Eclipse Award finalist Havre de Grace in Big Easy

Horseracing Betting Lines

01/05/2012 - New Orleans, LA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Horse of the Year candidate Havre de Grace has made her way to Fair Grounds Race Course where she will begin her 2012 racing season. The five-year-old mare had been stabled at Vinery Racing's Florida location near Ocala.

"She's just sleeping right now," trainer Larry Jones said a few hours after the mare arrived at the track early Thursday morning. "We haven't even had her out walking. We just walked her right to her stall and let her sleep. She looks good."

Owned by Fox Hill Farms, Havre de Grace is a finalist for the 2011 Eclipse Award as champion older filly and mare and is expected to be in the running as Horse of the Year.

"She's one of the few candidates with a winning record, and we could have kept her undefeated if we'd picked some easier spots for her," Jones said on Wednesday, referring to Havre de Grace's two losses in 2011. "We could have run her in the Breeders' Cup Ladies' Classic like we did the year before. We'd beaten Royal Delta (2011 Breeders' Cup Ladies' Classic winner) by eight- lengths in the Beldame but we thought our horse deserved the chance against male rivals (in the Breeders' Cup Classic, where she finished fourth after being bumped).

"Earlier last summer in the Delaware Handicap (when Havre de Grace was second by a nose to Blind Luck) I didn't like the weights and I thought about scratching her, but we felt we owed it to the Delaware people to go ahead and let her run."

Jones is based at Fair Grounds this winter and mentioned on Wednesday that is where his mare will open her five-year-old campaign.

"At this time, we're more than likely to point her for the New Orleans Ladies," said Jones. The $100,000 stakes is set for Saturday, March 17.

Havre de Grace won five of seven starts in 2011 for more than $1.6 million. She won the Apple Blossom and Azeri at Oaklawn Park followed by the Obeah, Woodward and Beldame.

Jazzdports Horseracing Betting News

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

Football Betting

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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