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In order to successfully bet on NFL football its important to start with the fundamentals. Were talking about the fundamentals of understanding the wagering side of the equation. There’s a lot of misunderstanding about what NFL pointspreads mean and how they are set. A firm understanding of the bookmaking concept of setting NFL lines is a prerequisite for any sports betting success.

The Columbus Blue Jackets learned a valuable lesson about NHL hockey on Friday night-it’s dangerous to ’sit on a lead’ and particularly against the defending Stanley Cup champion Pittsburgh Penguins. Down 3-1, Pittsburgh tied the game late in the third period as Ruslan Fedotenko and Alex Goligoski each lit the lamp with less than three minutes remaining. After a scoreless overtime period, Sidney Crosby scored the only goal of the shootout to give the Penguins an improbable 4-3 victory. It was the 9th win in ten games for Pittsburgh, who are a perfect 6-0-0 on the road. Columbus lost for the fifth time in six games.

The video game is now a ubiquitous part of American pop culture but pinball still holds a cachet of cool. Pinball went through a few lean years during the early years of the video boom, when designers tried to cram as much stuff onto the playfield as possible, perhaps feeling the clutter was needed to replicate the video game experience. In recent years, however, designers appear to have concluded–and rightly so–that pinball cannot be a video game, nor should it want to be.

When golf legend Jack Nicklaus was still a young upstart in the sport and only starting to tear up PGA courses, legend Bobby Jones commented following ‘The Golden Bear’s”65 Masters win that “he plays a game with which I am not familiar”. Following Lyoto Machida’s absolute destruction of Rashad Evans in the main event of UFC 98, there’s likely a few MMA fighters saying the same thing. Machida completely befuddled Evans en route to a 2nd round TKO victory after which ‘The Dragon’ looked as if hed barely worked up a sweat.

The good news for the Kansas City Chiefs as they prepare for the start of the NFL regular season is that their starting quarterback is back at practice. The bad news is that they still dont know when hell be able to play. Matt Cassel returned to the Chiefs practice field on Monday for the first time since he injured his left knee in a NFL preseason game on August 29th. Still, theres been no confirmation from either he or the team as to when hell return to action.

Tony Romo passed for a NFL career best 353 yards and threw three touchdown passes as the Dallas Cowboys got their 2009 season off to a good start with a 34-21 victory over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Raheem Morris went down in defeat in his debut as Bucs head coach, while the Cowboys answered a lot of questions about how their receiving corps would respond to the absence of Terrell Owens, now with the Buffalo Bills.

Alabama didn’t so much win their game against Tennessee on Saturday as much as they escaped. Despite playing one of their worst games of the year they managed to keep their undefeated season alive as nose tackle Terrance Cody blocked a potential game winning field goal on the last play of the game to preserve a 12-10 victory for the Crimson Tide. Alabama held a tenuous 12-3 lead late in the game before a Tennessee touchdown and recovered onside kick had them facing the specter of the defeat for the first time this season. Instead, Alabama improved to 8-0 while Tennessee slipped to 3-4.

Kyle Boller filled in for an injured Mark Bulger, and the St. Louis Rams improved to 2-1 on the NFL preseason with a 24-21 victory over the host Cincinnati Bengals. The Rams led 24-14 heading into the fourth quarter, but a Bengals TD early in the frame made for some drama down the stretch. The Bengals couldn’t close the deal, however, and dropped to 1-2 on the NFL preseason.

The New Orleans Saints used a 14 point fourth quarter to defeat the Indianapolis Colts 31-17 on Sunday to win their first Superbowl in franchise history. Drew Brees broke open a tight game midway through the final quarter with his touchdown pass to Jeremy Shockey, and Tracy Porter scored on a 74 yard interception return as the Colts were driving on the next series to secure the victory. Brees was named Superbowl MVP on the basis of his 288 yard, 2 touchdown, 0 interception performance.

Though it enjoyed solid fan support and was popular among sports betting enthusiasts, arena football fell off the map with the demise of the Arena Football League. The AFL suspended play under the weight of a poor business model in 2009 and later pulled the plug altogether. Since then, a new league has announced plans to take its place. Arena Football One (AF1 for short) will begin play in April and on Thursday secured a TV contract to broadcast games on the NFL Network in the United States. The TV deal should help the new arena football entrant to get off to a successful start as they attempt to revive the sport. Obviously the long term goal is a deal with a major network like Fox or ESPN but a good relationship with the NFL never hurts.