NY bans FanDuel & DraftKings

[raduray]

A lot of online sportsbooks offer fantasy head-2-head wagers, where you are given the choice between 2 players and select the one you think will score the most points. It is the same as wagering on a team (i.e. bet $110 to win $100) and sometimes there is a "point spread" involved.

For example, this weekend you could take Tom Brady versus Eli Manning +10 and bet like you would bet on the game's winner itself.

I always wondered what would happen if a casino like Foxwoods took such action.

Isn't that like the props at the sports books in Vegas?

 

[oldrover]

Isn't that like the props at the sports books in Vegas?

Naaaah... that's nothing at ALL like GAMBLING ON SPORTS. <snort>

...hey... I pegged it!

 

[Urgent]

Whoa, whoa, whoa. My F'n dogs are cute!!!

prove it

 

[raduray]

I just heard on PTI that Robert Kraft and Jerry Jones have $300 million invested in fantasy. They didn't say if it was $300 million each, or together, but either way, they've got to be a bit nervous right about now.

 

[PatsWickedPissah]

I just heard on PTI that Robert Kraft and Jerry Jones have $300 million invested in fantasy. They didn't say if it was $300 million each, or together, but either way, they've got to be a bit nervous right about now.

jeezze, just when I was calming down about Kraft I find out he's behind all those irritating ads

 

[Silver Blue&Red]

prove it

 

[QuantumMechanic]

I just heard on PTI that Robert Kraft and Jerry Jones have $300 million invested in fantasy. They didn't say if it was $300 million each, or together, but either way, they've got to be a bit nervous right about now.

Hope they lose it all.

 

[oldrover]

I just heard on PTI that Robert Kraft and Jerry Jones have $300 million invested in fantasy. They didn't say if it was $300 million each, or together, but either way, they've got to be a bit nervous right about now.

I'd heard that a while back. I'd say that it was disappointing coming from Kraft... but that's way down on the list of Kraft disappointments these days.

 

[XLIX]

Isn't that like the props at the sports books in Vegas?

I would consider it very similar. A Vegas prop bet would be something like "Tom Brady: Over/Under 325 yards passing" so it isn't really Brady versus Manning.

However, I have not been to Vegas in 2 years so it wouldn't surprise me if that sort of "Fantasy" matchup is being used now.

 

[BTTA]

I just heard on PTI that Robert Kraft and Jerry Jones have $300 million invested in fantasy. They didn't say if it was $300 million each, or together, but either way, they've got to be a bit nervous right about now.

This probability was gamed out during the scenario planning that went on before the investment. In fact, they were probably in contact with all of the major state legal authorities to ask for their views on FF at the time. They know the states will eventually find a way to allow it once their cut is maximized and put into law.

And this also puts into perspective the comments Jones made about Defamegate. What happens on the football field is insignificant to these guys on a day to day basis. It is just the fun part of their day. This kind of investment and other matters of high finance are what they actually care about.

Exactly. This is solely about a huge new economic engine and everyone wants their piece of it. It isn't going away. The government getting a piece of it is just a developmental step. Making it temporarily illegal is just a tactic.

Fantasy football is an immensely important part of keeping the NFL relevant throughout the season to a wide audience. Without it, half of the teams and players in the league are already irrelevant, because everyone knows they don't have a meaningful chance at the playoffs, and we are only in early November.

For the next 8-12 weeks, fans of Miami, Baltimore, Cleveland, Kansas City, San Diego, Jacksonville, Tennessee, New Orleans, Tampa Bay, Chicago, Detroit, Washington, Dallas, and San Francisco would have largely lost interest. Instead, millions of them are now glued to their TV sets for the full NFL season as their interest shifts completely to individual players rather than teams. The list of teams will now grow with each passing week.

If the NFL brass had come up with this, it would have been one of the most brilliant innovations in modern times. But most of them lucked into it (Goodell and most of the owners again being born on third base) and will reap massive benefits from it.

U.S. history has demonstrated repeatedly that these things don't get regulated away, they just get regulated into a certain order.

Kraft was prescient when he bought in early.

 

[Bobsyouruncle]

He can do whatever he wants no matter how crazy it is. The questions are (a) whether or not his decision will be upheld when challenged and (b) does he want to take on the political consequences of his actions.

He can do lots of things and the courts may have to stop him. But the fact that there exists a method of checks and balances doesn't mean he should do it. The method of making laws is not AG makes it up, court decides if they agree.

Roger Goodell, can suspend Brady for integrity of the game based on his own faulty interpretation of the CBA. By your logic he is doing exactly what he is supposed to do because there exists a method by which the courts can override his decision. I don't agree in either case, they are charged with interpreting correctly, the courts are a last resort, not part of a normal process for outlawing things that had previously legally existed for years.

As for practicalities and how likely he would be do to something like that, it depends on how the law that defines bannable drugs is written. If the law says "Bannable drugs are those on this list: drug X, drug Y, and all narcotics" then he's very likely not to try because there's no way his interpretation could possibly be upheld.

If, instead, the law has some broad, weasely qualifier in it like "substances which can be considered harmful" then he may decide to try. Maybe he can convince a court to agree that sugar is harmful enough to trigger that clause of the law.

No, you said "he can do whatever he wants no matter how crazy." Therefore it really doesn't matter how strained the logic is, or if there's any at all. That's for the courts to decide. No matter his decision, no matter how crazy, he's doing his job.

I don't agree with that, but since you wrote it there's no reason to write the above about how it depends on if the law says this or that, it doesn't depend on anything but what the AG wants.

Similar answer, though with the complication that federal regulation of the stock market might pre-empt state regulation via the US constitution's Supremacy Clause.


