August 13, 2007
Jeff Haney on an unfortunate trend in sports betting on the Strip
LAS VEGAS SUN
I am not a beard.
Nor am I a "runner," another term used to describe someone who makes bets with other people's money in a sports book following the instructions of his boss, the head money-mover.
I am not a "wise guy" or a professional gambler. I am not a member of any betting team, partnership, syndicate or consortium, either.
I'm just an average guy working alone who believes (evidently with some justification) that sometimes my opinion on a sporting event is more informed than that of the oddsmaker or the betting marketplace, and who once in a while likes to back up that opinion with a wager.
That's why I wasn't surprised when, in the wake of the NBA betting scandal, commissioner David Stern suggested any tainted bets probably did not come through Las Vegas but were instead limited to the so-called "underworld," the vast illegal sports betting market.
I thought back to this past basketball season and a few instances where I, a run-of-the-mill individual bettor, had trouble persuading sports books to accept my money at the counter.
I can only imagine how difficult it would be for an organized betting group, like one connected to any games that might have been fixed, to get down any kind of meaningful money in Las Vegas.
I recall trying to bet basketball at the Wynn Las Vegas and facing a grand inquisition that would put Torquemada to shame.
Are you staying at the hotel? Can you produce a room key? Who are you? And unspoken but coming through loud and clear: Why are you trying to bet here? (No. No. I'd rather not say. And I thought this was a casino on the Las Vegas Strip.)
I suppose because I was so "uncooperative" (What nerve! Trying to make a bet in a sports book!), my betting limit on the basketball game in question was set at a grand total of $550. Come on, how about $660? Nope.
The fact they wanted a room key tells me they would have gladly accepted, say, $770 or more, if I could prove I was an established sucker - er, I mean a valued hotel guest.
Then, with apologies to Jimmy Cannon and Jay McInerney, there was the grim scene at the late and unlamented New Frontier, perhaps the most depressing place in Southern Nevada:
You're the only bettor in the joint. You walk up to the counter and state your intended wager on one of the night's basketball games. The elderly gentleman behind the counter glares at you as if you're holding a pistol on him, turns around and disappears into a back room without a word. After a couple minutes he reappears and spits, "You can have $330," meaning that's the maximum amount he'll accept from you. You shrug, place the bet and wonder what you're doing in this mausoleum anyway.
Then there's the sports book at Terrible's, ostensibly a real live casino, that deigned to accept a maximum of a whopping $220 from me on a basketball bet.
Hey, gee, thanks! That makes the Wynn look like the sports book at the old Little Caesars (unofficial motto: If you can carry it in, you can bet it).
Also, at several joints in downtown Las Vegas, I would regularly encounter suspicious changes in the basketball betting line that mysteriously occurred between the time I confirmed the number and when I tried to make the wager.
I used to think one of the things that made Las Vegas a great gambling city was the opportunity to match wits against the oddsmaker.
Lately, I'm not so sure. Lately, it looks as if sports betting is going the way of blackjack, where in order to play the game you have to either a) be a dope or b) do your best to pretend to be a dope until you're inevitably caught and tossed out for having the audacity to risk money at a card game.
If that's the way the business is going, with sports books forever relegated to the status of the evil stepchild of casino operations, with bettors viewed with contempt and suspicion rather than appreciated as customers, and required to check their brains at the entrance like they do at the 21 pit, then it's a real shame.
Forget about policing sports betting as the industry's "watchdog," or catching any game-fixing schemes.
No, if that's the direction the business is going, Las Vegas sports betting will end up policing itself right into irrelevancy.
Jeff Haney on an unfortunate trend in sports betting on the Strip
LAS VEGAS SUN
I am not a beard.
Nor am I a "runner," another term used to describe someone who makes bets with other people's money in a sports book following the instructions of his boss, the head money-mover.
I am not a "wise guy" or a professional gambler. I am not a member of any betting team, partnership, syndicate or consortium, either.
I'm just an average guy working alone who believes (evidently with some justification) that sometimes my opinion on a sporting event is more informed than that of the oddsmaker or the betting marketplace, and who once in a while likes to back up that opinion with a wager.
That's why I wasn't surprised when, in the wake of the NBA betting scandal, commissioner David Stern suggested any tainted bets probably did not come through Las Vegas but were instead limited to the so-called "underworld," the vast illegal sports betting market.
I thought back to this past basketball season and a few instances where I, a run-of-the-mill individual bettor, had trouble persuading sports books to accept my money at the counter.
I can only imagine how difficult it would be for an organized betting group, like one connected to any games that might have been fixed, to get down any kind of meaningful money in Las Vegas.
I recall trying to bet basketball at the Wynn Las Vegas and facing a grand inquisition that would put Torquemada to shame.
Are you staying at the hotel? Can you produce a room key? Who are you? And unspoken but coming through loud and clear: Why are you trying to bet here? (No. No. I'd rather not say. And I thought this was a casino on the Las Vegas Strip.)
I suppose because I was so "uncooperative" (What nerve! Trying to make a bet in a sports book!), my betting limit on the basketball game in question was set at a grand total of $550. Come on, how about $660? Nope.
The fact they wanted a room key tells me they would have gladly accepted, say, $770 or more, if I could prove I was an established sucker - er, I mean a valued hotel guest.
Then, with apologies to Jimmy Cannon and Jay McInerney, there was the grim scene at the late and unlamented New Frontier, perhaps the most depressing place in Southern Nevada:
You're the only bettor in the joint. You walk up to the counter and state your intended wager on one of the night's basketball games. The elderly gentleman behind the counter glares at you as if you're holding a pistol on him, turns around and disappears into a back room without a word. After a couple minutes he reappears and spits, "You can have $330," meaning that's the maximum amount he'll accept from you. You shrug, place the bet and wonder what you're doing in this mausoleum anyway.
Then there's the sports book at Terrible's, ostensibly a real live casino, that deigned to accept a maximum of a whopping $220 from me on a basketball bet.
Hey, gee, thanks! That makes the Wynn look like the sports book at the old Little Caesars (unofficial motto: If you can carry it in, you can bet it).
Also, at several joints in downtown Las Vegas, I would regularly encounter suspicious changes in the basketball betting line that mysteriously occurred between the time I confirmed the number and when I tried to make the wager.
I used to think one of the things that made Las Vegas a great gambling city was the opportunity to match wits against the oddsmaker.
Lately, I'm not so sure. Lately, it looks as if sports betting is going the way of blackjack, where in order to play the game you have to either a) be a dope or b) do your best to pretend to be a dope until you're inevitably caught and tossed out for having the audacity to risk money at a card game.
If that's the way the business is going, with sports books forever relegated to the status of the evil stepchild of casino operations, with bettors viewed with contempt and suspicion rather than appreciated as customers, and required to check their brains at the entrance like they do at the 21 pit, then it's a real shame.
Forget about policing sports betting as the industry's "watchdog," or catching any game-fixing schemes.
No, if that's the direction the business is going, Las Vegas sports betting will end up policing itself right into irrelevancy.
Riiiight!
