2023/24 Week 14 Betting Report

Week fourteen of the NHL season has been logged into the history books and with it we say goodbye to the first half of 2023/24. First, I’d like to wish Martin Luther King a happy birthday. Good job by you. I’m already 4,000 words into my Q2 Report which should be ready in 7-10 days. The beginning of the second half also marks day one of my “Tournament of Models” which will continue until the final day of the regular season. There will be an entirely new tournament kicking off in the playoffs and a few new post-season specific models will be unveiled in the spring. Ziggy the “zig zag” model who always bets the loser of the previous game will be the first off the factory floor.
 
Before we go any further, it’s time for my obligatory *DISCLAIMER* it needs be noted that I’m not betting with real money. These are all fictional wagers in a spreadsheet. My mission is to engage in a mass betting campaign, picking a winner of every single game, every over/under, because it provides a complete dataset for macroeconomic analysis, which can be shared with you, shedding light on what worked and what failed. I’m also tracking the results of betting every outcome, to help me (and you) uncover previously unknown or newly emerging profit vectors. What started as a thought experiment has evolved into much more.
 
My blog has been moved to Substack this season and I’ll be repeatedly encouraging everyone to sign-up for a free subscription to alleviate my dependence on Twitter for traffic. I’m concerned that Elon will follow through on his threat to charge everyone for Twitter and ostensibly destroy his own company. Subscribers receive an email notification each time a new post is published, and even if Twitter stays free, the algorithm likes to hide Tweets with links so you don’t leave. You’ll also receive weekly exclusive picks emails that are not posted on my blog.
 

This was not a good week for me, doing a little regressing back to the mean after a strong few weeks, but there were a few specific teams who inflicted a disproportionate amount of damage. Nearly half of my total loss came from Chicago covering +1.5 against Edmonton and Winnipeg, as I dared venture into max bet -1.5 goal territory after abstaining for most of December because the Hawks best player is out of the line-up. I’ve been so busy preparing all these models for the start of Q3 that perhaps I’ve been overlooking my picks. The only models I’m allowing myself to build between now and the end of the regular season are playoff models.
 
Over/under was also a problem for me this week, which is very confusing considering I’m following either my primary (aka Prime) or Max Profit every game and both of those turned a profit this week. The answer is chronological, Prime started poorly, Maximus excelled early, and by the time I flipped my picks, that reversed. Shit happens. It does bother me a little that my performance for the quarter is significantly worse than both the algorithms I’m most often using to decide my own selection. My perception of value might be flawed. Perhaps I need a “shorting value” over/under model? I’ll dig a little deeper into my mistakes during the all-star break.
 
With all the renovations and model work I’ve been doing lately to prepare for this tournament, I’ve been posting model weekly results, but not for the full quarter. Some models received upgrades; some were deleted entirely. But with my new self-imposed ban on model construction, my focus can get back to my current advisory team and figuring out all their strengths and weaknesses. There are some new kids on the block that were already discussed last week, but still have not been added to my “Model Explainer” reference page. The latest additions are being called my “Hedge Fund” because they actually bet against the value they were designed to find.
 
Two hedge fund members are particularly confusing to me, the two goalie-based versions that were introduced in past previews, Goalies vs Teams and Goalies Last 30 Days. Both were so terrible that I decided to run their data through a 230-game sample to see if betting the opposite yielded positive results, and they did. What’s the problem? Okay, if Juuse Saros is 0-6 against the Edmonton Oilers in my sample (that’s a guess), the original model would make a big bet on Edmonton. It defies logic why it would be profitable to bet on goalies who are bad against that opponent, or betting a goalie who owns an opponent to lose. It makes no sense.
 
The goalie hedge funds are official entries in the tournament, so we’ll see if this extends into a larger sample. The original models input data is still in my Game Summary worksheet, so they could compete too, but it’s clutter. The final model to join the team is being called my “Grand Aggregator” that adds up the total amount of money that all the models have on each outcome and bets the largest. It does not have an upper limit on bets, but will mostly be under $500. There’s a simple formula that uses the total profit to approximate the bet size. It wouldn’t be hard to retroactively apply these composite bets going back earlier in the season, but we’ll get to it eventually.
 
