Welcome to my Week 23 NHL Betting Report, featuring my
Gambling Power Rankings, results by category, my best bets, and my best/worst
teams to bet on or against. It should be noted that I’m not betting with real
money. These are all fictional wagers in a spreadsheet. If you’re betting with real
money, you should not be betting on every single game, only the games you like
the most. Whereas I’m betting on every game, every over/under, because it
provides a complete dataset for macroeconomic analysis. If you followed my
weekly reports last season, one upgrade is that I’m now logging alt pucklines
for every game, favorites +1.5 goals and underdogs -1.5 goals. Click here to
see my Week
22 Betting Report.
If you’re looking for a big picture commentary on the
last 3 years of hockey betting, you should check out my new book; breaking it down by team, by category, by strategy, by season. There is
plenty of useful information for bettors of all skill levels. It covers
pre-pandemic, peak-pandemic, post-pandemic. What worked, what failed. Lessons
learned, market trends, team-by-team analysis. What impact did the pandemic
have on hockey betting? The market differences between these 3 seasons are
discussed at length, and there's a lot to talk about. To read more, visit
the Amazon
store.
My Weekly Profit: $52
My Season Profit: $18,147
The NHL regular season will reach its conclusion in
less than 3 weeks as many teams limp to the finish line. We have reached that
time of year when a minor injury can mean “out for the season” and teams
comfortably occupying playoff positions start resting their best players to take
a run at the Stanley Cup. At this time last year, favorites were booming, especially
on the puckline -1.5 goals, but history hasn’t been repeating as it was the 2nd worst category of the last 7 days (although they did have a very successful Saturday).
I still managed to turn a profit on favorites -1.5
goals, but largely stayed away (only making one wager on Colorado to cover vs
Chicago). I have reported about the strength of dogs +1.5 so often lately that
it has eroded most of my interest in the other side. Underdog puckline did finish
the week on top of the leaderboard, producing $435 profit on $100 wagers. Below
are a pair of charts showing favorites vs dogs ML and PL this season versus
last in the trade deadline aftermath. As previously stated, history isn’t exactly repeating, but could still end up trending in a similar direction.
At this point last year, underdogs moneyline was nosediving,
which is not repeating, or at least it wasn’t Monday to Friday. It was shaping
into a big week for dog ML before hitting a roadblock on the weekend. If you
bet $100 on each from Monday to Friday, you banked $1,037 profit. Then
favorites went 15-4 on Saturday and Sunday (which would have cost you -$935), thanks largely to home team dominance (home
teams were favored in 13 of 15 Saturday games). Perhaps the last two days is
the beginning of a collapse? We’ll have to wait and see.
It may just be more evidence of home teams performing
well on the weekend, though oddsmakers seemed very aware of any advantage they
might have. This whole home team performing better on the weekend phenomenon
has been on my radar for a few weeks, but I still bet a road heavy slate on
Saturday because there seemed to be a tax on home teams. In other weeks that
has paid off for me, as it is my line value algorithms that have been pushing
me towards visitors all season, leading to big profit. Betting road teams was
never a conscious strategy on my part, or my default wager.
While it was a good week for underdogs, that was not
because of longshots (+200 or higher), which had posted a healthy profit in 5
of the previous 7 weeks. The big reason why they crashed is Chicago, Arizona,
Anaheim, and San Jose went a combined 0-14. The Coyotes and Blackhawks collectively
went 5-1 last week as one of the big underdog success stories, but they came
crashing back down to Earth. In Arizona’s case, they played 3 of 4 on the road,
then barely lost to the mighty Avalanche in a shootout at Mullet Arena.
The two most profitable teams if you bet them to win
every game was Philadelphia and Vancouver, who went a combined 6-1. Both teams continue
making their best effort to screw up their draft lottery position, as I’m sure
both fan bases are confused and/or angered that they’re not properly tanking
to take a run at generational talent. Meanwhile the most profitable team to
bet against was the Tampa Bay Lightning, who continued to struggle with only 5
wins in their last 15 games. This is fantastic news for Toronto fans.
Originally I was planning to complete a 4th
quarter betting report, but those are roughly 15,000 words each and I don’t
want to spend the next 3 weeks analyzing 16 teams that will be golfing when the
report is published. Instead, all that time is being re-allocated into playoff
betting probability with plans to post a “Playoff Betting Preview” before the post-season begins. Among the items on my “to do list”
is building a model to estimate the probability of any given team winning in
different situations. I’ll post a first round preview before the puck is
dropped opening night.
My Week 23 Results
*Note* “Market Return” is based on betting exactly
$100 on every outcome.
Week 22 was the highest scoring of the season to date,
but there was regression in the 7 days that followed (declining from 7.2 to
6.6, which was still the 3rd highest scoring). Overs went 30-24-1,
producing $268 profit on $100 wagers. Granted, that was only $87 profit on the
closing line, as the public pushed totals higher from open to close. Last
week was very profitable for my algorithm, but posted a small loss this week
thanks to too many unders. That forced me to dig a little deeper into what
happened, with some interesting results.
A big reason for my losses came from burning -$500 on Buffalo. The Sabres happened to match-up
against some low scoring teams (Nashville and New Jersey) enough to tilt my
algorithm towards the under, but they weren’t low scoring vs Buffalo. Those two
high scoring games led to a recommendation betting double on the over Saturday
vs the Islanders, and Eric Comrie pitched an improbable 2-0 shutout. The Islanders offense
had been effective in their previous 10 games, adding to that nudge towards doubling
down.
