Arm's Length
Unlike the NHL, which signed a deal with Kalshi, MLB and the NFL are keeping prediction markets at arm's length... at least for the time being.
The Bulletin Board
THE LEDE: MLB weighs in on prediction markets.
QUICK HITTER: GA Committee recommends legalizing mobile sports betting.
NEWS: Kalshi has its day in court in Massachusetts.
VIEWS: Atlantic City’s impending crisis — New York casinos.
AROUND the WATERCOOLER: Are prediction markets gambling?
STRAY THOUGHTS: Who are you training to beat?
Sponsor’s Message: Increase Operator Margins with EDGE Boost Today!
EDGE Boost is the first dedicated bank account for bettors.
Increase Cash Access: On/Offline with $250k/day debit limits
No Integration or Costs: Compatible today with all operators via VISA debit rails
Incremental Non-Gaming Revenue: Up to 1% operator rebate on transactions
Lower Costs: Increase debit throughput to reduce costs against ACH/Wallets
Eliminate Chargebacks and Disputes
Eliminate Debit Declines
Built-in Responsible Gaming tools
To learn more, contact Matthew Cullen, Chief Strategy Officer, Matthew@edgemarkets.io
The Lede: MLB Keeps Prediction Markets at Arm’s Length
When the NHL signed a deal with Kalshi, there was speculation that the other professional sports leagues might follow suit. So far, that hasn’t happened.
In a letter from August, obtained by Front Office Sports, MLB and the MLBPA wrote to players that, “Several companies (including Kalshi, Robinhood, and Crypto.com, among others) are now offering what they call ‘prediction markets,’ which allow members of the public to risk money on the outcome of specific events, including baseball and other sporting events.”
That aligns with statements from NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, who said of prediction markets earlier this month: “[The NFL] likes to be first in the market in a lot of things, but in a lot of things, we’re willing to say, ‘We’re going to let things play out. We’re going to decide, is this something we want to do?’”
In an interview with Squawk Box, NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman said the deal with Kalshi provided the league with some leverage, calling it “protective”:
“We have aligned with the prediction market because we believe our fans need to understand that if they’re going to execute those contracts, it’s based on real data. But more importantly, it gives us control, because we have the ability to take down any contracts that we don’t think are appropriate. And that goes to the second part of your question.”
“Being aligned with either the sports betting entities or the prediction market entities gives you the ability to have more control and to observe more closely exactly what’s going on. So I think it’s more protective than anything else by having these alignments.”
Quick Hitter: Georgia Committee Recommends Legalizing Sports Betting
Straight to the Point has been monitoring Georgia’s House Study Committee on Gaming, as it held a series of hearings to discuss potential expansions, including casinos and mobile sports betting.
The committee has yet to release its final report, but a separate committee, the Senate Study Committee on Making Georgia the No. 1 State for Tourism (one of the great committee names) released its recommendations, including a late addition to legalize mobile sports betting to its final report.
Per the local press, “The Senate Study Committee on Making Georgia the No. 1 State for Tourism did not discuss the recommendation, which was added at the last minute, Chairman Drew Echols, R-Gainesville, told TCS in an email.”
“It was a simple recommendation much like the rest of the list,” Echols said. “The recommendations are just that. Hard to say how many if any of the recommendations will come to fruition.”
SPONSOR’S MESSAGE - Underdog: the most innovative company in sports gaming.
At Underdog we use our own tech stack to create the industry’s most popular games, designing products specifically for the American sports fan.
Join us as we build the future of sports gaming.
Visit: https://underdogfantasy.com/careers
News: MA Judge Could Go Either Way in Kalshi Case
I’m always cautious of reading too much into what a judge may be thinking (and a decision isn’t expected until next month), but if you are Kalshi, you have to be pretty happy with how things went down in Suffolk County Superior Court in Massachusetts yesterday.
Judge Christopher Barry-Smith latched on to an interesting part of the preemption argument: “Can you grow into preemption with a new action and a product that wasn’t contemplated by Congress?”
Judge Barry-Smith noted that while Congress didn’t originally intend for the CFTC to take over sports betting from the states, there is a strong case to be made given the current landscape, noting that with so many states involved in sports betting, the idea of federal oversight via the CFTC is no longer absurd: “In 2025… it goes from absurd and overruling state policy positions, to just providing for another form of sports gaming regulation. The more prevalent sports betting becomes, the less absurd it gets.”
Further Reading: Daniel O’Boyle has an excellent write-up over at InGame.
Views: Is it Time for New Jersey to Hit the Panic Button?
With as many as three casinos coming to New York City, New Jersey’s decision to keep casino gambling confined to Atlantic City has some hitting the panic button, and there doesn’t seem to be many good options.
Jane Bokunewicz, faculty director of the Lloyd D. Levenson Institute of Gaming, Hospitality and Tourism at Stockton University School of Business in Galloway, believes the competition across the Hudson River could force Atlantic City to reinvent itself (something I’ve said it needs to do for over a decade).
