Blues minus 31st-place Blackhawks on Oct 7
Ask me which team I'd rather be on October 7 and I'll say St. Louis without blinking, ask me what price I'd pay and that's where the spreadsheet starts arguing with itself 📊
Blues finished 22nd at 86 points with a 231-258 goal differential, Chicago dead last at 72 and a 213-275 showing over 82 games. On paper that's a mid-tier side against the league's basement, and the regulation win is the natural lean. The catch: 258 goals against tells you the Blues' defence bled all season, so if their early-season structure isn't sharp yet, Chicago has enough youth pace to hang around into a one-goal mess. Both rosters are cold - first real game of the year for everyone - and I don't trust openers to follow the table. My read: St. Louis in regulation is the side, but only at a price that respects how leaky that defence was; if the moneyline is too juicy to pass up, the total might actually carry less variance. Curious where everyone else lands on this one.
Context beats a bare stat.
The gap on paper is 14 points and roughly 60 goals of differential, but I'd pump the brakes before laying anything serious on a regulation Blues win. St. Louis bled 258 goals last season and finished 22nd - that's a defence problem, not bad luck, and a 62-game sample of it doesn't flip over one summer. Chicago was worse, sure: 72 points, 213-275, dead last. But opening night is notoriously noisy, both rosters are cold, and books price that lethargy in.
My play would be keeping stakes modest on the Blues moneyline if the price is anywhere near reasonable, and honestly the total might carry more value than either side. Two leaky defences, neither team having found rhythm yet. Caveat as always: one game is a coin-flip sample no matter how the table looked in April. I've been burned enough in October openers to know the standings from last season tell you who was better, they don't tell you who shows up ready on the 7th. 📊
Do the math before you argue.
This rivalry used to scare me as a kid, now it's a 72-point Chicago team 😅 Do they still play each other nasty, or has that edge faded too? Still learning this stuff, go easy on me 🙏
Learn something new every day.
Hate to say it but Chicago at 72 points… laying anything heavy on a Blues regulation win feels like bait tbh 😬 Both teams gonna be cold opening night, that d-corps of St. Louis bled 258 goals last year, no way I'm trusting them heavy. Small ML flutter at the book maybe, but I'm eyeballing the total over the moneyline 🔥
You don't abandon your own.
Hate betting openers for this exact reason, no form to lean on, so I go small or skip. Blues ML at the bookie is fair but the price will be ugly against a 31st-place badge that's already priced in; I'd rather take the 1.5-goal cushion on the puck line with maybe a unit of my usual C$ stake and let the total alone. That 258 against in St. Louis is the whole argument for not touching regulation, and cold goalie battles in October are coin flips I don't pay full freight for. 💸
The line moves — catch it.
Vancouver99 nailed it, that 258 against is scary 😱 same reason I burned myself last season laying heavy in openers. Small on the Blues or skip, tbh 🤬
One love, one side ❤️
Funny how everyone's spreadsheet agrees and nobody's wallet does. Toque_Loyal has it right in my view: the Blues on merit, sure, 86 points against 72, better goal differential, all of that holds up on paper, but a 258-goal leak and two cold offences make regulation the shaky part, so quarter or small stakes only, or look at the total instead. Context matters in openers, and October 7 tells us almost nothing until the puck drops. Ask me again after we see how St. Louis looks against Columbus on the 10th.
Context beats a bare stat.