I considered modifying the bet selection algorithms for Tailing History and Betting Venues, but decided to leave them in their current form (each already received upgrades a few weeks ago). “Tails” did end up having a good week because of the success of road teams, but it was a bad quarter. The optimal modifications would have been limiting bet sizes to minimize loss, but the whole point of Tails is to be my canary in the coal mine for historical replicability. If the model loses $10,000 in January but then gets hot in February, I’d like to know that history is repeating again. But that doesn’t mean you need to see what all the picks are ahead of time. Maybe it’s better if you don’t, but the model serves a purpose. Betting Venues too.
 
My “Dog Lover” and “Fave Lover” concepts were revived to simply use the same data as Max Profit, adding up the profit from all the models on VML, V+1.5, V-1.5, HML, H+1.5, H-1.5 in the last 30 days involving these teams. They don’t bet on teams with a back-to-back disadvantage and abstain when the models are collectively losing money on the dog or favorite. What’s interesting after running these two newbies through the last week worth of games, they both turned a profit despite often making conflicting picks. These will be handy if I’m leaning more on Max Profit, because Max may lay $500 on the favorite when the Dog Lover has $500 on the opposite side.
 
One more introduction is required to a model I’m just calling “Weighted Wins”, which required me to create an entirely new statistic for permanent tracking that could have other applications. The stat is easy to explain on a conceptual level, if you beat Colorado, that’s 1.5 wins. If you lose to Colorado, that’s 0.5 losses. Beat San Jose, it’s 0.5 wins, lose to San Jose, and it is 1.5 losses. We then compute a weighted win percentage for each team and compare it to the implied probability of the betting line. This is another model that “bets against value”, because it was profitable to do so. It was fit to second half data from the previous 2 seasons, ignoring 2021, producing an 8% profit.
 
Weighted Wins is the most sophisticated model in my “hedge fund”, but we’ll soon find out if that’s a good thing. Oh yeah, there’s one more model I’m just calling “Shorting Goalies” right now, which is another hedge fund that bets against line value. I’ll try to explain that one later (the picks aren’t shared below).
 
 
My Team of the Week: Colorado Avalanche, +$568
 
The Colorado Avalanche went 3-0 this week, and I went 3-0 picking their wins and losses, 2-1 on their over/under (taking the over in all 3 games). That top unit is a beast, and I’m riding this wicked MacKinnon heater (in my 24 sports predictions for 2024, I had Nate winning the Hart and Art Ross). They went down 3-0 to Toronto on Saturday and I Tweeted that Avs are +650 on the live line and no lead is safe against this team. But that Tweet lacked conviction because I’ve watched enough of their games to know they also lose some of these 7-4. Just a note to check the live line when Colorado falls down by a few goals, because they can fight back better than anyone.
 
My second best team of the week was the Arizona Coyotes, but that was mostly a product of accurately picking their over unders, not accurately picking their wins and losses. It does feel like the magic of the Mullett is starting to wear off, in part because they’ve been losing more on home ice, but also because the line price can be prohibitive. I’ll be very interested to see how my hedge funds are performing on Arizona at home. There’s some more work to do before all the models are plugged into my team-by-team and category-by-category pages, but it’s coming soon.
 
 
My Worst Team of the Week: Chicago Blackhawks, -$711
 
As previously mentioned, the Chicago Blackhawks held the proverbial murder weapon after doing an autopsy of my mangled mess of a week. Zach Hyman had multiple opportunities to score on the empty net and personally let me down, despite actually scoring the goal that put them ahead 2 goals before that was called back after a half hour offside review. There should be a time clock on reviews. If you can’t see obvious evidence to overturn the ruling in 30 seconds, the goal stands. Fortunately, I did hit the Stars ML on Saturday to win a little of that money back.
 
Not far behind Chicago in my weekly loser rankings was the New York Islanders, which I’ve lamented in some of my recent picks pieces that when I’m sharing my picks on Islanders games, I tend to feel stupid afterwards, whether picking them to win or lose. I’m strongly considering abstaining from sharing Islander picks until they become a little more predictable. One of the problems is that Semyon Varlamov is injured, and Ilya Sorokin has a .901 SV% in the last 30 days. You can get awesome Sorokin any given game, but he can get lit up too. It’s better to stay away from goalies like that, though my mandate is betting every single game, so I’ll need to figure this out.
 
