You can't conjure it out of thin air. When you look at the board, and you don't like a lot of the games, especially games that have good bets available, you shouldn't just take a chance for the sake of betting. If that were the objective, just play blackjack or roulette instead, or bet on the coin toss for the Superbowl. Nothing says "gambling degenerate" like betting the -115 on heads or tails. By the way, everyone knows you always call heads. Just settling that now. Also, don't get me wrong, blackjack or roulette can be really fun, when you're winning. But just imagine playing blackjack and not knowing how to play. That's virtually the same thing as betting without research. Speaking of research, today, we call on the king of player props to get our week started correctly. Here is what is on the table for today:

Brendan Gallagher anytime goal scorer @ Winnipeg (+320)

Can we just agree to throw the book out on Montreal games before Martin St. Louis became the head coach? I am now finding great value in their player prop bets. Gallagher isn't exactly lighting the world on fire since the coaching change, but in the last 3 games he has started to find his groove shooting the puck again, with 11 shots total. He is due for a goal, and the recent uptick of shooting has me convinced it is sometime soon. What better time than today? In their last 4 regular season meetings dating back to last year, Gallagher has 4 goals against the Jets with 12 shots. All of these goals came against Connor Hellebuyck, who is starting tonight. To make things more interesting, Gallagher was 1st star or 2nd star in two of the four games. I think Gallagher knows how to play well against this team, and his deployment is still pretty good at 2nd line RW and on the first power-play unit.

Teuvo Teravainen o2.5 shots on goal @ Detroit (-145)

Teuvo is really clicking on that top line with Aho and Svenchikov. He has 11 points in the last 8 games. Surprising enough, it seems like he is doing a lot of the shooting out of that bunch, even though he has almost double the number of assists compared to goals this year. In those last 8 games, Teravainen has shot 3 or more shots 6 out of 8 times. Detroit just got absolutely cooked by Toronto for 10 goals, but there's a chance of some revenge for Ned against the team that let him go last year. Therefore, I think points could go either way here. Detroit is giving up around 32.8 shots a game this year, and the shot total looks more predictable to hit for Teuvo tonight.

Dougie Hamilton o0.5 points @ Columbus (-105)

Teach me how to Dougie! Dougie comes into tonight with 6 points in his last 7 games, as the Devils continue to play well after I bad-mouthed them weeks ago. It is a personal vendetta at this point against me, I am 100% convinced. They even left my beloved Penguins in a complete massacre a few games ago. That was just the beginning though. They may even win out the rest of the way this season for all we know. That would get them to 6th place in the Metro right? I kid, I kid. Elvis Merzlikins has been very inconsistent this season, but I like the odds for Dougie to log a point tonight.

Josh Bailey u0.5 points @ Colorado (-155)

Josh Bailey has been in and out of the lineup the past couple of games, but when he is at the top of his game, he is best served dishing the puck out to potent shooters. Bumped to the 3rd line with Wahlstrom and Kieffer Bellows, this line has not been generating a lot of even strength time. Furthermore, that is a lot different experience than playing center for Kyle Palmeri or Anders Lee or even Zach Parise. Give us the under against Colorado.

Jonathan Marchessault o0.5 points VS San Jose (-145)

Marchessault has 3 points in his last 3 games played, but he also has the most points out of all Golden Knights against San Jose with 17 points in 15 games played in the last 3 years. More importantly, he is shooting the puck at around 3.2 shots a game this year. This should give him opportunity to score points as he is re-united with Karlsson and Smith on the 2nd line. He looks good to get on the board tonight.

BONUS FLASH PARLAY

Play all 3 of our top picks on one parlay ticket (+1285 odds):

Brendan Gallagher ATS

Dougie Hamilton o0.5 points

Teuvo Teravainen o2.5 shots on goal

We are betting $4.20 for the memes!