Pervak wins Memphis opener

Tennis Betting Lines

02/21/2012 - Memphis, TN (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Second seed Ksenia Pervak was an easy opening-round winner Tuesday at the $220,000 Memphis International tennis event.

The Russian Pervak handled Canadian Rebecca Marino 6-2, 6-4 on the indoor hardcourts at The Racquet Club of Memphis. Marino was last year's Memphis runner-up to Slovak Magdalena Rybarikova, who lost here on Sunday.

In some second-round action on Day 3, American Varvara Lepchenko upended seventh-seeded Swede Johanna Larsson 6-2, 6-4 and Russian Vera Dushevina bested American qualifier Jamie Hampton 6-4, 6-3.

Meanwhile, France's Stephanie Foretz Gacon doused struggling American wild card Melanie Oudin 6-2, 6-3 in an opening-round affair.

The 2012 winner here will collect $37,000.

Kisscasinio Tennis Betting News

<< Bologna extends unbeaten run against Fiorentina
Bologna, Italy (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Alessandro Diamanti and Gaston Ramirez both scored in the first half as Bologna followed its shocking win over Inter Milan with a 2-0 win over Fiorentina on Tuesday in Serie A. Bologna shocked Inter Milan,

<< Up the backstretch: Turf horse took to Golden Gate's artificial track
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - A 3-year-old colt that had never won a race except on the grass came away Saturday with a key victory on a synthetic surface. The change in surfaces for Daddy Nose Best proved to be beneficial for him to win

<< Gasquet wins Open 13 opener
Marseille, France (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - French crowd favorite Richard Gasquet was an easy first-round winner Tuesday at the Open 13 tennis event. The fifth-seeded Gasquet rolled past Japan's Go Soeda 6-0, 6-2 in 63 minutes on the indoor hard

<< Radwanska, Ivanovic advance; Bartoli exits Dubai
Dubai, United Arab Emirates (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Fifth seed Agnieszka Radwanska and former world No. 1 Ana Ivanovic moved on, while sixth-seeded Marion Bartoli was a first-round upset victim Tuesday at the $2 million Dubai D

<< Cesena names Beretta new coach
Cesena, Italy (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Cesena named Mario Beretta its third coach of the season Tuesday, one day after Daniele Arrigoni was fired. Cesena is last in Serie A and seven points from safety after Sunday's 3-1 loss to AC Milan, which c

Atletico Madrid's Diego to miss four weeks >>
Madrid, Spain (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Atletico Madrid playmaker Diego suffered a torn right thigh muscle Sunday and will be sidelined four weeks. The 26-year-old Diego was injured in the second half of a 1-1 draw against Sporting Gijon,

Dulgheru exits Monterrey >>
Monterrey, Mexico (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Fourth seed Alexandra Dulgheru came up an opening-round loser Tuesday at the $220,000 Monterrey Open. Spaniard Silvia Soler-Espinosa erased the Romanian Dulgheru 6-3, 6-3 on the hardcourts at Sierra Mad

Tevez apologizes to Manchester City >>
Manchester, England (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Manchester City forward Carlos Tevez apologized Tuesday and withdrew his appeal against the Premier League club's claim of gross misconduct, opening the door for his return from a five-month absence

Avs, Wings, Bolts deal; Downie, Quincey change locales >>
Denver, CO (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Colorado Avalanche brought in some skill and toughness on Tuesday, acquiring forward Steve Downie from the Tampa Bay Lightning in exchange for defenseman Kyle Quincey. The Bolts then turned around a

Chelsea bested by Napoli in Italy >>
Naples, Italy (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Chelsea's Champions League aspirations took a major hit on Tuesday as it suffered a 3-1 loss to Napoli in the first leg at the Stadio San Paolo. The Blues opened the scoring through Juan Mata in the

Big 12 Conference betting odds

Work left to do: Texas Tech, Oklahoma State, Kansas State

Texas joins Texas A&M and Kansas as locks after getting league win No. 11. Texas Tech greatly helped its own hopes and crippled OK State's with the two-point win Saturday. Is K-State the last reasonable hopeful? Could be an elimination match in Stillwater on Tuesday, at least for the Cowboys.

