La Russa to manage 2012 NL All-Star team

Baseball Betting Lines

01/24/2012 - New York, NY (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The retired Tony La Russa will serve as the manager of the National League All-Star team for the 2012 Midsummer Classic at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City on July 10th.

The longtime manager of the St. Louis Cardinals, La Russa retired after his club's 2011 World Series Championship.

La Russa also led the NL All-Stars in 2005 and 2007. It will mark his sixth Midsummer Classic managerial assignment, matching Joe Torre's total and surpassed only by Hall of Famers Casey Stengel (10), Walter Alston (9) and Joe McCarthy (7). While coaching the Oakland Athletics, La Russa was the American League All-Star skipper from 1989-1991.

The 67-year-old La Russa managed the Chicago White Sox (1979-1986), the A's (1986-1995) and the Cardinals (1996-2011), winning three World Series Championships and making six World Series appearances overall.

La Russa will become the second retired manager to lead an All-Star squad. Hall of Fame manager John McGraw retired following the 1932 season and managed the NL squad in the first Midsummer Classic in 1933.

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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.