 

My Week 14 Results

*Note* “Overall Market Bets” based on betting exactly $100 on every outcome.
 

 
There weren’t many strong categories for me this week, failing to adequately pounce on the surge in road teams despite being prepared for this to happen (see my preview from 8 days ago). Dogs +1.5, -1.5, visitors +1.5 and -1.5 all cracked the overall leaderboard this week, while visitors -1.5 goals were my second worst category (there is big overlap in my visitors -1.5 and faves -1.5 number). Aside from taking Buffalo -1.5 vs San Jose today, my failure at faves -1.5 this week has inspired a brake pump on my burgeoning enthusiasm. I just want the Sharks and Hawks to comfortably suck. They play tomorrow, more on that below.
 

The Winnipeg Jets bandwagon hit a bump in the road, losing to Philadelphia and failing to cover -1.5 goals vs Chicago. It does raise my eyebrow that the Oilers, Rangers, and Panthers are all on my worst teams to bet list this week, as these are 3 of the league’s best teams. Florida losing to New Jersey without Hughes cost me $300, while New York losing to St. Louis and Washington cost me $400. Those were all defensible picks and I’m assuming were popular recommendations among the punditry community. I know Matt Murley over at Chiclets Game Notes had Winnipeg -2.5 goals against Chicago, and had Edmonton -1.5 goals against those same Blackhawks. I was not alone.
 

One of the reasons for my over/under struggle this week is because under 6 and over 6.5 were better than the standard over 6 and under 6.5 combo that Tailing History has mostly been riding this season. Unders went 10-8 when the total was 6, and overs went 15-14 when the total was 6.5. Pushing in the opposite direction was problematic.
 

Team By Team Profitability Rankings

These profitability rankings are based on the sum of all my bets per team, including where the money was won or lost. Each week my new Profitability Rankings will be based on all the games in the season, not just what happened this week.
 

 

Me vs Myself

 
For those of you who are new here, the “Me vs Myself” section outlines my competition against my betting models, in my vain attempt to prove my own decision making is superior to the models that I’ve created. Me vs my creations. But rather than explain myself every week, a new post was published outlining how all these models make their decisions. For the full breakdown, click here. Granted that page needs to be updated in the next few days, and some of the models have been changed since the last update. I’m not posting my standard model by category graphic for this week (amid ongoing renovations), but you’ll be getting full model Q2 results category-by-category and team-by-team soon.
 

Above is my entire team of 15 over/under algorithms, which were surprisingly led by Full Season Avg this week. That one was relegated to the bench last month for poor performance, but seems to be trying to win back a seat on my advisory team (aka the Over Under Council). Also Betting Goalies has been a flawed formula and has been supplanted by Goalies Last 30 Days as my best goalie-based formula. Shorting Goalies is another one created recently, but it’s a little redundant and will often bet the same outcome as GL30. I’m also considering some betting against line value models (I could just flip Prime Line Value, which collapsed after a strong start (possibly because line “value” is bad)).
 
Below are our picks for tomorrow. Keep in mind that the “Return” number hasn’t been created yet for Weighted Wins and the Grand Aggregator. Also be aware that I’m in the early stages of a cold streak, and did not do well on my picks this afternoon (thanks to Florida and Vancouver choking 3rd period leads). Not how I wanted to start the first quarter, but now that my model building is complete and my focus can shift back to picks, I’m hoping another hot streak is brewing, just wai
ting to emerge from the ashes.
 
 
SEA @ NYR:
 

At first glance it looks strange that a team winning 9-straight games is a +164 underdog. The reason would seem to be playing the Penguins today with Joey Daccord in net, meaning this should be Driedger tomorrow (who was good in his only start this season). I’m taking the Rangers ML because my models are overwhelmingly going ML at -198 (the Grand Aggregator has a big bet on HML). Max Profit is the only one taking the Seattle ML, because he doesn’t care about back-to-backs (I should actually check how he’s doing on those games, because not caring could be detrimental). Dog Lover uses the same data, but sits out back-to-backs. It’s worth noting that my “Fave Lover” is sitting this one out too because my models are collectively losing money on each of HML, H+1.5, and H-1.5 with these teams last 30 days. That should probably be a warning that this Rangers bet is not safe. Interestingly, Betting Venues and Expected Goals L30 haven’t laid a penny on any HML on Ranger home games or Seattle road games the last 30 days. The Over/Under Council (aka the OUC) is voting 7-2 on under 6 goals, which is my pick as well.

