[BSPN] Texas says daily fantasy is gambling and therefore illegal

Ken Paxton is an embarrassment for sure, but he is absolutely 100% correct here. Don't like his ruling? Work to change the law as written by the Legislature.

 

Agree: Fantasy sports for $ is 100% gambling, and we should legalize gambling in TX.

Here's how you know fantasy sports are gambling: Can you run a fantasy boxing league for a payout? What makes that different than betting on single fights? Nothing.

 

DFS is no less gambling than poker is. Both are games of 'skill' which are also dependent upon chance. It's gambling and always has been, and the advertising for those two companies has been VERY misleading.

That said, it's stupid that Texas has not yet legalized gambling - how much more money needs to leave Texas and go to Louisiana??

 

Texas needs to Legalize Personal Freedom. Get big government out of our lives.

 

Banning DFS is a good thing if for no other reason than to get those stupid ads off TV every 90 goddamned seconds.

On the real though, the gambling laws need to be updated.

Season long fantasy leagues and Daily fantasy are such completely different animals.

 

If anyone hasn't seen John Oliver's story on daily fantasy, its worth a watch. Pretty crooked situation considering the daily fantasy companies were smart enough to get sports leagues and major owners to become investors and advertisers.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Mq785nJ0FXQ" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

Outstanding. Must-watch.

 

Of course Cuban feels that way. Mark Cuban invests in a Daily Fantasy Sports startup founded by two professional fantasy players

 

that's illogical. it's not like he's only taking the stance to protect his investment. he obviously would've felt the same way pre-investment. and his stake is less that $1MM. a pittance to him.

 

He's a moron of an investor if he's just going to throw away money. Of course he's going to support daily fantasy. His investment goes to virtually zero if daily fantasy is ruled illegal by most state governments.

This is about protecting not only his direct investment in daily fantasy but also marketing and advertising deals that he has with them via the Mavericks. I'm sure the his connection goes even deeper than that.

This is why daily fantasy is so successful. Both companies were incredibly smart and managed to make deals with the entire media and sports apparatus. The whole industry is invested in them so they'll always defend both companies.

 

I'm happy Paxton came down on them, and happy gambling isn't legal in Texas. I hope it never is. Still, Paxton needs to go to jail.

 

Wait, does this mean I won't have to be subjected to those ****ing annoying commercials anymore?? If so, sign me up for this!

Listen Jersey Mike, I don't give a **** if you won $2100 playing on Draft Kings.....you also wear a wife-beater to the bank, and listen to nothing but Bon Jovi in your beat-up '84 Trans-Am. I'm not following your lead on that either, buddy.

 

Pittance or not, you said it yourself....it's an investment. True he may have had the same stance in the absence of the investment, but the investment in itself is EXACTLY why he is taking the stance. He stands to gain, quite alot I'm sure, by keeping DFS legal.

 

The advertising is the biggest indictment here. DraftKings came in as a hot-shot startup (Seriously, its run by computer nerds, not oily businessmen) and immediately started pumping all its revenue into ads.

FanDuel did what it could to keep up, and it will always be considered the real first DFS site to hit big time, but DraftKings crushed them with a better model, more relevant ads (Featuring hipster dudes and Ed Norton voice-overs), and just a better overall experience.

The ads become ubiquitous at the start of this NFL season and that was ultimately their greatest achievement and their greatest downfall at the same time. They succeeded with their onslaught of ads pushing DFS into the spotlight, but with that comes the law who wants their cut.

Uncle Sam doesn't like billion dollar industries who are raking in cash by the truckload by taking advantage of a legal loophole.

This loophole inadvertently gave birth to DFS when they banned online poker, but put in loose wording to protect fantasy sports at the time.

Is it gambling? By definition, no. By US law definition? It varies by state. Gambling is a game of chance where luck consists of a certain percentage of winning (Usually a percentage determined by the states). This is not a federal matter, so certain states have already deemed DFS illegal.

So why is the state lottery legal? By definition it is gambling. There is no amount of skill involved in winning a lottery. There is virtually nothing you can do to improve your chances outside of purchasing a huge number of entries which still only moderately improves your chances.

This is now in essence the same battle Vegas and the casinos won vs legalized online poker.

Why go to the casino when I can sit in my underwear and play poker for money all day?

But there is a reason that many former poker pros took to DFS like flies on ****. The games are very similar in that the highly skilled players understand the odds and the real art in winning doesn't involve sports knowledge, but knowledge of game theory, and how to out-smart the opponent. They know that if they consistently play the odds, they will win at a rate higher than 50%.

So does DFS have a prayer of eventually winning these legal battles and survive? Probably not, but they have a better shot than poker ever did. Why? Because they have a very focused business model that generates a lot of cash not only for themselves, but for their powerful investors.

The NBA and MLB are heavily invested in DraftKings, so are prominent NFL owners like Jerry Jones. Roger Goodell won't publicly endorse DFS or even gambling like Adam Silver does, but that is because he has absolutely no reason to. The Rog has too many other fish to fry to worry about a few hundred million moving around. The NFL will still be king of the cash-cow American sports industry even if DFS dies.

But Adam Silver is sharp enough to understand that the NBA makes a perfect gambling model. It doesn't have near the variance of NFL games, or MLB games. People absolutely love playing NBA DFS or betting on NBA games because it doesn't take genius level intuition to pick winning players/teams in an NBA slate of games.

Now that Mark Cuban is in bed with fantasylabs, DFS has a better shot than poker, but even if they do somehow survive, they're going to be gutted down and regulated up the arse.

 

Sucks that things I enjoy partaking in (gambling/weed) are always an uphill battle here yet things I have no interest in (having big ass guns or being able to carry a gun around) gets laws passed so easily....dammit texas i love you but sometimes you can be annoying

 

i'm just saying, your implication was that he's only speaking out and perhaps disingenuously taking the stance simply because this is coming in the aftermath of his investment. the fact that he made the investment in the first place speaks to him not lumping this in with gambling.

 

Soo... you enjoy illegal things, and are opposed to things which are guaranteed in the Constitution.. and.. you think it's TEXAS' problem? Sorry to break it to you guy, but the problem is not with Texas, it's with you.

 

A. I'm not opposed to anything involving guns it was just an example of something that so easily can get passed here as opposed to other things.

B. Yea it is a problem with the state because both things can easily be allowed here and heavily taxed or givien strict rules but the state will have a problem allowing that because most people in this state are stuck in 1920 as you my friend seem to be.

 

I dont think open carry is constitutionally protected nor has there been any precedent to ever share that. Gambling also isn't constitutionally prohibited either. Both are subject to legislation legalizing and/or banning them. He was just commenting that we legalized one thing that he didn't care about and continue to ban one item that he does.

Nothing unreasonable about what he said. He just disagrees with Texas's legislative priorities.

 

Just out of curiosity...why the eternal ixney on gambling? The tax revenue couldn't make up for the social costs? I'm torn on the issue, because I've seen it.

That our AG is also a possible/actual felon just makes me shake my head and walk away.