Some NHL betting fans are tired of hearing that Chris Osgood is underrated. Others are tired of hearing that’s he’s overrated.

Well, when it comes to assessing the Stanley Cup Final odds, I’m sick of both sides! Why? Because it doesn’t matter. Pittsburgh has the goaltending edge no matter what anyone thinks. The Osgood haters will tell you he rides coattails, that he gives up soft goals, that he was garbage in the regular season (and he was — 3.09 GAA, .887 save percentage). The lovers will tell you he was good outside Detroit (Had a season with 30-plus wins and a .910 save percentage in Long Island and Detroit).

But neither opinion matters, as Marc-Andre Fleury is still better. He’s matched Osgood’s great playoff stats, he’s younger, he’s more athletic, he likes pressure and, perhaps most importantly, he’s good enough to steal a game. No matter how much you may like Osgood in NHL betting, he doesn’t steal games. Fleury can — and maybe he will against Detroit, just like he stole Game 5 of last year’s Stanley Cup Final odds. He’s a big reason why I think the Pens will win this series…

Worse than no Kobe/Lebron in NBA odds (well, it sure looks that way for the final), steroids — yes steroids — have suddenly been linked to the supposedly squeaky-clean NHL.

Ugh. Everyone knows Sudafed gets passed around dressing rooms like candy, but the NHL odds of steroid use seemed slim to me. But why? Why would NHL players be any different — in fact, speed, strength and explosiveness are as crucial to hockey as they are to any sport, so steroid use in hockey betting would make sense. So maybe I was just in denial.

Worse yet — the Florida couple busted with large amounts of PEDs on them claimed they sold to the Washington Nationals (I doubt that; we’d be seeing results) and, gulp, the Washington Capitals. Unless it was the Penguins, there’s probably not a worse team to pop up in this scandal. The prospect of the world’s best player, Alexander Ovechkin, being linked to steroids is heartbreaking.

How much longer until we concede that every athlete juices and everything returns to normal? Sigh.

Sorry for the downer post — I’ll crank things up tomorrow with a full-fledge rap song previewing Stanley Cup betting. The Penguins vs Red Wings odds should be a sports wagering doozie.

Sacrilege! Worse than a Belmont Stakes odds jockey saying “Triple Crown” to jinx his horse!

Yes, after the Penguins advanced to the Stanley Cup Final odds last night, Sidney Crosby did the unthinkable and TOUCHED THE WALES TROPHY. If you’re a hockey betting fan, you know it’s supposedly a curse to do so.  But is there really much evidence to back it up? Scott Stevens broke the rule in 2003, handing the trophy around to his whole team, and the Devils’ NHL odds didn’t suffer, as they went on to win the Cup.

Mario Lemieux touched the trophy in the years when the Penguins last won the Cup and, as Sid the Kid pointed out in a post-game interview, the Pens didn’t touch the trophy last year and they didn’t win the cup. Good on the Pens for mixing things up. As good as the Red Wings are (oh, and, uh, the Blackhawks if they win, haha), it’s looking more and more like Pittsburgh’s year at online sports book.

I’m back, hockey betting fans. Did you miss me? No, I wasn’t off cavorting with basketball betting fans. suppose I should’ve told you I was leaving North America for a week. Well, here I am, having missed the beginning of the Penguins vs Hurricanes odds and the Red Wings vs Blackhawks odds and trying to catch up.

I’ve noticed something interesting. Something that happened 25 years ago in hockey betting.

The year: 1984. The budding dynasty known as the Edmonton Oilers reaches the Stanley Cup Final for the second straight year. The season prior, the young Oilers lost to the powerhouse New York Islanders, who captured their fourth straight Stanley Cup odds crown. In 1984, though, the Oilers, led by legendary superstars Wayne Gretzky and Mark Messier, faced the Islanders again and took the next step forward, triumphing over the Isles in five games.

The year: 2009. The budding dynasty known as the Pittsburgh Penguins is up 1-0 in the Conference Final after losing in last year’s Stanley Cup final to the Detroit Red Wings, who captured their third cup in 11 seasons. Now, the Wings and Pens are on a collision course to meet again in the final, and something tells me the result will follow the path of the ’84 Oilers, as Crosby and Malkin take the torch from Gretzky and Messier.

I’m saying it now: the Penguins will win the Stanley Cup odds this season. Make a sports wagering pick now, why don’t ya?

