NFL and Gambling Linked? Say It Ain't So!

Online Casino Advisory has an article discussing the linkage between the founders of NFL and gambling. History is history so that isn't really big news. However, the NFL's stance opposing gambling does seem more than a bit hypocritical, if not outright schizophrenic. Gambling interest helps drive NFL viewer interest.

The NFL does have communications with the Nevada sportsbooks, so that unusual betting patterns can be quickly discerned and action taken. In that sense, legal sports betting helps protect the integrity of the game. The NFL needs to look at the recent NBA officiating scandal and make sure that that kind of thing doesn't happen.

I don't think players are the weak link. With the high salaries of professional atheletes in the US professional sports, the players aren't the people likely targeted by bad guys -- it's the officials. They don't have the publicity or notoriety and they don't get paid nearly as much.

College is a different matter. My opinion is that college sports wagering needs to be properly controlled. It would be naive to think it is only happening in legal Nevada sportsbooks. You still need the few legal books to help detect unusual wagering patterns. College players are vulnerable due to NCAA rules with regard to income.

I think the professional leagues' opposition to legal sports gambling is misplaced. They should embrace it. What needs to happen is that the leagues need a cut of the wagering. For typical fixed odds wagering, if a book is balanced, the sportsbook should gross approximately 4.5%. So, the leagues get 10% of that, or 0.5%. If approximately $1 billion is wagered illegally each week of the NFL regular season, and that wagering was made legal and regulated, the NFL would pull in an additional $5 million. For a 17 week regular season, that's $85 million. Figuring just an additional $15 million for the playoffs and Super Bowl, a round $100 million in additional revenue every year. Not chump change.

With that, they could easily pay officials more and ensure proper security and game integrity with beaucoup cash left over. Not that officials won't make bad calls, but the public would be more sure the bad call was just that and not something worse.

Gambling as Entertainment?

Is Gambling entertainment, or just gambling? The Southtown Star article mentions that leisure activities are getting more costly and a gambling outing can be just as enjoyable, with the bonus of possibly winning some money in addition to having a good time.

The author does mention that gambling can get out of control, and become a huge problem in one's life. No argument there. Moderation and responsibility are important. The anti-gambling crowd uses the examples of people that fall into trouble as a means to try and outlaw or limit gambling expansion, but Prohibition ultimately shows the pool logic of trying to stop people from doing what they want to do that doesn't directly impact others. If 6% of the population has a drinking problem, and we don't outlaw alcohol, why outlaw gambling if 1% of the population has a gambling problem?

What I found interesting in the article is the implied comparison between an "entertainment" night out and a "gambling" night out. Could they really be similar in terms of cost? What follows below is a hypothetical comparison of an evening for two. One evening is a typical movie date and the other is a gambling date.

The movie date consists of a dinner for two at a casual dining restaurant, followed by a movie and a nightcap of a couple of drinks at a local pub. The gambling date consists of a dinner for two at a tribal casino buffet, followed by two hours of slot wagering on a 5-line nickel machine (each person playing one machine), ending with a nightcap of a couple of drinks at a local pub. I don't include the cost of gasoline to and from the venues, but we'll treat them as equivalent for this exercise.

Movie Date

Dinner for 2 (incl tax/tip) $60 - 1 hour
Movie Tickets for 2 $15 - 2 hours
Movie Snacks (1 popcorn, 2 sodas) $8
Nightcap (2 drinks each) $20 - 1 hour

Total cost $60+$15+$8+$20=$103
Total time: 4 hours

Gambling Date

Buffet Dinner for 2 (incl tax/tip) $45 - 1 hour
Gaming Play - 2 hours
5-Pay line nickel slot machine
5 lines played @ 6 plays/minute
Payback - 92%
Theoretical loss / minute - 12 cents
Theoretical loss / hour / machine - $7.20
Each person plays one machine
Nightcap (2 drinks each) $20 - 1 hour

Total cost - $45+($7.20*2)*2+$20=$93.80
Total time: 4 hours

So, yes, it is possible to gamble at a higher wager level and for a longer period of time, but given this scenario, a gambling evening can be as lengthy of an escape as typical leisure activities, at a comparable cost. And with the gambling activity, the possibility exists that you can actually win something, possibly making the gambling date very inexpensive indeed.

Support for US Online Gambling Continues

Online-Casinos.com reports on a recent poll conducted by the Las Vegas Advisor.com site. As the post title suggests, the poll shows that support for legalized online gambling remains. This poll was more detailed in that the answers available were more than a yes or no. Respondents were allowed choices that nuanced their yes or no positions.

Of the approximately 4,800 votes, the yes/no split was 68%/32%. Being an open, online poll, the result is unscientific but since the poll was conducted on a site that has a Vegas bias, it is still interesting. If any locale would be opposed to widespread online gambling, it would be Vegas.

The Ultimate Fantasy Football Magazine

As discussed in a previous post, this is the time of year where fantasy football touts flood the magazine racks with their wisdom, claiming that they are the gospel leading you to fantasy glory or redemption, as your case may be.

The magazines are basically the same. They offer the same core product content:

• How to play
• Fantasy league schedule
• Pro (or college) schedule
• "Experts" picks
• Performance projections/player analysis
• "Cheat sheet"/ranking (for a particular scoring methodology)
• Page to write down your draft selections
• Advertising for other fantasy football offerings

All this for $5.99 - $7.99! (US dollars)

Not to plug a particular vendor, but I did get a copy of Fanball.com's "Just Cheat Sheets." This magazine has player rankings based on about a half a dozen different scoring schemes. It is very light on projections and analysis, but it is true to its word as a cheat sheet publication.

But what if you could combine this with some of the standard fantasy football magazine content? Now, that would likely be something you could see paying $10.00 - $12.00 for. With a magazine like this, you wouldn't need to make sure you had two magazines to refer to during a draft preparation or the draft. One magazine you could roll up and stick in your pocket (assuming you wear cargo pants). That, a pen and highlighter, and you're ready! The only thing you would need to worry about is the accuracy of the projections. Over time, the better prognosticators would (hopefully) be able to document their accuracy.

On a separate topic, I have changed my opinion on experts. At first, I enjoyed looking to see where experts viewed players. Over time, I noticed that generally there were few times where the experts radically disagreed, so just like political pundits, they all say pretty much the same thing. I suppose experts picks can be used to make you feel better if you made an early round choice that fizzled. You could point to the experts and say, "see, they all had this guy going in the second round." Forget experts unless the experts were winners of high-stakes contests where they put up their own money to compete. No more experts where they are merely guys who blog (like me) or work for these same publications they want you to buy. If you laid $1,000 of your good money down and won $100,000, I would be interested in your opinions.

If I was starting up a competing magazine, or wanted to increase my magazine's popularity, I might take a hard look at this format and price point. Having several scoring methodology player rankings helps as not every league operates the same. Make it easy for customers to determine your magazine is a good fit for their league, informational and hopefully entertaining. Charge more than a typical magazine, but less than if you purchased two.