NEVER TELL ME THE ODDS

This week, Bodog, a popular online gambling site, revised their odds for all NHL teams on winning the Stanley Cup, hockey’s ultimate championship. What a surprise it was to see that the local professional ice hockey team in my city, the Vancouver Canucks were the odds on favourite to win the Cup. Bodog has the Canucks at 9/2 or having an approximately 18% chance of taking hockey’s greatest prize. I found the revisions to be absurd, at least for the Canucks.

Though the local team has done relatively well this season as we enter the half-way mark of the 2010-2011 campaign, there’s is a lot more hockey to played and then there’s the issue that the playoffs haven’t even begun yet. I know that Bodog must have kept in mind numerous stats and crunching many numbers before spitting out the odds, they neglected to keep in mind one thing, the Vancouver Canucks are the Vancouver Canucks. By that I mean, no matter what players play on the team, no matter what year it is, the Canucks always find a way to their own defeat. The huge exception to this is of course the team that went to the Cup finals in 1994. Every single player on that team holds a special place in my heart. To me, they didn’t beat themselves, they gave it their all and it was all that anyone could ask for them.

Enough reminiscing though, the odds are for the current incarnation of the team. I think the bookies have put way too much faith on how well the team has done in the regular season. Keep in mind this current collection of players has never gone back the second round of the playoffs. In the last several seasons, the Canucks exited the second round with a whimper, getting badly beaten in many of the key games. It would be slightly different if they put up a huge effort and lost in seven games but that didn’t happen. Despite some interesting player signing during the off-season, the core of the team remains the same. Now one could argue the same players have gotten more mature and are better players today but I’m not so sure that will make a difference in the playoffs. In the last seven games, the Canucks have cooled off considerably and in two of those games they were outright shutout from scoring. I know every team, even the elite ones, have their rough spots during the season but I’m just not feeling it from Vancouver.

In light of this, I’m trying to find a way to bet some money that the Canucks actually won’t win the Cup. I know that makes me sound like a terrible fan but the despite what the bookies think, they truthfully aren’t the real favourites to win the Cup. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love if they actually did triumph but realistically that’s not going to happen. So why not make some money off of something I know more about than the bookies do? If anyone call tell me how I can place like a reverse bet, you let me know.