See a clip of the documentary here:

In other news:

• Delaware will take sports betting challenge to the U.S. Supreme Court – L.A. Times
• Rhode Island Senate committed considering joining the fight against the Federal ban on sports betting. More details at RecentPoker.com.
• The state of New Jersey has introduced the first intrastate gambling bill in the US, potentially leading the way to the opening of the US egaming market on a state-by-state basis. Read more at EGRMagazine.com.

Sports betting history was made today as sports bettors in Delaware placed the first legal bets under the new state-sponsored sports betting system. The AP covered this remarkable milestone, outlining some of the contentious history surrounding this issue:

DOVER, Del. — Sports betting in Delaware officially got under way Thursday after surviving a contentious legal battle with professional sports leagues and the NCAA.

Bill Mele, a cemetery supervisor from Dover, was so eager to get started he tried to place his wager a minute or two before the official 10 a.m. kickoff. The computer at the new, high-tech sports book at Dover Downs casino wouldn’t accept his initial bet, so he had to wait a couple of minutes and try again.

“I wanted to get my sports bet in, and when I realized they were having a Thursday night game, I got pretty excited,” said Mele, who celebrated his 57th birthday by becoming the first person to place a sports bet at Dover Downs.

Delaware is now the only state east of the Rocky Mountains to offer legal sports wagering.

The casinos at Delaware Park near Wilmington and at Harrington Raceway and Casino in southern Delaware also began taking bets in advance of Thursday night’s NFL regular season opener between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Tennessee Titans.

Under a federal appeals court ruling in a lawsuit brought by professional sports leagues and the NCAA, Delaware’s sports betting is restricted to parlay, or multiple wagers on at least three NFL games. A bettor must pick all the games correctly to win.

Delaware officials were hoping to offer bets on single games and sports other than professional football, but the court said that went beyond what was allowed under the state’s exemption to the 1992 federal ban on sports betting. Delaware was exempted from the ban because it had previously conducted an NFL sports lottery in 1976.

This video above is from the DelawareOnline.tv and it gives you a first-hand look at the front lines of this raging battle.

On a related note, the NFL season starts today. If you are an American customer looking for an online sportsbook, we recommend you check out Canbet.com. They offer $400 free for new customers right now, and they have a rock solid reputation in the industry. Full disclosure: the link provided is part of an affilate program, but the recommendation is 100% genuine and unbiased. Thanks for your continued support and good luck to you in the upcoming NFL season!

Pro sports bettors meet in Vegas

A group of top sports bettors met recently in Las Vegas and the Sun ran an interesting interview with one of the participants. The interviewee wanted to keep a low profile for obvious reasons:

A tableau reminiscent of that classic exchange played out this weekend in a well-appointed conference room at a Strip resort, where a small group of sports bettors had gathered for a private meeting to network and exchange information on their trade.

One guest speaker, going by the pseudonym “Mr. X,” runs a major sports betting syndicate that wagers large sums of money through offshore sports books as well as in Las Vegas.

One thing that surprised me is the rate of return expected by pro sports bettors. I expected something more than 1% of total amount wagered, but this is what is reported:

Overall, Mr. X said, his syndicate “holds,” or wins, about 1 percent of the amount of money it puts into action. To put that in perspective, if you bet $1,000 a week for 17 weeks of a football season and had as much success as this group of high-level professional gamblers, you could expect to pocket a grand total of $170. This sports betting stuff truly is a game of inches.

Sure, 1 percent of a big fleet of new cars can be quite a nice score. But even that rate of return requires an enormous amount of work, according to Mr. X. His team completes much of the “heavy lifting” in analyzing the forthcoming football season by June, then relies on statistical models throughout the season itself.

Typically during football season, Tuesday is a big day for placing early wagers. But the action kicks into high gear Thursday through Sunday, when Mr. X sleeps about five hours a day and works the other 19 hours.

“Thursday and Friday, we’re betting all day every day,” Mr. X said. “That’s when we start doing a lot of ‘halves’ (first-half lines), which start coming up (on betting boards). Last year we were betting a lot of college totals on Fridays because there’s so much other stuff you can be doing Saturday morning. On Saturdays, you can really get money down, particularly if you have a network.”

I really enjoy interviews like this that give the reader a small window into the world of pro sports betting. I’m looking for a video interview along the same lines – if anyone knows of one please forward me the info. Thanks!

The big news item today is the blown call at the end of yesterday’s Chargers Steelers game. While not affecting the outcome of the game, the official’s decision to invalidate Pittsburgh’s last minute touchdown caused San Diego to beat the point spread resulting in a lost wager for those who picked Pittsburgh. To make matters worse, the play was originally ruled a touchdown and then was overturned based on a false understanding of the rules. The NY Times paints an interesting picture of the pandemonium that ensued at the Vegas sportsbooks:

As befuddling as the end of Sunday’s game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the San Diego Chargers was for fans — when an apparent Steelers touchdown on the final play was affirmed by the referee and then waved off with little explanation — imagine if your company had bet $1 million on the point spread and more than 1,000 people were loudly demanding you pay it off.

Bob Scucci did not have to imagine. As the head of sports betting for Boyd Gaming in Las Vegas, he lived it for a harrowing 15 minutes Sunday night, when chaos reigned about the final score. Bettors who had picked the Steelers and given 4 to 5 points believed that Troy Polamalu’s final-play touchdown had made the final score 17-10, making them winners. Those who had taken the Chargers and the points insisted that the play was later reversed and the final score reverted to 11-10, making them the winners.

