something Rick Telander writes in the Chicago Sun Times. She's a sports fan. If she doesn't know you, you're just filling a niche. And niche players, even historically good ones like Roger and Raf, don't drive betting volume. Only the highest profile names attract square money, which inflates wagering totals like a shot of saline to the lips. Bubbe, and the public, loved Agassi, tennis' last cross-the-rubicon, mainstream draw. She also has a crush on Tiger. She's given me standing orders to put a sawbuck on the big cat whenever I walk through a sports book (or mistakenly tap into one via my Internet machine.) That explains why the Masters is getting $100K in action at some books while the four tennis majors might not get that combined this year.
This isn't a case of tennis being a difficult sport to bet. In fact, in Europe, it's probably the second most popular sport for gambling after soccer. Granted, as the WSJ football betting last week and The Mag's Shaun Assael examined in even greater depth last year, that might be because gamblers across the pond see it as an easy game to fix. But it could also be because, over there it holds the kind of sway the big two do over here.
Street corners in Spain are peppered with public courts and kids doing their best Raffy impressions. In some war torn parts of Eastern Europe poverty-stricken kids view tennis as an escape route, like football or basketball here. A couple years ago The Mag's Lindsay Berra wrote a great piece about Belgrade's Jelena Jankovic, Ana Ivanovic and Novak Djokovic. They learned the game as kids while bombs were raining down on their homeland. They practiced in drained swimming pools. Not exactly Nick Bolletierri conditions.
In the United States, casual fans think tennis is played four times a year. But on the tightly packed European continent, national interest in homegrown talent runs deep every weekend. Of the ATP's current top 20 players, only two, tennis betting and James Blake, are American. Fourteen are from Europe, representing six different countries.
No wonder fans from Lisbon to Bhudapest get jacked up for the net game, whether it's Wimbledon or a low-level tourney like the Estoril Open in Portugal (congrats to Spain's Albert Montanes for winning that one, btw). Chances are good that someone representing their flag will not only be playing, but have a shot at winning.
And that's all any bettor can ask for.
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