The best team in the NHL is not the favorite to win the Stanley Cup. Far from it.
The Winnipeg Jets are tied with the Washington Capitals for first place in the entire NHL entering Thursday.
The Jets and Caps have each collected 94 points, eight more than the third-place Dallas Stars and 16 more than the Edmonton Oilers, who spent most of this season as the consensus Stanley Cup favorite.
Edmonton’s price has drifted slightly — the Oilers are sitting around +800 at most sportsbooks — but it’s not the Jets who have jumped to the top of the board.
There are seven other teams in the NHL with shorter Stanley Cup odds than Winnipeg’s 12/1 mark (BetMGM Sportsbook), and four (Dallas, Edmonton, Vegas and Colorado) are in their conference.
One reason that the Jets have slipped through the cracks is that they were relatively quiet compared to their rivals during last week’s trade deadline.
The Stars added Mikko Rantanen, the Colorado Avalanche acquired Brock Nelson and Charlie Coyle, while the Oilers made a shrewd move for Jake Walman.
Winnipeg was expected to be in the hunt for a No. 2 center — it reportedly had plenty of interest in Nelson — but ultimately just nibbled around the edges by acquiring bottom-six forward Brandon Tanev and veteran defenseman Luke Schenn.
Neither of those additions glisten like the ones made by Winnipeg’s rivals, but the Jets added more length to a roster that was already considered to be among the deepest in the circuit.
Nothing gets money to flow in on a team like a blockbuster trade, so it’s not surprising that sportsbooks were quick to shorten the prices on Dallas and Colorado, but that’s also caused bettors to overlook the Jets, who also got better at the deadline.
It’s also quite possible punters just don’t have the appetite to back this Jets team in the playoffs again.
Winnipeg was dumped out in five games in the first round in each of the past two postseasons and hasn’t won a game in the second round since 2017-18.
For all the good work that Vezina Trophy-favorite Connor Hellebuyck has done in the past two regular seasons, he has wilted in the spring and that has caused bettors to question his big-game ability and tread lightly when it comes to backing him in the playoffs.
The most obvious reason why this team isn’t getting much love from the markets is that they are the Winnipeg Jets.
They are the smallest market in the league and aren’t exactly a public darling like the Golden Knights, Oilers, Avalanche or Panthers.
This may sound like an indictment of the Jets, but it’s the opposite.
All of these market forces have kept Winnipeg — the team with the top goal difference, most points and best goals-against average in the NHL — at a very palatable price.
Betting on the NHL?
One that becomes even more tempting when you consider their path.
While Dallas and Colorado will likely face off in Round 1 of the playoffs, Winnipeg will draw the team that finishes in the second wild-card spot.
This means that one of Winnipeg’s biggest rivals in the West will be golfing by Round 2, while the other will be recovering from what would certainly be a hard-fought series before facing the Jets.
And yet, the Stars (+300) and Avalanche (+500) are sitting with considerably shorter odds than the Jets (+600) to win the Western Conference.
Sometimes the betting market is stubborn — and that’s a good thing.
BEST BET: Jets to win Western Conference (+600, BetMGM)
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Michael Leboff is a long-suffering Islanders fan, but a long-profiting sports bettor with 10 years of experience in the gambling industry. He loves using game theory to help punters win bracket pools, find long shots, and learn how to beat the market in mainstream and niche sports.
