Back after a day off yesterday, our 8 game undefeated run ended with two losses on Monday night.  We lost a close one with Calgary against the LA Kings while the Toronto Maple Leafs got off to a fast start and beat the Atlanta Thrashers easily.  Both were games I’d play again based on the information going in, so they’re not losses I’m going to lose any sleep over.  All of the boiler room touts scream about their hot streaks and undefeated runs (of course they’re making them up most of the time) when the reality about sports gambling is that the name of the game among serious players is long term value.

I’ve got at least a dozen of the sharpest sports bettors in the world on my cellphone speed dial, and I’m acquainted with many more.  It’s striking how their approach to the discipline is diametrically opposed to what the sports touts sell to the unwitting public.  If a serious player ever went around saying things like ‘I’ve got a 1000 star platinum club special going today’ they’d get laughed out of the room.  Serious players don’t think in this way, and don’t delve into nonsense like ‘games of the year’.  The only time I’ve ever heard a serious player refer to a ‘game of the year’ is in a humorous tone.

Anyway, the college bowl season is about to begin and that’s one of my favorite times of the year.  Football purists gripe about the ever growing number of ‘meaningless’ bowl games but those of us who handicap sports love it.  We’ll start looking at some of the early bowl games in the coming days, as well as continuing our analysis of the ‘in season’ sports.  Today, we’ll start by going back to the NHL:

ST. LOUIS BLUES VS. DETROIT RED WINGS:

Two teams that are having trouble scoring goals meet up in Motown.  We talked about the Red Wings scoring problems last week, and they haven’t gone anywhere.  At home, they’re under the total in 11 of 14 games this season.  They average 2.5 goals per game at home, while the Blues average 2.5 goals a game overall and have gone under in 16 of 25 overall.  In terms of their standing against the rest of the league, Detroit is #18 in scoring offense while the Blues are #29 of 30 teams.  They both have decent defenses (Detroit is #13 in scoring defense, St. Louis #9) and we look for a defensively oriented game here.

The St. Louis Post Dispatch even ran an article today talking about the Blues’ scoring woes.  They conclude there are no easy answers:

St. Louis Blues try to analyze scoring woes

Despite both teams’ scoring problems the total on this game has been posted at 5′, likely due to the past performance of the two teams with 9 of the last 14 going over the total.  We’re big on the ‘styles make fights’ concept of totals handicapping, but the problem with these teams isn’t style of play but lack of offensive playmakers.  They’ve quickly learned that with their scoring problems they have to change that style. Look for this one to stay under the total.

PLAY ST. LOUIS/DETROIT UNDER 5′ -120

Related posts:

1. NHL Hockey Free Picks for Wednesday: Learnin’ The Blues
2. NHL Betting Free Picks For Thursday: Blues In The Night
3. NHL Free Play for 11/23/09: Blue Monday
4. NHL Betting Free Picks: St. Louis vs. Vancouver
5. NHL Free Play for 12/10/09: Southern Fried Hockey and a review