Kinda like that horse Rachel Alexandra entering the Preakness Betting, my hockey punishment opinions come out of left field at times. My main gripe, one I’ve stressed for years in hockey betting circles, is that the NHL punishes cheap shots based on injuries rather than actions.

Take the cheap shot in last night’s Hurricanes vs Bruins sports wagering matchup, for example. Scott Walker brutally suckerpunched the helpless Aaron Ward late in the game, dropping him to the ice like a ton of bricks and (possibly) breaking a bone in Ward’s face. The punishment: a $2,500 fine.

What do you think the punishment would’ve been had Ward hit his head on the ice and suffered serious brain drama leading to death, as Don Sanderson did?

The fact that it didn’t happen that way doesn’t make what Walker did any less dangerous, does it? If a player doesn’t suffer career or life-threatening injuries, you can bet at the sportsbook that the NHL won’t hand out a serious suspension to the perpetrator. How can you set an example when you let plays like Walker’s suckerpunch go? One or two isolated incidents — the best example would be Steve Moore’s — clearly haven’t scared the NHL betting goons enough. Any player who attempts a surprise attack like Walker’s should be treated like Todd Bertuzzi if you ask me.

Am I alone here? Anyone want to take a break from placing online sports bets and weigh in?

Interesting. Hockey betting has done us well, bringing a neato off-ice controversy to augment the already dramatic Penguins vs Capitals odds. The Caps have banned the CBC — the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, a.k.a hockey’s greatest voice — from doing any interviews with them indefinitely. The reason: CBC jotted down and aired the “keys to victory” Caps coach Bruce Boudreau wrote on Washington’s dressing-rooom white board before Game 3.

I love the CBC but I have to say, the Caps are totally in the right here. I specifically remember asking aloud, “are they allowed to do that?” when they printed Boudreau’s gameplan word for word during the Game 3 hockey betting telecast. Who knows if it was relayed to the Pens or seen in their pressbox, allowing them to alter their own strategy and defy the sportsbook odds?

It’s understandable why CBC wanted the information — it prides itself on being the source for Stanley Cup odds coverage and wants to prove it’s still relevant as a public broadcaster in Canada — but this was overkill. What did the producers expect to happen? “Let’s copy the team’s secret plan to beat Pittsburgh and air it on TV.”

Way to stick it to The Man, Caps…now, back to the real hockey betting action tonight and tomorrow!

Things come full circle in hockey betting. Interesting, isn’t it? If any of you were fans of this blog a few months ago, you’d remember that I wrote a post trashing the Phoenix Coyotes and suggesting that they move to a Canadian city. Low and behold, RIM CEO Jim Balsillie made his big offer today after the Coyotes filed for bankruptcy. $220 mil. Not bad. And I thought player salaries in NBA odds were exorbitant!

i should be happy, and I probably will be should a seventh team come back to hockey betting in Canada, a.ka. a place that cares about the Stanley Cup odds. I still have to wonder, though, if losing a U.S. team would take away from the big south-of-the-border TV deals that help drive league revenues. I’d still be curious to see a team in Kansas City, but a Canadian franchise would be pretty cool too…just don’t let it be another Toronto team!

Ok, playas. NHL betting rhymes back for the East side, yo. If you thought the NBA odds on Celtics/Bulls were ill, check out these fat Stanley Cup betting riffs. More dangerous than picking the Hatton odds, yo.

Bruins vs Hurricanes odds

CAROLINA MOTHA F*CKAS GONE AND DANCED WIT DA DEVIL

ENDED SERIES ON A HIGH NOTE LIKE MY BOY AARON NEVILLE

ERIC STAAL’S STICK CURVED LIKE A RIPENED BANANA

WRAPPING GOALS ROUND BRODEUR LIKE A GUCCI BANDANA

BUT PLAYIN PUCK IN BEANTOWN AIN’T SO MUCH F*CKIN FUN

CRAZY MOFO NAME OF CHARA BIGGER THAN BIG PUN

BRUINS DEEP LIKE JASON CAMPBELL DOWNFIELD TO MOSS

GONNA STYLE ON THE CANES LIKE EMINEM ON RICK ROSS

(Bruins in seven)