According to Bokunewicz, the New York casinos don’t have to result in cannibalization, per Play NJ:
“The addition of three integrated resort-style properties in the region will, at least in the short term, increase competitive pressure on Atlantic City operators, but hopefully, the city will be able to distinguish itself in the long term. While New York’s properties will soon boast many of the same dining and entertainment amenities that have long been available in Atlantic City, they will never have the beach and historic Boardwalk.
“The new properties will likely attract international visitors and audiences that have not considered Atlantic City before. This could actually be a plus for Atlantic City. Since two of the operators will have interests in both New York and Atlantic City, they may seek to leverage interest in the new properties to bring greater attention to Atlantic City.”
I don’t agree with that assessment (multi-billion-dollar New York casinos are going to have far superior amenities to Atlantic City, and the only way to get to AC is via car), but I do agree with another point Bokunewicz made, Atlantic City and New Jersey have several years to come up with a plan to mitigate the impact, as only Resorts World is likely to be up and running before 2030.
Another option is casino expansion outside of Atlantic City (something New Jersey voters have rejected several times):
“State Sen. Joe Pennacchio is renewing his call for slot machine gambling at the Meadowlands Racetrack, as neighboring states move forward with new gaming operations.
“‘New Jersey continues to sit on its hands. Putting a racino in the Meadowlands would generate tons of cash for strapped New Jersey, and I think the taxpayers deserve that to be looked at,’ Pennacchio said.”
Again, I’m not sure this is the answer, as a racino at an aging racetrack is going to have a hard time competing with three brand new/freshly renovated destination casinos.
Casino Association of New Jersey President Mark Giannantonio (a longtime casino executive, including in AC), seems to have a better handle on the situation, saying, “We must accelerate Atlantic City’s transformation into a leading year-round resort destination.”
Here’s what I’ve been saying for years: Atlantic City needs to stop being gambling-focused (since unlike the 1980s, people can gamble anywhere and everywhere in 2025). Instead of a gambling town that also has entertainment and dining options and a beach, it needs to reinvent itself as a beach town with entertainment and dining that also has casinos.
This is from a 2016 column:
“And because the city had put all of its eggs into the gambling basket, once casino gambling proliferated, the reasons to go to Atlantic City shrank. With so many competitors in a shrinking market, reinvestment dollars to entice these lost customers were hard to come by. It was exacerbated by the fact that the city didn’t offer enough non-gambling activities to make it a vacation spot that happened to have gambling… Will the city continue to rely on gambling? Or will it mix in gambling and place a renewed emphasis on fun and sun?”
Frequent podcast guest Kim Lund recently made a similar point about Las Vegas’s transformation from a gambling-first city: “It replaced a ‘maybe players will want to eat after they gamble’ mindset with a ‘maybe people will gamble after they eat’ mindset, and as a result captured a much bigger market.”
For those interested, I spoke at length on the Atlantic City market with former Press of Atlantic City columnist (now working for the Nevada Review-Journal) David Danzis on one of my first podcast episodes:
Episode 3: Atlantic City's Past, Present, and Future with David Danzis
In Episode 3 of the Talking Shop Podcast, I was joined by Catena Media’s David Danzis. David writes for several of Catena’s Play properties but is best known for his coverage of New Jersey at PlayNJ.com and, before that, for the Press of Atlantic City.
Sponsor’s Message: Promoting a sustainable, entertainment-first global gaming industry.
Play’n GO is celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2025. Drawing on that experience from the dawn of the iGaming industry through to today, Play’n GO designs and creates world-class slot games in the online casino space.
Play’n GO wants to see a sustainable industry that puts players first. To realize that vision, Play’n GO:
Creates games designed to be entertaining and fun first
Actively lobbies for increased regulation to keep players safe
Refuses to make games that feature mechanics that we believe to be predatory, such as those that allow players to pay hundreds of times their normal stake to buy into the bonus round directly (‘Bonus Buy’ games)
Now live in over 35 regulated territories around the world, including all US and Canadian iGaming jurisdictions, Play’n GO is the leading provider of entertainment to the online casino industry.
For more info, visit www.playngo.com
Around the Watercooler
Social media conversations, rumors, and gossip.
I’ll discuss this in greater depth in the future, but the “are prediction markets gambling” discourse is getting out of hand.
Stray Thoughts
Two years of serious training. That’s my general guideline for being able to deal with an untrained, but still capable (never conflate not trained with not dangerous) random on the street.
The first two years of training, the fundamentals, will allow you to deal with the typical person, everything you learn after that, the advanced moves, is for beating another trained practitioner in the same art.
In the same vein, significant speed, size, and power mismatches cannot be overcome with technique alone (an NFL linebacker is going to smash your typical, 170 lb., 40 year-old karate or BJJ student before they even know what happened), but when those gaps are closer, technique will win the day.