 
COL @ OTT:
 

My eyebrow raised upon seeing Colorado only favored -135 against Ottawa, but they have Georgiev playing today, so this should be Ivan Prosvetov in goal (.757 SV% last 30 days). Avs will be on a back-to-back, but Anton Forsberg is injured and Joonas Korpisalo has not exceeded an .890 SV% in his last 6 games. Or this could be Mads Sogaard (.889 SV% in 19 games last season) who has not started in the NHL this season. My models are overwhelmingly on Ottawa because of the back-to-back, but I’m not going to overthink this and just continue riding the Avalanche. Avs 8-2 last 10, Sens 4-6. My favorite bet is over 6.5 goals (Betting Goalies is expecting 9.1 goals, while Goalies Last 30 Days is more conservative at 7.6). The line is at -135, so this could move to 7 after goalies are confirmed. I’d probably still bet over 7, but with less enthusiasm.
 
 
ANA @ WSH:
 

The Washington Capitals have won 3 of their last 10 games, Anaheim 3 of 10 (they just beat Florida in OT). That makes me uncomfortable betting Washington at -205 despite Anaheim being on short rest. Alex Ovechkin is currently day-to-day with an injury, so I’m going to put a minimum bet on Ducks +1.5 goals at -142 and move on. I’m also taking under 6 goals, which has 8-1 support from the OUC but hasn’t been a profitable wager with these teams in the last 30 days.
 
 
NYI @ WPG:
 

My Islander picks have been so bad lately (whether picking them to win or lose) that you might be better off fading my pick. Jets are without Mark Scheifele, but Kyle Connor is a full participant at practice and could be back any game now. Islanders play Minnesota tonight then fly to Winnipeg. Ilya Sorokin is starting today, Varlamov is on IR, so this could be Ken Appleby who has never played in the NHL. For that reason, I have to take the Jets, and over 5.5 goals. That over is at -130, but if it moves to 6, I’d rather have the under.
 
 
LA @ DAL:
 

The LA Kings have lost 8-straight games and are playing in Carolina today, then flying to Dallas. They’re about to beat the Carolina Hurricanes, so the losing streak is over, but the travel situation is putting me on the Dallas ML -148. That being said, my confidence on Dallas beating LA without Miro Heiskanen is mild at best, so I’m just putting a minimum bet. I’m also going to tail the 7-2 vote by the OUC on over 6.5 goals. Rittich is starting today for the Kings, meaning Talbot is tomorrow, and I’m not sure that helps them tomorrow. Talbot has been leaking lately.
 
 
SJ @ CHI:
 

The Sharks lost 3-0 in Buffalo this afternoon, and are flying to Chicago as I’m writing this (presumably, I’m not tracking their current location). The models overwhelmingly like Chicago, and I’m going to put a minimum bet on their ML -130 despite missing Bedard. My feeling is that a warm weather team like the Sharks are going be miserable in these winter conditions, like a “fish out of water” so to speak. I’m also taking under 6 goals.
 
 
TOR @ EDM:
 

The Edmonton Oilers are 10-0 in their last 10 games while Toronto is 4-6. I’m taking the Oilers ML at -148, but some of you already know that there’s a disclaimer coming. I’m running a large negative balance betting Edmonton to win this season, and the Leafs historically play their best hockey when I pick them to lose (though I’m running a positive balance on their losses this season). Just keep that in mind if you’re going to tail. If you bet Edmonton and Toronto wins 6-0, you were warned. I’m also taking under 7 goals, which was a clean sweep by the OUC.

ARI @ CGY:
 

The Calgary Flames have won 6 of their last 10 games (Arizona 5-5) and just swept their recent dads trip. While Calgary is growing more enticing and soliciting my attention more often, I can’t take them as a -170 favorite against Arizona. I’m going to put a minimum bet on Arizona ML at +142 and over 6 goals. Not many thoughts on this game aside from that.