One potential flaw in my algorithm that has come up multiple
times in my various quarterly/weekly post-mortems is when a high scoring team
faces a low scoring team. This has been on my mind for a while, I just hadn’t
attempted to quantify the results until yesterday. It was a wise decision, that I
regret not doing during my All-star break deep dive. My previous algorithm was
a simple 5-game average, switching to a hybrid model after the break. But I
neglected to check what happens when high scoring teams meet low scoring teams.
If we look at 5-game averages in the second half of
the season, when one team is at least 0.75 goals above the betting total with the other at least 0.75 goals below, overs are 42-24-3. I lost -$1,312
on those games. In the second half (excluding Sunday) my O/U return has been
4%. By simply not betting on those 69 over/unders, my return would have been
7.2% (insert 69 joke). Conversely, if you laid $100 on every over when low and
high scoring teams collide, you've banked $1,365. I should code an escape clause
in my model to account for this phenomenon.
When the Buffalo Sabres or Edmonton Oilers come to
town, you can expect a high scoring game even if their opponent hits unders
often. It’s also worth noting that in this sample of second half games, when
both teams are averaging more goals per game in their last 5 GP than the
betting total, overs are 73-49-5 and betting $100 on each yielded $1,483.
Perhaps those should be the only matches where I’m betting double, when both
sides are tilting over. Though I should investigate across a larger sample
before making any major structural changes.
My Team of
the Week: Columbus Blue Jackets, +$987
The Columbus Blue Jackets might be in last place
chasing Connor Bedard, but don’t bother telling the players on the ice to roll
over and die. They pulled off two big wins against the Capitals and Islanders
as +220 and +165 underdogs, before getting crushed 8-2 by Montreal on Saturday.
I bet the right side of all 3 games, the first two because there was value on
their lines as big underdogs, then flipped to their opponent after it was
announced that Patrik Laine would likely miss the rest of the regular season.
They were also far and away my best over/under team, hitting their over in all
three. Those overs are now 9-1 in their last 10 games. Losing Laine can’t help
that, but their goals allowed have skyrocketed since trading Korpisalo.
The Edmonton Oilers were my second best team of the
week, with the team going 2-1 and their overs going 2-0-1 (with me going 5-0-1
on my wagers). Connor McDavid continues to set the league on fire, pacing for
the best season of any player in the salary cap era. My concern would be that
the Oilers are close to being locked into their playoff position where they can’t
really move up or down. If that happens, it would make logical sense to get
McDavid some rest in the final two weeks, rather than gunning to set records.
My Worst
Team of the Week: New Jersey Devils, -$1,050
I have spent a large majority of this season firmly
planted on the New Jersey Devils bandwagon, and they let me down in the last 7
days. My money was on Jersey to win their first two games against Minnesota and
the struggling Sabres, both of which they lost. That helped convince me to bet
Ottawa Saturday with the Devils on a back-to-back, and I got burned. Going 0-3
on their over/unders certainly didn’t help either (they have been alternating
back and forth between unders and overs lately, confusing my algorithm).
The Detroit Red Wings were my second worst team of the
week, going 0 for 8 on my bets. They played 4 times, losing 3, and every single
one of my choices was wrong. Thankfully they were all small wagers, otherwise
they would not have finished in second place. Yes I’m a Wings fan and have
struggled in the past to make unbiased decisions with this squad, but this time
it was my line value algorithms that encouraged me to bet Detroit. The one game
I bet them to lose vs St. Louis was their only victory of the week.
My 3 Best Market
Bets of Week 23: Overall Best Market Bets of Week
23:
1) Home favorites moneyline: +$505 1)
Underdogs +1.5 goals: +$435
2) Heavy favorites moneyline: +$455 2)
Heavy favorites moneyline: +$280
3) Shorting back-to-backs ML: +$403 3) Home underdogs
moneyline: +$275
My 3 Worst Market
Bets of Week 23: Overall Worst Market Bets of Week
23:
1) Unders: -$466 1)
Underdogs -1.5 goals: -$2,295
2) Longshots moneyline: -$400 2) Favorites -1.5
goals: -$967
3) Road underdogs +1.5 goals: -$205 3) Unders: -$742
My Best Teams To Bet On In Week 23: Overall Best Teams To Bet On:
(over/under/hedges not included) ($100 ML + $100 PL+1.5
+ $100 PL-1.5)
1) Los Angeles Kings: +$417 1) Philadelphia
Flyers: +$930
2) Edmonton Oilers: +$276 2) Vancouver Canucks: +$929
3) Vegas Golden Knights: +$270 3) Los Angeles
Kings: +$602
My Worst Teams To Bet On In Week
23
(over/under/hedges not included)
1) New Jersey Devils, -$500
2) Detroit Red Wings, -$300
3) Anaheim Ducks, -$300
4) Arizona Coyotes, -$300
5) Chicago Blackhawks, -$300
My Best Teams To Bet Against In Week
23: Overall Best
Teams To Bet Against:
(over/under/hedges not included) ($100 ML + $100 PL+1.5
+ $100 PL-1.5)
1) New York
Islanders, +$383 1)
Tampa Bay Lightning: +$683
2) Dallas Stars,
+$300 2)
Florida Panthers: +$632
3) Chicago
Blackhawks, +$298 3)
Chicago Blackhawks: +$587
My Worst Teams To Bet Against In Week
23:
(over/under/hedges not included)
1) Minnesota Wild, -$350
2) Buffalo Sabres, -$250
3) St. Louis Blues, -$200
Market’s Best Over/Under Bets In Week
23:
($100 wagers)
1) Florida overs,
+$335
2) Winnipeg unders,
+$291
3) Washington
overs, +$283
Team By Team Power
Rankings
These power rankings are based on the sum of all my bets per team, including
where the money was won or lost. Each week my new Power Rankings will be based
on all the games in the season, not just what happened this week.
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