Whether in three years, five or a full decade, the normalization process that leads America down a path toward nationwide regulated sports betting is expected to be complete. With it, passive fans rooting for a favorite team or player will increasingly be replaced by active sports consumers with a financial stake in the action. Technological changes, evolving Eric Staal Jersey societal views and increased media coverage have contributed to wider acceptance of sports betting.
Such conclusions stand in sharp contrast to statements like those made by former U.S. Senator and New York Knicks player Bill Bradley, the chief supporter of PASPA during Congressional hearings in 1991.
“Athletes are not roulette chips, but sports gambling treats them as such,” wrote Bradley in a 1992 academic article. “If the dangers of state sponsored sports betting are not confronted, the character of sports and youngsters’ view of them James Wisniewski Jersey could be seriously threatened.”
Now, NBA players, led by their union, are looking at sports betting legalization as a commercial opportunity.
Kick the extra point when down nine to make it a one-score game.
Let’s flip that scenario and say the Browns kick the extra point first to go down 28-20 with 2:10 left. Then, let’s say that the same stuff happens. The Browns recover the onside kick, score another touchdown, and then go for two and fail. They’re in the same situation. They’re down 28-26, but now, it’s with 30 seconds to go. There is no time left to overcome their failed two-point play.
But that argument has now been somewhat flipped recently. As discussed in part 1 of this series, professional sports leagues are increasingly of the belief that a regulated sports betting market that allows wagers to be transparently tracked would help protect the integrity of their games, not hurt it.
This is consistent with recent partnerships with big data companies by the professional sports leagues, representing a profound shift in the leagues’ position on line monitoring, the task of tracking gambling data in an attempt to identify unusual moves or unnatural money.
The NFL, NBA and NHL have deals with Sportradar, a Switzerland-based conglomerate that is the parent company of Betradar, a major player in the global sports betting industry, and Major League Baseball has partnered with Genius Sports, a multi-faceted gambling data firm located in London. Even the NCAA has a commercial affiliation with Sportradar, with the Pac-12 conference using the services of CG Analytics, a subsidiary of a prominent Nevada sportsbook.
“The issue of sports integrity is something that always comes up … Anywhere there’s big money there [are] going to be scandals. They’re just people, and people do things wrong all the time in every industry.”
“The issue of sports integrity is something that always comes up,” said Michelle Minton, consumer policy specialist who has opined on sports betting legalization as part of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a Libertarian think tank. “The argument is if we legalize sports gambling, the games will be rigged, people will be taking dives, et cetera. I think that’s a red herring argument. I would make the argument that it’s less likely to cause match-fixing.”