#Sports injuries don’t always move the betting line

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Dougie Hamilton scores against Henrik Lundqvist and the Rangers earlier this season.
Paul J. Bereswill

Player news such as injuries and illnesses can have a huge impact on a betting market. But in some scenarios, such news warrants no action, no matter how important the player might be.

Take the Carolina Hurricanes and Dougie Hamilton. The defenseman played heavy minutes and was a big reason for the Hurricanes’ special-teams success. Hamilton logged important time on the penalty kill and was the quarterback of the top power-play unit. The Hurricanes scored 8.8 goals per 60 minutes of power-play time in 2019-20, good for fourth in the NHL and a huge improvement on their 19th-place rank of 6.8 a season ago.

Hamilton, 27, put up 14 goals and 40 points in 47 games and was on pace to hit the 70-point mark for the first time in his career before breaking his leg. It looked as if Hamilton would be good to go for the Hurricanes’ play-in series against the Rangers which begins Saturday in Toronto, but he recently suffered an injury in practice. Hurricanes reporter Sara Civian noted on Twitter that the timetable for Hamilton’s return is in the realm of weeks, not months, but that still means the Hurricanes will be without their best defenseman for the entire qualifying round.

Rangers fans know their team’s chances of defeating the Hurricanes have improved, but what does this mean from a betting perspective? Well, not much, according to the market.

Many shops listed the Hurricanes as -140 favorites to win the best-of-five series, with the Rangers carrying a price tag of 120, and that hasn’t changed. In fact, the price for Game 1 also stayed where it was, with the Rangers at 110.

This doesn’t mean the Rangers’ chances haven’t improved — they definitely have. What this signifies is that sharp bettors have seemingly priced this matchup around Carolina -140 (a 58.3 percent win probability). Even if they discount Carolina to -120 (a 54.5 percent win probability), that leaves a 45.5 percent chance the Rangers win the series, which doesn’t offer any value above the 44.5 percent win probability implied by 120 odds.

Did you like the Rangers at 120, or were you closer to betting the Hurricanes at -140? If the former, you could make a case that this series is a coin flip, even more so if you don’t believe home-ice advantage will be a factor. If the latter, and you were on the fence about whether to bet the Hurricanes at -140, step back and really think about how much the line should change with Hamilton out for the series.

This is why it’s so important to spend a few minutes thinking about what price you are willing to pay before looking at what is available. A bettor who practices this will be better equipped to decide whether the absence of a good player like Hamilton will be enough to justify betting on the other side.

Personally, while my projected series odds have changed (from Carolina -143 to -124), my stance on betting this series hasn’t. I don’t see value on either side. Instead, I will look for the market to overreact to early results and maybe uncover some value on a game-by-game basis.