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Almost the upset of the season As the American football season winds down, so, too does the most wonderful time of the year for sportsbooks. I always enjoy hearing about the interesting bookmaker situations and games for a given weekend, and since it’s still a little slow on the news front after the holidays, I… Read more »
Omicron variant running rampant The Nevada Gaming Control Board issued a notice to its licensees emphasizing that they must comply with Governor Steve Sisolak’s Emergency Directive 045 regarding mask wearing. The Directive, originally issued in March 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic began to take hold in the United States, essentially says that the state will… Read more »
Staying power I have a very specific fond memory of the Flamingo Las Vegas. It was probably 2005, the first year I covered the World Series of Poker live at the Rio. My brother came to visit and, having seen all he was going to see at the WSOP, decided to enter a small daily… Read more »
Under new management In early December, Johnny Chan’s 888 Social, a poker room or “social club” in Houston, closed without warning, leaving many customers with money locked up inside. Fortunately for those players, it looks like all may be well, as the club has a new owner, Sanjeev Vora, who is ready to reopen under… Read more »
Bettors spotted a rare stat-keeping mistake in a college basketball game this past weekend that persisted through to the final score. After the score was corrected, some sportsbooks decided to pay out wagers on both sides. It was a game that not a whole lot of people paid attention to besides alumni of the schools… Read more »
The landscape – and skyline – of Las Vegas will soon change, as MGM Resorts International has agreed to sell the operations of The Mirage Hotel & Casino to Hard Rock International for $1.075 billion in cash. VICI Properties, Inc. owns the property and will lease it to Hard Rock; terms of that agreement were… Read more »
Possible trouble with the purchase of GNOG DraftKings is just finding itself in all sorts of legal messes lately. A law firm has announced an investigation into the sports betting company’s acquisition of Golden Nugget Online Gaming (GNOG) for potential violations of securities law and a British bookmaker has sued DraftKings for patent infringement. Let’s… Read more »
Cash on delivery would have been wise A man running a car sales scam laundered his ill-gotten gains through a casino, so says an FBI affidavit filed in U.S. District Court. 36-year-old Ismail Shalash, a citizen of both Jordan and Palestine, is now on the lam in Morocco. Shalash’s scheme began with a “business” he… Read more »
Does everyone really love an underdog? The betting gods giveth and the betting gods taketh away. After an ultra successful October, NFL sports bettors got destroyed in November, leading to what Superbook executive director John Murray told ESPN was “one of our best hold months in Nevada on record.” Jeff Stoneback, who heads BetMGM’s Nevada… Read more »
A major question mark hangs over the sports betting industry in Florida after a federal judge ruled on Monday that the state’s compact with the Seminole Tribe violates federal law. As a result, all sports betting in the state will likely have to come to a halt. That has not stopped the Seminole Tribe yet,… Read more »
Huge haul in a short time span In a variation of an old casino scam, a gang of four men defrauded UK betting shops out of more than £600,000 this summer. All four men have since been caught and handed varying prison sentences. I’m the kind of person who actually kind of appreciates a good… Read more »
Try to hit it big The highly-anticipated 2021 DraftKings Sports Betting National Championship took place this weekend and it did not go well. In fact, “took place” is being generous. Technical issues caused significant problems, tilting the playing field, and eventually resulted in the competition having to end early. After problems marred the 2019 edition… Read more »
Diversification plans The landscape of the Las Vegas Strip will continue to change, as MGM Resorts International has said it is looking to sell The Mirage. During the company’s quarterly conference call on Wednesday, CEO Bill Hornbuckle said that the company feels it has enough exposure on The Strip. “As such, we are currently in… Read more »
We have all been there. That 24-hour marathon study session in college, the all-night bachelor party, the sleepover when we were kids where we refused to actually sleep (though most of us probably gave up at about 11:00pm). But 124 hours straight with no sleep? That’s beyond most people’s physical capabilities. But not only did… Read more »
Former Australian online sportsbook BetEasy certainly lived up to its name, but not in a good way. The site, now part of Sportsbet, was fined by the Northern Territory Racing Commission for allowing a self-excluded problem gambler to not just create an account, but lose over half a million dollars. The case is a few… Read more »
Couldn’t see eye to eye DraftKings’ pursuit of Entain is over. On Tuesday, the sports betting and daily fantasy sports leader said it has ended talks with Entain about acquiring the partypoker parent company. Neither company gave specifics as to way no deal could be agreed upon. According to UK law (Entain is headquartered in… Read more »
Cheap eats Here’s something different. UK gambling giant William Hill is under attack in some circles for serving food at some of its retail betting shops. And not just any food: inexpensive, HOT food. The humanity. The “WH Café” is currently in a test run at five of its outlets, less than half a percent… Read more »
Many years ago, on a break from college, I took a drive with my best friend from our hometown of Milwaukee to Kenosha, Wisconsin and Dairyland Greyhound Park. There was a violent thunderstorm on the way down there – we couldn’t see a thing, lightning was blind us, and my friend told me he was… Read more »
Spent money that wasn’t theirs The Football Index scandal was bad. It was a disaster for thousands of the site’s users, but there was still some question when all was said and done as to whether or not management was incompetent or unethical. Signs leaned toward the latter, but what The Athletic recently uncovered tilts… Read more »
Major League Soccer (MLS) announced on Friday that it has suspended Sporting Kansas City midfielder Felipe Hernandez for the rest of the season without pay for betting on MLS games. The league said that he “engaged in extensive and unlawful sports gambling” while he was on the team, gambling which included wagering on two MLS… Read more »
Strange end to the season The 2021 World Series of Poker is just two days away, but I want to talk about something else in the gambling world for a few minutes: Ghana professional soccer. That is not a sentence I ever thought I would write or say 20 years ago, but here we are.… Read more »
MGM Resorts International has announced that it has agreed to acquire the operations of The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas from Blackstone for $1.625 billion in cash. The deal is solely for the property’s operations, not the real estate itself. The purchase is part of a larger transaction in which Blackstone is selling the real estate… Read more »
Apparently that wasn’t DraftKings’ best offer Late Tuesday, after partypoker’s parent company Entain confirmed that DraftKings had put forth an offer to buy the UK-based gambling company, Entain pulled back the curtain further, revealing that it was already considering a second offer from DraftKings. The original offer, according to CNBC, was for $20 billion. Entain… Read more »
Just need all of them to win, no problem I have had a great sports year. My Milwaukee Bucks won their first NBA championship in my lifetime, my Milwaukee Brewers are on the cusp of a division title, and my college has won multiple team and individual national titles. My Green Bay Packers are one… Read more »
Plenty of sports betting options in Arizona Sports betting operators can start taking bets in Arizona on Thursday, September 9, after a judge ruled against a tribe that had filed an injunction to block the industry’s launch. On Monday, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge James Smith rejected most of Yavapai-Prescott Indian Tribe’s arguments. Arizona Governor… Read more »
