NHL weeknight betting guide: True moneylines for March 8-11

On Saturday night, one of the best bets in sports continued as the Canucks beat the Maple Leafs as significant underdogs. Vancouver hasn't owned Toronto since the start of the pandemic, but its two wins this season give it a 6-4 edge since the 2020 shutdown.

Anyone blindly betting the Leafs has won four units in their wins and lost close to 15 units in their losses; that's -11 units total. In plain terms, assuming Toronto is the favorite each game, and the teams continue to play twice per season, the Leafs would have to win the next 12 games over six seasons to make them profitable and worth bragging about.

Whether it's sitting at the bar or typing in the text chain, in the world of sports betting, that's how bragging rights are defined. Not by record, but by what your team can do for your account - even if they're only your team for one game. In moneyline-centric sports like hockey, it doesn't take much record-wise to have underdogs prove valuable.

The recipe

Before the 2021-22 campaign, we provided a three-chapter series on how to use the regular-season point-total market to create team ratings, how to interpret home-ice advantage, and then how to use those to create your own moneylines.

We'll make a small adjustment to our formula this week, moving this season's on-ice predictive metrics to 75% of our total rating. While our ratings are weighted to this season, the 25% of the ratings based on preseason "priors" means that we can put more emphasis on team metrics without going all-in on what's happened this year. That's important because this season is still a relatively small sample size that contains some tainted results from when COVID-19 ravaged lineups.

The cheat sheet

The following includes my fair price on the matchups (true moneyline) and the moneyline price I would need to bet either side. I just need a 1% edge for a favorite if we're getting better than a fair price on the team that's more likely to win. For the underdog, I'll need 4% or better to make it a bet. On games that I have projected will be a near coin flip, a 2.5% edge is enough to make it a worthwhile wager. I also have a 5% win probability consideration for a side playing in the second game of a back-to-back with travel and 3% for without travel.

Matt Russell is a betting writer for theScore. If there’s a bad beat to be had, Matt will find it. Find him on Twitter @mrussauthentic.