Racings next 800 lb gorilla in the room

[miff]

Unless the Feds step in and block this,DFS is horse racings next worst nightmare.A pal working for an investment bank tells me the handle for DFS will surpass horse racing handle within 5 years if this allowed to go forward.I wonder if the Clueless Clowns running racing even know about or care about this issue.From their overall treatment of the players, you would think not.The prime market for DFS is 18-40 which should also be the target for new horse players. What is not clear is if \"some\" horse racing handle will divert to DFS betting.Interesting that bills have been introduced in NY/NJ State to legalize Sports betting as politicians smell more money.


Bloomberg:

Daily Fantasy Sites Seen Positioned for Jump to Sports Gambling

 
Daily fantasy sports(DFS) websites such as FanDuel Inc. and DraftKings Inc. are thriving because they drew a line between themselves and sports betting.
Yet the possibility of legal online sports gambling one day might be the ultimate destination for daily fantasy companies, who are part of the fastest-growing segment of the $3.6 billion industry.

"Legalized sports gambling is the endgame," said Laurence DeGaris, a University of Indianapolis sports marketing professor who has been a sponsorship consultant for the National Football League, the National Hockey League and companies such as Bank of America Corp. and Home Depot Inc. "One-day fantasy delivers a similar fan experience to gambling, so I expect the current database of customers would provide a good foundation for sports gamblers."

Daily-play has attracted millions of dollars of investment in the past year from groups such as Comcast Ventures, Raine Group and NBC Sports Ventures. Fortune magazine reported this week that closely held FanDuel is considering another round of fundraising that would value the company at $1 billion. FanDuel and DraftKings have used the venture capital to attract users, enhance their products, partner with professional sports teams and leagues, and offer prizes of as much as $2 million.
Unlike online sports betting, which is banned in the U.S., for-fee online fantasy sports are legal. Participants select real players and accumulate points based on the game-day statistics they generate.

"That's the only thing I hear about," Dallas Cowboys running back DeMarco Murray, who led the NFL in rushing, said at a league-organized fantasy football panel during Super Bowl week. "Win or lose for the Cowboys, all they care about is fantasy."
NBA, NHL

Even after the NFL season, daily-play continues with the National Basketball Association, which has a partnership with FanDuel, and the National Hockey League, which is aligned with DraftKings.
The popularity of daily-play fantasy has more than tripled each of the past three years, according to Eilers Research in Anaheim, California. In the past year, user entry fees more then quadrupled to $1 billion from $245 million.
Sports wagering is even more popular, and the majority of action doesn't take place at Nevada's legal sports books. Of the estimated $164 billion wagered on sports in the U.S. in 2013, about $160.3 billion was bet through illegal bookmakers and offshore websites, according to Eilers Research.
Legal Gambling

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in September at a Bloomberg Sports Business Summit that legal sports gambling throughout the U.S. is "inevitable." In a November op-ed for the New York Times, Silver wrote that sports betting "should be brought out of the underground and into the sunlight where it can be appropriately monitored and regulated." A recent Seton Hall University poll found that 55 percent of Americans support legalized betting on sports.
With a rapidly growing user base and partnerships with teams and leagues, DeGaris said the biggest daily-play fantasy companies are in position to merge with existing online sportsbooks if they don't make the transition to sports betting themselves.

"The online platform for daily fantasy sports contests, for the most part, already looks incredibly similar to sports books in casinos," said Marc Edelman, an associate professor of law at Baruch College in New York who consults on legal issues for online fantasy sports companies. "And they were not designed that way by accident.

Fantasy Focus
DraftKings Chief Executive Jason Robins said his company only is focused on bringing daily fantasy play mainstream and said that's attainable by building the user base.

''Maybe Adam and some other people at the leagues want to see standard sports betting, but it's so distant for me," Robins said in an interview. "It's a possible benefit down the road, but I don't think about it that much."
Among the NFL teams DraftKings has partnered with are the Patriots, who this year won their fourth Super Bowl title.
Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, who won his third Super Bowl Most Valuable Player award, has an endorsement agreement with DailyMVP, a daily-play site created by TopLine Game Labs, which last year got $25 million in funding from Cantor Ventures.

Fantasy sports are legal because they're considered games of skill, according to the Fantasy Sports Trade Association. The Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006, which mainly targeted online poker, included carve-out language that makes fantasy sports legal, the industry group said.