Work left to do:

Texas Tech [18-11 (7-7), RPI: 44, SOS: 12] A critical two-point win over OK State leaves the Red Raiders with Baylor and at Iowa State left. Get both and the Red Raiders likely are good to go. Get one and there could be some interesting comparisons with a K-State team that could finish two or three games "ahead" of them in the standings but doesn't have any of the quality wins Texas Tech has. Not a lot in nonconference play (against Arkansas in Little Rock being the best win, by far) to lean on.

Oklahoma State [18-9 (5-8), RPI: 50, SOS: 35] Still without a road win, the Cowboys now need to win two on the road just to get to .500 in conference play. It's hard to recall a team (OK, other than Clemson) falling so precipitously from lock status to almost certainly out of the NCAAs at this point. There are wins to be had in the last three, including a very big home game against K-State on Tuesday, but this team is reeling. Can you tell the pressure to win is getting to them with the way the final possession played out at Texas Tech? There are some good nonconference performances to lean on, specifically beating Missouri State and Syracuse on neutral floors and Pitt in OK City, but if the Pokes don't right this very, very soon, that won't be enough.

Kansas State [20-9 (9-5), RPI: 56, SOS: 96] It pays to be in the Big 12 North. The nine league wins are Colorado (twice), Missouri (twice), Iowa State (twice), Baylor, Nebraska and (a good one against) Texas. That helps explain the middling computer profile. The win over USC is nice, but the nonconference leaves a lot to be desired. The game at OK State in Stillwater on Tuesday is huge, as it could KO the Cowboys and leave K-State with a home date against Oklahoma with which to work.


FOOTBALL TRASH TALK

NFL Football Trash Talk

Trash talk has a place in every competitive endeavor (except baseball; those stirrup-wearers are too busy chewing on their sunflower seeds and their supplements to worry about what their opponents are doing).

Fantasy sports is no exception. Any intelligent discussion of the subject would probably start with a thesis statement or a definition of terms. Thankfully, this wont be an intelligent discussion.

Let me just say that I am happy to take a place in this space alongside my talented colleagues, even our commissioner. (You should see how she bleats like a demented paper boy about league fees on our fantasy site).

Trash talking, I would argue, is primarily about amusing your friends, their sheeplike demeanors and sloping foreheads notwithstanding. The best place I have found for football trash talking is at www.SportsAlarm.com.

Beyond the entertainment factor, though, I would recognize that the sophomoric ritual has one advantage, when properly applied. It magnifies your fantasy triumphs and mitigates your fantasy failures by transforming the eventual point total into an afterthought. Winning makes it seem like your opponent really is a truss-owning, lapel-pin-wearing nitwit. And in defeat, trash talk can be the air bag to break the fall from your hyperbolic heights. The plug-necked yahoos on your team, you can say, will be sacking groceries by the end of the season.

The best trash talk, in my view, is layered and nuanced. And it doesnt focus only on your opponents team. It picks apart your opponent. The idea is to create a shock-and-awe-scale blizzard of nonsense, and the goal is to make your opponent drop his hands from his keyboard in exasperation.

What team does your opponent root for? Accuse a Giants fan of having a Joe Namath pillowcase. Wheres your opponent from? Give a look of concern no matter his reply, then say, I'll try to type slower for you next time. Is your opponent into politics? Label everyone a tax-and-spend corporate shill.

Cap all that with a liberal application of irrelevance. For instance, dont just conclude by saying your opponent is a twerp who drafts like my grandmother. Say that your opponent is a sweater-wearing, eyebrow-plucking twerp who drafts his team about as well as Zsa Zsa Gabor gave acceptance speeches at the Oscars. By the time your foe makes sense of that, his starting running back will have had puppies.

But what about you? Hmm? Recall a memorable slam? Have a tried-and-true technique? Know someone who seems impervious to insult? Take a moment and tells us about it. Put together some (fit-for-publication) thoughts. You wont be too busy returning phone messages from your friends, Im sure, to reply.

In addition to the trash talking, the Sports Alarm has a huge gallery of high resolution pictures of beautiful women and models in bikinis. The most popular models are: Lindsay Lohan, Carrie Underwood, Alessandra Ambrosio, and Paris Hilton.