Linemakers Aren’t Worried About Alex Ovechkin’s Tough 2010-11 at BetLM

Linemakers Aren’t Worried About Alex Ovechkin’s Tough 2010-11

To most casual hockey fans, Alex Ovechkin fell off the map last sea­son. It’s tough to fault that mind­set when you con­sider the fact that Ovi makes about mil­lion per year – not count­ing endorse­ments involv­ing choco­late and magic powers.

The thing is, some­times the bounces just don’t go your way. That’s exactly what hap­pened to Ovechkin in 2010-11; the Wash­ing­ton Cap­i­tals super­star con­nected on a career-low 8.7 per­cent of his shots (the only time he’s ever been under dou­ble dig­its). To give you an idea of how big of a drop that is, Ovechkin took an almost iden­ti­cal amount of shots the last two sea­sons: 368 in 09–10 and 367 in 10–11, yet he scored 50 goals (13.8 per­cent) in 09–10 and 32 last season.

It’s fair to assume that at least some of that wasn’t related to luck – maybe Ovechkin was a lit­tle worn down, per­haps the Cap­i­tals’ decel­er­ated sys­tem hand­cuffed him a bit – but the smart money is on a bounce-back sea­son. In fact, online sports bet­ting sites have not been fooled by Ovi’s off year; they gave him the best odds to win the Hart Tro­phy next season.

Here are their top six choices (with a tie for fifth):

Ovechkin 4/1 odds
Steven Stamkos 11/2
Sid­ney Crosby 13/2
Daniel Sedin 12/1
Hen­rik Sedin 14/1
Pavel Dat­syuk 14/1

Inter­est­ingly, the Anze Kopi­tar band­wagon keeps get­ting more crowded, as the Los Ange­les Kings’ pre­vi­ously under­rated star was the next high­est choice with 25/1 odds. It’s sur­pris­ing – but delight­ful – to see the Kings’ mar­quee tal­ent (not named Drew Doughty) get so much atten­tion after slid­ing under the radar for quite some time. Maybe that has some­thing to do with LA’s prox­im­ity to Las Vegas, but it’s still pleas­ant to see him get his due.

Here are the top three expected final­ists for the Vez­ina Trophy:

Ryan Miller 5/1
Tim Thomas 7/1
Roberto Luongo 15/2

Look­ing down the list, Pekka Rinne (10/1) and Tomas Vok­oun (18/1) are inter­est­ing dark horse choices, with Jonas Hiller (25/1) being an intrigu­ing sleeper as well.

Mov­ing on, here are their guesses for the Nor­ris Trophy:

Shea Weber 4/1
Zdeno Chara 9/2
Nick­las Lid­strom 13/2

Inter­est­ingly enough, the Nor­ris process is the only one with the same three antic­i­pated final­ists as there were last sea­son. It’s hon­estly a bit sur­pris­ing – but like­wise delight­ful – to see Weber get the appre­ci­a­tion he deserves. As far as other awards, Bodog pegs Philadel­phia Fly­ers cen­ter Bray­den Schenn over 2011 top pick Ryan Nugent-Hopkins for the Calder Tro­phy and Stamkos tops Ovechkin for the Mau­rice Richard Trophy.

If you are a gam­bling fan, Vok­oun at (18/1) sure seems appeal­ing. Michal Neu­virth is likely to steal his fair share of starts, but that setup didn’t really hurt Tim Thomas in 2010-11. (Of course, Thomas put together a his­toric year, but don’t count out Vok­oun for big num­bers play­ing behind the first truly dom­i­nant team of his impres­sive career.)

There are plenty of ways to pre­dict how the 2011-12 sea­son will pan out, but look­ing at gam­bling odds can be an inter­est­ing way to gauge pub­lic opin­ion. So far, the odd­s­mak­ers seem like they know their stuff – for the most part, any­way. What do you think about those choices, though?

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