If you’re as pop culture-challenged as I am, you might shudder at the thought of leaving the friendly confines of the sports world for the entertainment futures market. But hold on there. You don’t have to buy those “newspapers” at the front of the checkout line to sniff out a good bargain.

It’s often just a matter of comparing prices. Here’s an easy one: American Idol 7. At press time, you could bet on David Archuleta at –150 on the moneyline to win the competition (+110 to lose). Or you could bet on David Archuleta to win at 3/2 odds (+150) when matched up against his six remaining opponents, like golf or tennis futures. The second bet is a good deal.

Here’s another one: Will the Idol winner will be under 23 years of age? Betting yes at the same –150 covers 17-year-old Archuleta, plus Jason Castro and Syesha Mercado, both age 21. It’s a blue-light special.

The cynics (and I was one of them) have been answered. The Boston Celtics not only played well with Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen in the fold, they continued to get better. The C’s will go into the playoffs with the best record in the league and the shortest title odds: 3-2 at press time.

It’s a crowded field of contenders; any number of teams could win the championship and deserve it. But Boston stands above the crowd at 62-16 SU and 48-28-2 ATS – making the Celtics the most profitable team in the NBA as well. Not easy to do when everyone expects you to blow out the opposition.

Danny Ainge gets extra marks for adding more and more talent to the roster after picking up Garnett and Allen. You can’t have enough experience or depth at this time of year; Sam Cassell and P.J. Brown provide both. Anything short of a title would be a major letdown.

We’ve all heard of the king of rock and roll and only in America could it happen that they would theme an entire casino in the king’s honor. That’s right, Elvis will be everywhere in the building.

FX Real Estate and Entertainment have just announced plans for and 18 acre development on the Las Vegas Strip with the Elvis Presley theme. This project will be spending an estimated $3 billion to do the king proud. As well as a 2,269 room hotel to be built along with the casino there will be a second smaller hotel and various “Elvis” teamed shops as part of the over all complex.

This Elvis venture will start soon and this venture has also opened up the possibility of other themed casino ventures throughout the industry. The potential is enormous when you consider how this area of the industry may develop.

Do you know enough about the games you’re playing when you go online or to the casino? Lots of people think they know what they’re doing, but in reality they just know the rules of the game. If you answer ‘no’ to any of the following questions, you should go to casino school.

Do you know basic strategy for blackjack?
Do you know why the “come” and “don’t come” bets are the best on the craps table?
Do you know the worst bet on the roulette table, which gives the house a 7.89% edge?
Do you know what you must do on a slot machine to qualify for the progressive jackpot?
Do you know how to collect your comp points whenever you play a game?

These are things that everyone should know if they plan on having a chance to win some money in any casino.

Mine’s hooped.

I did all right in the first round of March Madness. Clemson didn’t get through, nor did South Alabama, my Cinderella No. 10 pick to reach the Sweet 16. But everything else went largely according to plan.

And then it didn’t. The Duke Blue Devils lost. The Georgetown Hoyas lost. The Pittsburgh Panthers lost. There are three Cinderella teams in the Sweet 16, and none of them is South Alabama. Grumble. Losing teams this early is death in a progressive bracket, where the points get bigger as the rounds progress.

And how’s your bracket doing? If you’re perfect so far in the  Bodog Fantasy game, you’re already three-fourths of the way to $1 million. Ah, but what strategy did you use? If you picked a lot of underdogs, you might be a little nervous right now for taking Villanova over Kansas. Then again, your bracket is perfect and mine looks like Bobby Knight threw a chair at it.

I’m thoroughly hopped up on first-round March Madness matchups. I need something to take the edge off – some simple predictions, swiped right off my Tournament bracket. Here’s who I have going to the Sweet 16.

EAST

No. 1 North Carolina vs. No. 4 Washington State
No. 3 Louisville vs. No. 10 South Alabama

MIDWEST

No. 1 Kansas vs. No. 5 Clemson
No. 3 Wisconsin vs. No. 2 Georgetown

SOUTH

No. 1 Memphis vs. No. 4 Pittsburgh
No. 3 Stanford vs. No. 2 Texas

WEST

No. 1 UCLA vs. No. 5 Drake
No. 3 Xavier vs. No. 2 Duke

There are only two picks I’m torn with here: I could have gone with No. 6 Marquette instead of Stanford, and No. 4 UConn instead of Drake. But the Golden Eagles might have their hands full with No. 11 Kentucky, and I think Drake has the upside over the Huskies with that heavenly 20-7-1 ATS record.

The higher the stakes, the bigger the drama. That’s why most college basketball fans are more interested right now in who’s on the Tournament bubble for March Madness, rather than who’s winning the conference tourneys.

Every once in a while, though, you get double the drama: A long shot wins a conference and gets an automatic berth in the big dance. The upset victim usually still gets an at-large bid, which leaves room for one fewer team on the bubble.

The San Diego Toreros are that long shot. Bill Grier’s boys have made the biggest splash thus far at Champ Week, bouncing the St. Mary’s Gaels (-5.5) and the Gonzaga Bulldogs (-7.5) to claim the West Coast crown.

Elsewhere, the Drake Bulldogs continued their magical campaign by winning the MVC title for the first time ever. Drake (20-7-1 ATS) and San Diego (21-9 ATS) are two of the four most profitable teams in Division I. Coincidence? I think not.

Arelia Margarita Taveras, 37, a once rising star of the New York legal community gambled away nearly $1 million USD. She now has lodged a $20 million lawsuit against 7 different casinos, claiming they had “a duty of care” to spot her compulsive behavior and intervene.

Beginning as a mode to relax Taveras soon found herself spending days at the tables. “They had a duty of care to me. Nobody in their right mind would gamble for four or five straight days without sleeping,” said the former lawyer, who once wrote a guide for women chasing ex-partners for child support.

According to her suit, she would play 7 hands of blackjack at once so she could have the entire table to herself, loosing money at $5000 an hour.

After loosing her apartment and her parents’ home, and being left owning nearly $60,000 in tax, Taveras said she contemplated suicide. She was disbarred last June after she admitted taking money from her client’s accounts. She has spent a year in clinics to treat her addiction and now works at a call center.

The size of your bankroll is definitely important to your success when playing blackjack. If you’ve ever played the game, you know that there are winning and losing streaks. If you have a desire to remain in the game and not go broke, having a bankroll big enough to survive the losing streaks is essential.

The Kelly Criterion is the method most gamblers use to gauge their bankroll size. It’s a bet-to-bankroll ratio system that tells you how big the bankroll should be to play at a certain level. The equation is too long to show here, so a rule of bringing 50 bets to the table for a three-hour session will hold you over until you learn the Kelly Criterion.

That’s only for one session. You should carry a bankroll of 300-400 bets and you should have it divided into sessions. And follow your win/loss limits every time.

OK, I will concede that the Survivor reality series is kind of a sport. There are physical challenges, winners and losers, rules, and hot babes in short shorts. Just like the NFL.

Betting on Survivor also happens to be one of the biggest hits on the entertainment futures market. The latest series is called Survivor: Micronesia – Fans vs. Favorites, and we were three episodes in at press time. As you may have guessed, this one pits “fans” of the show against former fan-favorite contestants. You can bet on either a fan (-110) or a favorite (-130) to emerge the sole survivor. I’m wondering if CBS had it in their minds that they wanted a fan to win when they were handpicking 10 of them out of the 800 applicants.

You can also bet on male (+150) or female (-200). You can find charts of voting histories on the Web to guide your handicapping.