08/15/2008 - Stockholm, Sweden (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Nick Dougherty and Peter Hanson both posted rounds of four-under 66 on Friday to share the lead at the midway point of the SAS Masters.
Dougherty and Hanson, both of whom were first-round co-leaders, are knotted in first at eight-under 132 at Arlandastad Golf.
Soren Kjeldsen fired a five-under 65 on Friday and shares third place with Patrik Sjoland, who posted a 66 of his own in round two. The pair is tied at six-under 134.
Dougherty birdied the third hole, but that strong start was erased by a bogey at the par-three fourth. He birdied seven and nine to make the turn at six- under for the championship.
At the 12th, a hole Dougherty eagled on Thursday, the Englishman made bogey to fall down the leaderboard. It was his finish that got Dougherty a share of the lead.
Dougherty missed the fairway at the par-five 15th, but ended up with a 15-foot birdie look. He drained that birdie putt and added another at the next par five, the 17th, when he got up and down from a bunker.
Just one off the lead when he stepped to the par-three 18th tee, Dougherty roped a four-iron to 10 feet to set up the birdie that tied him for first place.
With three tournaments left before the European Ryder Cup team is finalized, Dougherty is 15th on the points list. He has dealt with the death of his mother, but Dougherty has gotten back to playing his style of golf with a shot at the Ryder Cup in his eye.
"The Ryder Cup would be lovely and I would be an idiot if I said it does not matter, but more important is enjoying my golf again," said Dougherty, a two- time winner on the European Tour. "I've had my reasons to feel a bit down, but considering how I've played the last few months I've a lot to smile about this week."
Hanson started strong with birdies at his first two holes. He added a birdie at the par-four sixth, then parred his next eight holes around the turn.
Hanson collected his final birdie of the round at the par-five 15th and parred his last three holes to stay in a share of the lead.
Peter Baker (68), Paul Broadhurst (68), Daniel Chopra (64) and Gary Orr (68) share fifth place at five-under 135.
Jamie Donaldson (68), Pelle Edberg (67) and Graeme Storm (66) are knotted in ninth place at minus-four.
Pedro Linhart, who shared the opening-round lead with Dougherty and Hanson, struggled to a four-over 74 on Friday and is part of a group tied for 39th place at even-par 140.
Defending champion Mikko Ilonen shot his second consecutive 70 and is also part of that logjam at 140.
The 36-hole cut fell at one-over-par 141 and world No. 21 Robert Karlsson, a first-round co-leader after last week's PGA Championship, missed the weekend by a single shot.
American Ryder Cup hopeful D.J. Trahan shot a 70 on Friday, but it was not enough. He missed the cut at three-over 143.
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Crew to unveil new forward vs. Cooper-led FC Dallas >>
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Las Vegas Sports Consultants (LVSC) is the world’s premier oddsmaking company and the most respected authority on making the lines. Mike Seba is a Senior Oddsmaker at LVSC and has been making lines for the last six years. In our extended interview, Seba explained that there are 4-5 oddsmakers assigned to make lines for each of the major sports (pro & college football and basketball; MLB, NHL, boxing, golf). Each of these oddsmakers bring unique opinions, strengths and weaknesses to the process. Oddsmakers at LVSC are professional sports junkies who love what they do and would probably do it for nothing if you asked them, but they do get paid for it. By necessity their approach is very research-oriented and concise, since with millions of dollars at risk there is little margin for error.
“You either have a passion for it or you don’t,” Seba said.
“The #1 thing for us is to make a line for each game that creates good two-way action. We do this by drawing from past experiences and applying them to current situations. People think it’s much more complicated, but it’s not. “Divided action means the sportsbook is guaranteed a profit on the game because of the fee charged to the bettor (called juice or vig – typically $11 bet to win $10).
Power ratings are the oddsmaker’s value of each team and are used as a guide to calculate a "preliminary" pointspread on an upcoming game. The power ratings are adjusted after each game a team plays. Examples of non-game factors that would require an adjustment to a team's power rating are key player injuries and player trades.
Once a game’s power rating based pointspread is determined, the oddsmaker will make adjustments to that line after considering each team's most recent games played and previous games played against that opponent. Also, adjustments are made after reading each team’s local newspapers to get a sense of what the coaches & players are thinking going into the game.Since the oddsmaker’s ultimate goal is equally dividing the sports betting action, public perception and sportsbook betting patterns must be taken into account. For example, the public might have heavy betting interest week after week on a popular college football betting team such as USC. If an oddsmaker comes up with a preliminary line of USC -7, then an adjustment up to -7.5 or -8 would be made in response to the public’s expected USC bias.
The last step in the line-making process for each oddsmaker is taking one final look to determine whether or not the line "feels right." This is where common sense and past experience with how games are bet enters into the picture.A round-table discussion among the 4-5 oddsmakers involved in making the line for each sport is then conducted and a consensus line is decided upon by the Odds Director before it is released to the sportsbooks. Of the 4-5 oddsmakers, generally the 2 most respected opinions are weighed more heavily by the Odds Director before he decides on the final line.
Experts working for the individual books having a strong opinion on the game
Individual books having players who consistently bet with certain tendencies (such as an extreme bias toward favorites or toward a certain popular team like USC)The purpose of these adjustments, like all line adjustments, is to more equally divide the betting action.
Once betting begins, sportsbooks can adjust the line at any time. In doing so they attempt to make more attractive the team that is getting less action. By moving the line, sportsbooks can influence how the public bets on a particular game.For example, if the pointspread on a game is 7 and most of the money is coming in on the underdog (taking the +7), sportsbooks will then move the number down to 6 ½ to try and attract money on the favorite.
Moving the line is the oddsmaker's effort to balance betting action, and often times such moves can have a major impact on a bettor’s decision. Oddsmakers can also change the line depending on various event-related factors such as player injuries or weather. Obviously, if the line comes out a week ahead of the event (which is the case in football), there is much that could happen during the week leading up to the event that could affect the line. Oddsmakers have to determine if any changes are necessary and send out an "adjusted line."“The main objective is that our clients get equal action on both sides,” Seba said. “We’re not trying to pick the team that covers the spread, we’re trying to make it a coin flip, a tough decision (for the bettor). If we’ve done that, we’ve done our job.”
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