NHL weekday betting guide: True moneylines for every game

If we're being honest, it's always kind of a guessing game: NHL oddsmakers and bettors alike, trying to figure out how to price a hockey team with this player out or that backup goaltender in.

We use the information that oddsmakers give us in the form of previous odds, and with some high school math prowess, we turn them into team ratings. Then, 60-some-odd games get played, and around the time the calendar turns to March, it gets entirely jumbled, shifted, and twisted all around. That's the effect of the trade deadline.

Already a below-average team (-13%), the Red Wings traded Filip Hronek, Tyler Bertuzzi, and Jakub Vrana at the deadline. Each player is interesting enough to be traded for, but none move the needle on a nightly basis when it comes to pricing a team. While Vrana hasn't contributed this season, do the collective deals mean the Red Wings need a further downgrade post-deadline?

What about the Predators? A purely average team (+1%) - which had already seen Filip Forsberg and Ryan Johansen go out with injuries - traded away its fourth- and fifth-highest scorers in Mikael Granlund and Nino Niederreiter, along with its second-best defenseman, Mattias Ekholm, all after Tanner Jeannot was deemed valuable enough to garner a decent package from the Lightning. How much below average are the Predators now that they're left with Roman Josi, Matt Duchene, and little else?

On the positive side of things, the Kings - a team I have rated 5% above average - somehow found themselves in a playoff spot despite getting goaltending of the same low quality as teams that have long given up on the postseason. Presumably desperate to stop playing 6-5 games, they added Joonas Korpisalo. Under the radar with the Blue Jackets, Korpisalo has actually been a top-10 goaltender, with a plus-10.18 Goals Saved Above Expected over fewer than 30 games played.

When Korpisalo starts for the Kings, how much of a boost should they get with the assumption of even average goaltending for that game? What if we assume above-average goaltending, as Korpisalo provided when he stopped 24 of 26 shots as part of a 4-2 win over the Blues on Saturday? What if his presence translates to even better play from Pheonix Copley if/when he starts on a more limited basis? The Kings can't be judged through a lens of 41 games started by Jonathan Quick and Cal Petersen, but with a 20-6 record in games not started by those two, Los Angeles might be on the come up, particularly dangerous in a wide-open Western Conference playoffs.

The recipe

We started the campaign using regular-season point totals as a baseline for rating teams since it's our best measurement. Throughout the campaign, we adjust club ratings using on-ice metrics to remove the cognitive bias of win-loss records, which can be skewed by outliers like special-teams results, poor goaltending performances, and other unreliable events.

The cheat sheet

There are no bad bets at the right price, but how do we know what a good price is?

The following includes my fair price on the games (true moneyline) and the moneyline price I'd need to bet either side. I only need a 1% edge for a favorite if we're getting better than a fair price on the team more likely to win. For the underdog, I'll need 4% or better to make it a bet. For games I project to be closer to a coin flip, a 2.5% edge is enough for a worthwhile wager. I also have a 5% win probability consideration for a team playing in the second game of a back-to-back with travel and a 3% consideration for a team on the second leg of a back-to-back without travel. When it comes to injured players, I do my best to estimate the impact on their team's win probability.

When the betting markets open up the night before, you can compare those prices with our "price to bet" column to see if you're getting any value with either side's moneyline. There's also a possibility that a moneyline moves into a bet-friendly range at some point between market open and puck drop.

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.