PENGUINS VS CAPITALS ODDS

SPORTSBOOK JUNKIES SAY GOOD THINGS COME TO THOSE WHO WAIT

MAN UPSTAIRS BLESSING US WITH SID AND ALEX THE GREAT

CAPS CAME BACK ON DA RANGERS LIKE DA WRESTLA MICKEY ROURKE

ROOKIE GOALIE PLUGGIN NETS LIKE A CRISTAL BOTTLE CORK

BUT THE PENGUINS BEEN THERE DONE THAT, GOT GOOD IN A HURRY

GOT KILLA NETMINDA IN MARC-ANDRE FLEURY

SID THE KID UNSTOPPABLE AND MALKIN TOO

SPREADING PUCKS TO THEIR TEAMMATES LIKE THE F*CKIN SWINE FLU

(Penguins in seven)

It’s strangely fitting that a Kentucky Derby odds favorite, Quality Road, went down to injury and pulled out of the race today just after the San Jose Sharks, a top Stanley Cup odds favorite, bowed out of the NHL betting playoffs with a whimper last night.

Watching the Sharks fade into the ocean of eliminated teams, I was at a loss last night. If you’re the Sharks, you just won the Presidents’ Trophy with a team-record 117 wins. There’s no carrot, no motivation to be better in the regular season when NHL betting starts up again next fall. It’s just one more loooonnnng wait until the hockey betting playoffs start again. And it begs the question: how can you improve a team that’s perfect in the regular season? What pieces do you add to it?

The only thing that comes to mind is to cut out a losing attitude — one that reminds me of the mentality constantly stymieing the Ottawa Senators in the early 2000s as team after team failed to win it all after dominant regular seasons. And to me, no one on the Sharks embodies that mentality more than Joe Thornton.

There’s no denying Thornton is an elite player — in the regular season. He’s a perennial 90-plus point guy with great vision who can guide a last-place team to the top of the standings. But he consistently disappears from sportsbook success when the playoffs arrive, shying away from contact and playing on the perimeter despite being 6’4″ and 230 pounds. Little Pavel Datsyuk shows more courage than this guy.

Why not move Thornton for a really nice return? Some people might call it foolish to dismantle a first-place team, but it’s clear this team is incapable of winning the Stanley Cup as is. Trading Joe could net multiple valuable players. Another idea is to swap him for a guy who has similar big-game struggles — Dany Heatley. Just something to talk about the next time you and your hockey buddies are betting online.

Just as often as basketball betting produces endless Kobe/LeBron/D-Wade debates, hockey betting these days is relentless with Crosby/Malkin/Ovechkin debates. And, after participating in a bunch of NHL betting forums over the last few months, I’m sick…and tired…of the Crosby bashing.

It’s not that I don’t think he deserves any criticism– didn’t I post an anti-Crosby song last month? — but it should be restricted to calling him a whiner, diver or baby.

What really gets my goat is when online betting players start trying to tell me Sid the Kid is overrated. That makes my blood boil! Just because two of his peers happen to be the other two best players of the last, say, 15 years or so doesn’t mean Crosby is a bust! That’s like saying Yzerman and Mario were busts because “Gretzky left them in the dust.” Nuh-uh.

Let’s crunch some NHL betting numbers.

Sidney Crosby’s first four full NHL single season point totals

102

122

72 (injury-shortened)

103

Now, Crosby was supposed to be the next Great One, right? And according to Wayne’s first four years…

104

137

164

212

Crosby is waaaay behind, right. Yes, but that doesn’t make him a friggin bust!

Lets look at the first four seasons of the other members of hockey betting’s top-five all time scorers (we’ll use No. 6 Yzerman since Howe didn’t play long enough seasons):

Mark Messier: 33, 63, 88, 106

Ron Francis: 68, 90, 83, 81

Marcel Dionne: 77, 90, 78, 121

Steve Yzerman: 87, 89, 42 (injury), 90

Sidney Crosby: 102, 122, 72, 103

HMMM, seems to me like Crosby has started off better than all that elite company. Also, his career points per game mark of 1.37 places him FIFTH-BEST ALL TIME, behind only Gretzky, Lemieux, Bossy and Orr.

COME ON! CROSBY ISN’T A BUST! GIVE THE KID A BREAK! In theory, his points-per-game numbers could rise even more considering that he’s at least five years away from his prime.

So please, NHL betting fans, sit back and enjoy the Stanley Cup odds. And give Crosby a round of applause for a change. He’s more than living up to the hype.