"If you look at the players who do well consistently in the fantasy sports games, its very evident that the more skill you have, the better you're going to do in these games," David Geller, the chief executive of TopLine Game Labs and former head of Yahoo! Fantasy Sports, said by telephone. "It's simply not a coin flip. You'll lose if that's the way you play."

Decade Wait
DeGaris predicts the U.S. will have legal online sports betting within 10 years.

"At this point, it's pretty clear it's just a matter of time," DeGaris said. "When the commissioner of the NBA comes out and says it, that's just prefacing that we're moving in that direction, trying to figure out the business model and how to regulate it."
The NBA's Silver has said that sports betting is popular, legal and regulated outside the U.S., offering the example that bettors in England can place a wager using a smartphone, at a stadium kiosk or with a TV remote control. Many daily fantasy sites also give users the chance to play from their mobile devices as well as their laptop computers.

"Daily fantasy sports at its very essence serves as the gateway toward legalized, online sports gambling," Edelman said. "The differences aren't as great as one may think."

[BitPlayer]

I read the Pull The Pocket blog, which covers both thoroughbred and standardbred racing.  He has several posts about DFS as a lower-takeout alternative to playing the horses for those with an analytical bent.  He is experimenting with it himself.

As Richiebee has noted, TVG has also been promoting one of the DFS sites.

I think it\'s going to make a big dent.

[TGJB]

Or, the industry could move itself... nah.

[miff]

\"Or, the industry could move itself... nah\"

JB,

Surprised you feel that those currently running racing have the wherewithal \" to move itself\"

Mike

[TGJB]

I don\'t. Hence \"nah\".

The thing that finally made clear to me what the situation really is, and how bad, was the reaction to my Lasix piece in TDN. An awful lot of industry people thought my idea was great, and... nothing. Everybody looked at everyone else and shrugged.

So I looked at that and realized, if you wanted to make that happen, how would you do it? What would it look like? Answer-- you can\'t. There\'s no mechanism to effect industry wide change. People talk about lack of centralized authority in this business, but it isn\'t just a theoretical question. There\'s nothing in place to make changes industry wide. The Jockey Club is the closest thing to a national body, but they can\'t order change, just suggest it.

And it\'s going to stay that way. The people in power-- most of them in (or influenced by people in) Kentucky who are IN A RELATED BUSINESS (breeding, not racing), aren\'t going to give up power voluntarily. As I said the other day, it\'s going to have to be wrestled from their cold, dead hands.

[miff]

NY, Cali, Florida, Ky can easily go at it on their own without any \"industry\" type blessing simply because they have the best perceived brand and the most handle.The idea that 38 States,with parochial views,will come together for the good of the game will never happen.

[richiebee]

I know it is semantics, but I do not consider DraftKings, FanDuel and Derby Wars
\"fantasy\" sports, because the events which the players/fans are involved in are,
for lack of a better word, \"real\".

The term \"fantasy sports\" brings to mind hours spent playing both APBA and Strat
- o - Matic baseball board games in my early teens; I actually had to pull the
APBA game out when, in my early twenties, I was stranded in Tulsa for nearly a
year, and the archaic drinking laws in Oklahoma made becoming an alcoholic
impossible. (APBA even tried a horse racing board game as I recall).

Personal note: Sitting out Derby Wars until they write a tournament for maidens.

[Topcat]

No shame in that.  The competition\'s triplestiff, and no foolin\'.

[moosepalm]

richiebee Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> The term \"fantasy sports\" brings to mind hours
> spent playing both APBA and Strat
> - o - Matic baseball board games in my early
> teens;


Fantasy?  That was as real as it got in our neighborhood, short of fights braking out.  Those were our summers, mixed in with actual baseball in the street.  There were also roulette games in which the stakes were Topps baseball cards.

I have no doubt that one could trace a straight developmental line from there to the picnic area in Saratoga.

[FrankD.]

Roger,

ONLY 2 points of development in 40 years!!!
That doesn\'t bode well for your stud prospects.

Stay warm.

Frank D.

[moosepalm]

FrankD. Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Roger,
>
> ONLY 2 points of development in 40 years!!!
> That doesn\'t bode well for your stud prospects.
>
> Stay warm.
>
> Frank D.

Frank, those near and dear are quite convinced that I\'ve actually backed up.  As for stud prospects, I\'m a NY bred whose running line is all Finger Lakes.  If I was a standardbred, I\'d be transporting Amish down in PA.

Unfortunately, staying warm does not appear to be an option around here.  Hope you\'re having better luck.