Weekly Sports Betting Roundup: August 1

The Boston Red Sox get a visit from both the Cleveland Indians and the rival New York Yankees in an upcoming sports betting week that also offers up a NASCAR event at Pocono Raceway, a pair of PGA Tour events in Akron and Reno, a full slate of Canadian Football League action, and a major MMA show in Philadelphia.

Holding down top spot in the AL East division standings, the Red Sox will find that position under siege this week as they host a couple of other American League playoff contenders in the Indians and the Yankees. That stretch gets underway on Monday night with the Tribe beginning their four-game series at Fenway Park.

John Lackey (9-8, 6.20 ERA) and his ugly ERA will head to the hill for the Red Sox in Monday's betting matchup, while the Indians counter with Josh Tomlin (11-5, 4.01 ERA). Righthander Lackey has pitched better of late, winning each of his last four starts while allowing just seven earned runs over those 25 innings of work. Righthander Tomlin has pitched Cleveland to just a 1-3 mark in his last four starts.

Other early-week series on the MLB betting board include Texas at Detroit, the Yankees at the White Sox, and Minnesota at the Angels in the American League, and St. Louis at Milwaukee, Philadelphia at Colorado, and Arizona at San Francisco in the National League. Along with the Yankees at Red Sox this weekend it'll be Cleveland at Texas, the White Sox at Minnesota, and Philadelphia at San Francisco.

This weekend's Sprint Cup Series event will be raced at Pocono Raceway on Sunday, with the drivers competing in the Good Sam RV Insurance 500 (formerly the Pennsylvania 500). Jeff Gordon is a five-time winner in Cup events at Pocono, visiting Victory Lane at the track in the 5-Hour Energy 500 back in June. Greg Biffle, Denny Hamlin, and Carl Edwards are the three most recent Pennsylvania 500 winners.

The world's top golfers will be in Akron, Ohio this week for the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational at the Firestone South Course – including Tiger Woods, who has announced he'll make his return from injury for this event. Woods has won this tournament seven of the 12 times it has been held, most recently in 2009. Hunter Mahan is the defending champion. PGA Tour golfers not qualified for the Bridgestone Invitational will be in Reno this week for the Reno-Tahoe Open at Montreux G&CC.

Week 6 of the Canadian Football League season gets underway on Thursday night, with Montreal (3-2 SU, 2-3 ATS) at Toronto (1-4 SU, 2-3 ATS). On Friday night it's then Edmonton (5-0 SU, 4-1 ATS) at Winnipeg (4-1 SU, 5-0 ATS) and Saskatchewan (1-4 SU, 1-4 ATS) at British Columbia (0-5 SU, 1-4 ATS), with the week's schedule ending on Saturday with Hamilton (3-2 SU, 3-2 ATS) at Calgary (3-2 SU, 2-3 ATS).

Finally, the MMA calendar offers up UFC 133: Evans vs. Ortiz from Philadelphia on Saturday night. Oddsmakers at Bodog have Rashad Evans set as the -400 favorite for the main event on Saturday, with Tito Ortiz listed as the +300 underdog. As well, Vitor Belfort is a -285 favorite at Bodog against Yoshihiro Akiyama (+225), with Chad Mendes (-625) big chalk against Rani Yahya (+425).