The NFL exhibition season wraps up late Friday night with three games out West. The San Diego Chargers and the San Francisco 49ers will be at Candlestick; odds had yet to be posted at press time.

The Niners (2-1 SU, 2-0 ATS) will have wide receivers Bryant Johnson and Ashley Lelie available for the first time this preseason. They’re expected to play the first half, although new starting quarterback J.T. O’Sullivan will only join them briefly at the start of the game. Lelie is coming off a torn calf muscle and needs to play well just to get a job with the Niners.

San Diego (2-1 SU and ATS) is playing on short rest after beating the visiting Seahawks 18-17 Monday night. Seattle was a 5.5-point puppy. Friday will be the first game since the preseason opener for Chargers DT Jamal Williams; without him, San Diego’s starting unit has had some issues on defense.

We’re halfway into the NFL preseason, and we haven’t seen much from the first-stringers. But we’ve seen a few things of note.

The early signs aren’t good for the Cleveland Browns. Already on the radar as a potentially overvalued team at 25-1 to win the Super Bowl, the Browns first unit was shredded on Monday night in an eventual 37-34 loss to the New York Giants. Worse, five players were injured. Quarterback Derek Anderson (concussion) was among them; he may have hurt his hand, as well.

The Philadelphia Eagles (also 25-1) deserve a look as a potentially undervalued team, but wideout Kevin Curtis suffered a hernia injury that will keep him out for at least the start of the season. That might leave the Kansas City Chiefs (125-1) as the most tempting underdog to follow. The Chiefs have finally cleared out the deadwood after last year’s 4-10 campaign. The Super Bowl is a bit much, but going over six wins isn’t.

So we’ve got the New England Patriots in their usual position as the preseason Super Bowl favorites at 7-2. They’ve won three championships in seven years of Bill Belichick and Tom Brady, which makes these odds a steal if they can keep up this pace. Then again, three years have passed since their last one.

Here are the odds for the guys that have won the Super Bowl since 2005:

Pittsburgh Steelers: 18-1
Indianapolis Colts: 15-2
New York Giants: 20-1

The salary cap has done a real number on the idea of a “dynasty” in the NFL. The Dallas Cowboys (6-1) won three in four years back in the 1990s and haven’t won since. The Denver Broncos (50-1) haven’t been the same since John Elway led them to back-to-back championships. Especially in this ultra-competitive league, past results are not necessarily indicators of future success.

Except when they are. Damn, those Patriots are a good football team.

Don King was hoping to put the best two lightweight boxers in the world together in the same ring. Joel Casamayor will indeed be at the MGM Grand on Sept. 13, but he will not be fighting Nate Campbell; instead, Juan Manuel Maquez will move up from the super featherweight division to take a crack at Casamayor’s WBO interim title.

Marquez is coming off a disputed split decision loss in March to Manny Pacquiao, Ring Magazine’s No. 1-ranked pound-for-pound boxer. That high-profile fight ensures a healthy HBO pay-per-view buyrate for Sept. 13; the fight itself might not be so pretty. Marquez is the –325 favorite with Casamayor fighting from behind at +250. It’s expected Casamayor will force the pace in this matchup, which is saying something at age 36. Expect a slow dance that will go the full 10 rounds.

Campbell has a mandatory fight with Joan Guzman (–205) that should be more entertaining, and will be made available on Showtime.

Opening night is in 83 days. Are you ready, LeBron?

The NBA released its 2008-09 schedule today and the opening matchup features a double header on Tuesday, Oct. 28th with the defending champion Boston Celtics taking on LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers; and Greg Oden and the Portland Trail Blazers versus Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers. A star-studded night of basketball to be sure.

For more information on some of the other exciting games taking place during the opening week, plus other cool double headers scheduled to take place over the coming NBA season, click here.

Heading into Thursday’s opening round of the 2008 Reno-Tahoe Open, you could have gotten 5-2 odds on Michelle Wie. Which is to say, she was part of the betting “field” at 5-2 for this relatively minor event – Ben Crane and John Merrick were the co-favorites at 20-1.

Wie is getting slapped around in the media for taking the sponsor’s exemption to play with the men. Some of her fellow golfers questioned her decision (or, quite possibly, the decision of her manager-parents) to skip the Women’s British Open. The blogosphere is kicking it up a notch, painting Wie as a joke and a failure.

Well, here’s the punchline: Wie went into the clubhouse at the Montreux Golf and Country Club at 1-over par for the first round. That’s tied for No. 77 out of 132 golfers, leaving Wie a serious contender to make the cut on Friday. I guarantee Steve Elkington (also +1) isn’t laughing.