Unbelievable but true: We lost our eighth straight National Hockey League (NHL) free bet on YouTube last night as the Blackhawks failed to overcome a 2.5-goal deficit in Colorado and posted a 5-0 shutout had to.
I almost feel guilty reporting that the other two premium hockey picks shared on the MJPicks.com website were winners: Columbus, which covered the +1.5 margin against Vegas, and Shea Theodore, who had fewer than 2.5 shots on goal. This is a recurring theme and I am terribly disappointed with the poor performance of the free picks compared to the performance of the premium picks on MJPicks.com.
Today I would like to share one of my bets on specific players. This season, my bets on NHL players resulted in 62 wins and 50 losses, which is a win rate of 55.4% and a profit of +4.05 units when only “risking one unit per bet”.
Remember, smart bettors aim for a win rate of around 54-58%. If you look at the last 11 bets on hockey players, the result is an astonishing 9:2. So, let's move on.
Tonight the Montreal Canadiens travel to Nashville to take on the Predators. Now my free NHL pick for Tuesday, March 5th is Roman Josi, who will have fewer than 3.5 total shots on goal. The current odds for this bet are between 1.77 and 1.88 in decimal format.
What concerns me is that he has taken more than 3.5 shots in four of his last five games. During that time, he averaged 3.8 shots per game, including 4 against the Avalanche, Senators and Ducks and 5 against the San Jose Sharks.
However, his overall season average is 3.19. Additionally, prior to these five games, Josi had completed ten consecutive games under 3.5 shots. This is encouraging for today's duel because I think he will return to average.
Another concern is that Montreal ranks fourth in the NHL in most shots allowed per game. The team concedes an average of 33.3 shots per game.
Please note that on December 10th, the last time Rosi played against the Canadiens, he finished the night with three shots on goal as the Predators won 2-1.
Although it looks like Josi has been having some success and shooting more often lately, I really like the chances of seeing him under 3.5 shots tonight. According to my mathematical model, this bet has a 57% chance of success, meaning it is a good value bet with decimal odds up to 1.75.
Good luck to you my friend, I'm Professor MJ and I'll see you tomorrow!