Conn Smythe Trophy betting: Balancing championship probability
It all looks so tantalizing when you pull up the odds on who will win the Conn Smythe Trophy.
Conn Smythe Trophy Odds
| PLAYERS | ODDS |
|---|---|
| Nathan MacKinnon | +1200 |
| Jonathan Huberdeau | +1500 |
| Aleksander Barkov | +1500 |
| Mikko Rantanen | +1500 |
| Auston Matthews | +1700 |
| Johnny Gaudreau | +2000 |
| Cale Makar | +2000 |
| Andrei Vasilevskiy | +2000 |
| Jacob Markstrom | +2000 |
| Sergei Bobrovsky | +2500 |
| Aaron Ekblad | +2500 |
| Darcy Kuemper | +2500 |
| Nikita Kucherov | +2500 |
| Sebastian Aho | +2500 |
| Frederik Andersen | +3000 |
| Leon Draisaitl | +3000 |
| Kirill Kaprizov | +3000 |
| Connor McDavid | +3000 |
| Mitch Marner | +3000 |
| Steven Stamkos | +3000 |
| Igor Shesterkin | +3000 |
| Matthew Tkachuk | +3000 |
| Gabriel Landeskog | +3500 |
| Marc-Andre Fleury | +4000 |
| Elias Lindholm | +4000 |
| Victor Hedman | +4000 |
| Jack Campbell | +4000 |
| Brayden Point | +4000 |
| Andrei Svechnikov | +4000 |
| Brad Marchand | +5000 |
| David Pastrnak | +5000 |
| Artemi Panarin | +5000 |
| Sidney Crosby | +5000 |
| Adam Fox | +6000 |
| Patrice Bergeron | +6000 |
| Chris Kreider | +6000 |
| Jake Guentzel | +6000 |
| Alex Ovechkin | +6000 |
| Mika Zibanejad | +6000 |
| Evgeni Malkin | +6500 |
| Vladimir Tarasenko | +7500 |
| Ville Husso | +7500 |
| John Tavares | +7500 |
| Sam Reinhart | +7500 |
| Claude Giroux | +7500 |
*all others not listed are 75-1 or higher
What other futures market has the favorite listed at 12-1?!
How to find value
You need to start with the champion and work backward. This isn't an era where Ron Hextall or Jean-Sebastien Giguere can win from the losing side.
Let's look at the Toronto Maple Leafs as an example. They're 10-1 to win the Stanley Cup, implying they'll snap their epic drought 9% of the time this postseason plays out. Of that 9%, you then have to assign a value to each possible team MVP. Here's how that might look:
| PLAYER | PROBABILITY | SHARE OF 9% | FAIR ODDS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Auston Matthews | 66% | 6% | 15-1 |
| Mitch Marner | 11% | 1% | 99-1 |
| John Tavares | 11% | 1% | 99-1 |
| Jack Campbell | 5% | 0.5% | 198-1 |
| Morgan Rielly | 5% | 0.5% | 198-1 |
| Other | 2% | 0.2% | 500-1 |
Matthews at 15-1 is the closest we'll get to fair value, but that's after making him 66% likely to be the Leafs' most valuable player. He was that this season, but Toronto would need an outlier performance from someone else if it wants to win the Stanley Cup. Maybe that's clutch scoring from Marner or Tavares, but it could also be a surprise string of hot goaltending performances.
More importantly, if you're looking to talk yourself into someone other than Matthews, where does that win probability come from? Marner, for example, would need to be 33% likely to be the Leafs' MVP to be worth betting at his offered price. Are you taking some off Matthews' slice of the pie? Or are you eliminating everyone not named Matthews and Marner?
What about the Cup favorite Colorado Avalanche? Oddsmakers expect them to win the Cup 22% of the time. Here's how the Avalanches' top candidates are priced and the implied probability of each hoisting the Conn Smythe.
| PLAYER | ODDS | IMPLIED PROB. |
|---|---|---|
| Nathan MacKinnon | +1400 | 6.7% |
| Mikko Rantanen | +1600 | 5.9% |
| Cale Makar | +1800 | 5.3% |
| Darcy Kuemper | +2500 | 3.8% |
| Gabriel Landeskog | +3300 | 2.9% |
Those five players add up to 24.6%, which is more than 22%. Maybe you believe that one of the above should have a larger piece of the pie, but it's unlikely you're getting a good bet versus just taking Colorado outright. The same issue exists for other top contenders with depth like the Panthers, Lightning, and Bruins.
Best bets
Connor McDavid (+3000)
This is a decent bet if you believe McDavid will win a Stanley Cup at some point in his career. You might be willing to bet this every season for the next 20 years, knowing that it'll be profitable when he does it. As long as McDavid's odds (30-1) at winning the Conn Smythe are even the slightest percentage longer than the Edmonton Oilers' odds of winning the Cup (18-1), he's a good value.
Sidney Crosby won the Conn Smythe in 2017 when he scored just eight goals, and he didn't lead the Pittsburgh Penguins in points that postseason. There's a zero percent chance that voters will look elsewhere if the Oilers win the Cup and McDavid posts even modest stats. Of course, if Edmonton wins it all, it'll be because he was outstanding.
Matthew Tkachuk (+3000)
Flash goes a long way with voters in other sports, especially in the small sample sizes of the NBA Finals and Super Bowl. In the NHL, grit is a hit over the long grind of the playoffs.
Markstrom and Gaudreau have shorter odds, as a goaltender and leading scorer often do on a contender. The Calgary Flames' best chance to win the whole thing comes from Tkachuk being a force up front. Players combining size and skill get a lot of attention from the media as a difference-maker in the playoffs. At 30-1, Tkachuk might get more of the probability pie than he's allotted in this market.
Kirill Kaprizov (+3300)
Sometimes betting and odds valuation comes down to name recognition. With 47 goals and 108 points, Kirill Kaprizov isn't a household name in even some of the most die-hard hockey families. However, that means his Conn Smythe price might be depressed for that exact reason.
The Minnesota Wild doesn't have a clear-cut star defenseman or a goaltender who will get a ton of voting attention should the team make a run to the Stanley Cup. Unlike past years, they're a club that prides itself on its scoring. If the Wild lift the Cup, it'll be because they outscored their opponents on the way, getting Kaprizov all the attention.
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.