The first few seasons of Dion Phaneuf made it look like the Defenseman would be a future Hockey Hall of Fame inductee.  It likely won’t happen, but Phaneuf’s career is worth a solid look.

Phaneuf debuted in the NHL with Calgary in 2005, where he was an All-Rookie, was third in Calder voting and eighth in Norris balloting.  The Canadian had his first 50-Point year as a sophomore, and in his third year, Phaneuf was a top Norris Trophy contender, finishing second for the award, and posting a career-high 60 Points.  Phaneuf, who was an All-Star in 2007, was so again in 2008, but this time he was a First Team All-Star.  After another good year with the Flames, Phaneuf was traded to Toronto, but he never captured the magic he did in Calgary.

Pheneuf began to suffer from injury after injury, but he was considered to be a locker room leader, and morphed into a character player, rather than superstar.  He went to his third All-Star Game in 2012, and he continued his career with stints in Ottawa and Los Angeles before retiring with 494 Points in 1,048 Games.

For a state as far north as Alaska, there are not a lot of hockey players that come from this region.  Brandon Dubinsky is one such player.

Dubinsky split his pro career (13 years) with the New York Rangers and the Columbus Blue Jackets and the Center accumulated 438 Points over his career.  A solid two-way player, Dubinsky had four years where he received (although not many) votes for the Frank J. Selke Award.  He also represented the United States three times Internationally.

Whether you’ve been big into football all your life, playing from a young age and being on the cusp of becoming a pro, if it weren’t for your dodgy knee, or whether you’re a casual armchair fan. We’ve all considered trying our hand at gambling, me personally I’m more into Esports, but I’ve been a Liverpool fan for 29 years at this point SO, you could say I’ve watched my fair share of football. Not all of it has been as good as the last few years, but it has been enjoyable more recently!

So, if you’re wanting to get into betting, where’s a good place to start? What should you be looking out for? Are there any particular betting stats you should be keeping your eyes on? As with pretty much everything, when it comes to staking YOUR money on things, you need to remember to be responsible, this is a risk and if you’re not prepared to risk it, don’t consider it. You’re not always going to win, just because Real Madrid are playing <insert local primary school name> Under 11s team at a packed Bernabeu doesn’t mean they’re guaranteed to win 20-0, crazier things have happened.

I want to preface this article by saying NEVER bet out of your means, just because you see you COULD make £10k by betting £100, if you can’t afford it PLEASE DON’T DO IT. Bet for fun and if that fun stops, stop. IF you end up losing yourself and losing a lot of money, please PLEASE PLEASE don’t chase a win to recoup it, if you’re struggling, please reach out and ask for help. We know how it can be and don’t worry, you’re not the only one. If you understand the risks, we’ll get into it.

So where do we begin? Well, the best way to start is to figure out HOW you want to bet. In my opinion it’s much better to use an app or a website since you have access to everything you need at your fingertips then. If you’d like to visit a brick and mortar store that’s not a bad option, they have staff there who can help point you in the right direction and as a beginner, it’s pretty handy for sure. BUT! Here’s my thoughts. Every betting company has new customer deals, things like deposit <money> and gain <+Money> as free bets, or some companies will have deals like massively increased odds on certain games for new customers. So for example, Liverpool to beat Wolves by 2+ goals, 10/1, new customers? 30/1, MAYBE not exactly to that extent, but you get what I’m saying! Take some time, mull over the options and once you’re settled on a place, we can move on!

Now you’ve decided where you’re going to make your first deposit, what should we be looking out for? There are a few schools of thought here. When I first started, what I’d do was deposit £10 a month, and I’d put small multi-line accumulators on every weekend. So I’d have maybe a treble where it would be say, England to beat Hungary, Portugal to beat Luxembourg and then Sweden and Greece to draw, you have two games on there that “should” be gimmies, England and Portugal which alone has odds of x1.19 as a double, with a 3rd that isn’t a guarantee which is used to give a solid boost to the odds, which in this case is the draw. In this case it boosts the odds to x3.92. That way you’re changing a £1 bet returning £1.19 into £1 that returns £3.92, it’s not a lot and it’s relatively risk free. 

In my opinion this is the BEST way to learn, you can figure out what potential markets you like, you can mess around a little more and have some freedom to figure out what your preferences are, you can figure out HOW the sites themselves work and check out any special markets. Another fun thing to do is tease yourself massively with a crazy pay out. By looking at all the fixtures in the football league for example and just saying every game will be a draw or just picking the favourite for every game. So for example, there are 13 world cup qualifiers tonight, if I pick the betting favourite in each game I get offered a 13 fold accumulator with a x277.19 return, is it likely to come in? Definitely not, but I can LITERALLY put 10p on this with a chance at returning £27.72, so it’s an interesting way to fiddle with things and test out some systems that you’re not familiar with.

There are just a few suggestions on how you could get started with your sports betting, not specifically just football. A question to all the experienced heads in the community,  as a beginner what methods did you use to try and maximise your profits? Did you join betting communities or did you fly solo? We’d love to know, let's share our experiences and help out the newbies in the community! Remember, bet responsibly folks!

In the early 2010’s, Marshawn Lynch could make the claim that he was the best Running Back in the NFL, and if you didn’t believe that you would have to agree that he was one of the best known.  Lynch had over 1,000 Rushing Yards in his first two seasons in football where he was offensive cog of the Buffalo Bills.  He struggled in 2009 and was traded to the Seattle Seahawks early in 2010 in a transaction that Orchard Park would like to forget.

From 2011 to 2014, Lynch would rush for over 1,200 Yards and was in the top seven in that metric each year.  A First Team All-Pro in 2012 (with a career high of 1,590 Yards) he would also have at least 11 Rushing TD those years with him leafing the league in both 2013 and 2014.  Lynch was the focus of the Seahawks offensive attack and it would get them to two straight Super Bowls where he rushed for a Touchdown in Seattle’s Super Bowl XLVIII dismantling of the Denver Broncos.  He led them to the next Super Bowl where he rushed for 102 Yards and a TD but in the last play of the game where everyone thought he would get the ball on the New England 1 Yard Line, he didn’t and Seahawks Quarterback, Russell Wilson threw a pick that ended the game.

Lynch retired after 2015 but would make a comeback for his hometown Oakland Raiders where he played for two more seasons.  He retired again, but made a brief comeback with the Seahawks late in the 2019 season for their playoff run.  This allowed Lynch to retire with over 10,000 Rushing Yards (10,413) and he would gain another 2,214 from the air.  Overall, he would punch the ball in the endzone 94 times.