You realize that it is longstanding vanilla US and state law that the executive branch essentially gets to interpret statutes as it sees fit unless and until a court says the executive branch's interpretation is incorrect? This is nothing new at all.

Their job is to interpret the laws correctly. I'm not sure you disagree with that since in the above you went on about how the AG would have to look at the language of a law for his interpretation. If his job is to apply the law correctly, and how it was understood when it was made then this instance is nearly indefensible.

His stance is that the law always made fantasy illegal. Yet somehow when the law was made nobody mentioned that. After the law was passed, nobody noticed that thing that everyone just outlawed is being done everywhere. I don't believe that they just meant it to be illegal the whole time and everyone just had amnesia for the last 10 years. At least when they decided to make online poker illegal they went through legislature.

The actions speak for themselves, when NYers asked their representatives for this law, it wasn't for fantasy sports. They know it, we know it, everyone knows it. Lots of people don't care because for some reason moral panic has swept the nation. But they should care because it isn't always someone else's ox getting gored when something legal gets reimagined as illegal.

 

[QuantumMechanic]

His stance is that the law always made fantasy illegal.

No, his stance is that DFS is illegal.

Yet somehow when the law was made nobody mentioned that. After the law was passed, nobody noticed that thing that everyone just outlawed is being done everywhere.

Did DFS meaningfully exist when the law was passed? I very much doubt it. So when something new comes along the AG is supposed to just completely ignore it rather than consider how it stands relative to the law that exists? Really? Also, this AG has been in office for 4 years. While FanDuel was founded in 2009 it didn't really get rolling until 2013. And DraftKings was only founded in 2012. So basically they've really only been rolling for the past two years.

The actions speak for themselves, when NYers asked their representatives for this law, it wasn't for fantasy sports. They know it, we know it, everyone knows it. Lots of people don't care because for some reason moral panic has swept the nation. But they should care because it isn't always someone else's ox getting gored when something legal gets reimagined as illegal.

Please. When the law "asked for" was passed DFS didn't even exist. And the "F" in DFS standing for "fantasy" is not some magic spell that says DFS -- which is qualitatively different from the fantasy sports that existed when the law was passed -- can't possibly have a "material aspect" of chance.

On top of that, it doesn't matter what the people "wanted". It matters what the law actually passed says. The law says that activities where chance is "a material aspect" are illegal gambling. If DFS does indeed have chance as "material aspect" why the heck shouldn't it be illegal? And it certainly is the business of state regulators (like the AG) to look at something new like DFS and make a finding as to whether or not is gambling under the law.

It's not like I have anything against gambling. Personally, I think all gambling should be legal. We should be able to bet on everything from game outcomes to what gender some celebrity's baby will be -- just like you can in the UK, for example.

 

[TheBostonStraggler]

jeezze, just when I was calming down about Kraft I find out he's behind all those irritating ads

You call your most recent posts about Kraft "calming"?

 

[XLIX]

He can do lots of things and the courts may have to stop him.

There is not a chance in the world that happens. He uses the NY State Constitution to justify his actions, and the law is pretty darn cut and dry. The DFS's need a judge to agree that it's not gambling when even the staunchest of supporters agree it is.

I don't agree in either case, they are charged with interpreting correctly, the courts are a last resort, not part of a normal process for outlawing things that had previously legally existed for years.

Just because they were turning a blind eye doesn't really mean it was legal.

When Fantasy Football was just a bunch of buddies putting $20 each into a pool with the money going to the winner, no one cared. But now that it is a $3 billion a year industry with a very questionable relationship between the league, the networks, and these gambling websites, I have no problem with a little government oversight.

 

[primetime]

He can do lots of things and the courts may have to stop him. But the fact that there exists a method of checks and balances doesn't mean he should do it. The method of making laws is not AG makes it up, court decides if they agree.

Were you born prior to the 12th century? Because you really need to read about this "common law" thing that's taken the Anglo world by storm over the last 900 years or so.

 

[primetime]

It's not like I have anything against gambling. Personally, I think all gambling should be legal. We should be able to bet on everything from game outcomes to what gender some celebrity's baby will be -- just like you can in the UK, for example.

I agree with this on a theoretical level, though there's some political economic caveats (full disclosure, if somewhat unnecessary, I play small amounts on DFS each week for entertainment).

The US has two gambling policies that the UK does not. The first is casino complexes as an economic development tool and the second is the complicated relationship between gambling rights and revenues and Indian tribes.

I've mentioned the first in a previous post. The second is really a result of weird historical accident based on tribal sovereignty and the Puritan laws that made gambling illegal in most places in the first place, and is being infringed upon as states legalize gambling (see New York and its new casinos, which will now compete in some way with established casinos that were previously the sole purview of the tribes).

So totally legalized gambling undermines the carefully politically constructed gambling infrastructure in states in terms of tax revenue and jobs for the state and/or tribal revenue.

I suppose you could come up with some economically optimal way that's also just in a Rawlsian manner in which tribes and the feds go into the DFS business together and share revenues, but this seems unlikely politically. So you're left with someone getting short shift, and for right now it's the DFS folks and the rest of the Internet gambling enterprises because they're the newcomers.

 

[raduray]

John Oliver's take. Long, but funny.

 

[Wheelman]

John Oliver's take. Long, but funny.

Lol, that was really good! I especially love how they trolled Fanduel/DraftKings with those commercials at the end, even taking a shot at the NFL*.

Thanks for sharing it!

 

[PatriotsReign]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/11/s...sy-sites-to-stop-taking-bets-in-new-york.html

Good! This country has become insane about gambling....hint...gambling is not a good thing.