As he watched the mounting mutiny from behind the counter at the Orleans Casino, Scucci said, he knew that “maybe” would be an insufficient response.

“People were trying to cash all sorts of tickets — no one was really sure,” Scucci recalled in a telephone interview Monday. “They demanded an explanation. It got pretty ugly.”

Ted Sevransky, a prominent professional handicapper, said: “It was chaos. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

The controversial play took place soon after the Steelers had kicked a field goal with 11 seconds left to make the score 11-10, with the subsequent kickoff and one last Chargers play from scrimmage remaining. Philip Rivers threw to LaDainian Tomlinson, who lateraled to Chris Chambers, whose toss toward Rivers was tipped by Polamalu — who corralled the ball and ran it into the end zone for an apparent touchdown.

Suddenly the Steelers led, 17-10, with 0:00 on the clock. Pittsburgh bettors were delirious and Chargers bettors distraught, but all joined in communal confusion when the referee, Scott Green, announced that the play was being reviewed.

“It was so loud that we couldn’t hear what the ref was saying,” Scucci said.

At one point, Green signaled touchdown again, but it soon became clear that matters were not settled. Viewers on the East Coast saw CBS flash an 11-10 final score for a few seconds before the network switched to its “60 Minutes” interview with Barack and Michelle Obama. Stations in the Pacific time zone stayed with the CBS game feed.

This is one of the reasons I dislike betting on the point spread. Nothing is more frustrating for me than to lose a bet because my interests as a bettor are no longer in sync with the coach who only cares about winning the game. In this particular case the Steelers coach really had no motivation to argue the call as they had won the game regardless, and you often see examples of teams just spiking the ball at the end of the game rather than kicking an easy field goal if they feel they already have the game won.

Apparently John McCain and his staffers have a tradition of holding a March Madness pool. This is strange because McCain has been a steadfast supporter of keeping sports betting illegal in this country – going as far as trying to ban legal sports betting from Nevada casinos. I think this example shows both the increasingly pervasive nature of March Madness betting in this country and the hypocrisy of our elected officials on the issue of sports betting.

Props to Zeal For Truth, who provides a nice summary:

McCain is a big fan of college basketball (maybe he swayed the NCAA tournament committee to put in Arizona this year) – so much so that it is becoming an annual tradition for the Senator to sponsor a bracket competition on his site (last year’s included campaign gear to the winner). McCain even bets in an office pool with his staff – or at least did last year.

This is all wonderful and good. I would definitely say that sports betting is almost as American as apple pie.

Cue McCain, who declared that sports betting in legal Nevada Casinos “feeds illegal betting on campuses and on the Internet, leads to corruption of college athletes and sets students on the path to becoming problem gamblers.” Naturally of course, McCain has been a huge advocate of banning the practice of betting on college sports.

Anyone who enjoys sports betting and plans on voting in the upcoming election may want to keep in mind McCain’s precarious position on this important issue.

Eye on Gambling is reporting today that U.S. House Democratic policy committee chairman George Miller has endorsed U.S. Regulation of internet gambling:

Congressman George Miller (D-CA), chairman of the House Democratic Policy Committee and the House Education and Labor Committee, has signed on as a co-sponsor of the Internet Gambling Regulation and Enforcement Act. The legislation, introduced last year by Congressman Barney Frank (D-MA), would allow licensed operators to provide Internet gambling services in the United States.

The endorsement of this key legislation by Congressman Miller, one of the most influential leaders on Capitol Hill, further demonstrates the growing support for regulated Internet gambling,” said Jeffrey Sandman, spokesperson for the Safe and Secure Internet Gambling Initiative. “We expect continuing momentum in Congress as more people realize that the current approach to prohibit Internet gambling is a failure. Rather than leave consumers vulnerable in an underground, uncontrolled marketplace, regulation of Internet gambling would protect consumers and generate billions in revenue needed for critical government programs.”

The Internet Gambling Regulation and Enforcement Act (H.R. 2046) and the Internet Gambling Regulation and Tax Enforcement Act (H.R. 2607), a companion bill introduced by Representative Jim McDermott (D-WA), would regulate and tax Internet gambling activity. Under the proposed legislation, each Internet gambling operator would be licensed by the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) and required to ensure that the individual placing the bet or wager is physically located in a jurisdiction that permits a particular form of Internet gambling. The legislation would reinforce the rights of States to control what, if any, level of Internet gambling was permissible within their borders, including the ability to apply additional taxes, and to ensure that appropriate consumer protections and limitations were in place.

It’s great to see that there are still some members of our government who are not in the pocket of influential offline casino interests. If you live in Congressman Miller’s district, please let him know that you support his position on this issue.

In other news, here are some interesting sports betting related links I’ve stumbled upon recently:

Hello there iBet.pro!

I am a new contributor here at iBet.pro and I will be focusing on some of the different bets that I find to be attractive for the upcoming year in sports! It’s just about that time of year when pitchers and catchers start breaking out the leather and warming up for the upcoming season so let’s talk some baseball!

There are always a number of futures bets that you can make right now, before the dust from spring training has settled, and get some favorable odds. Often times early trades will artificially pump up or down the odds of a number of teams within the effected division and these can make some attractive bets. There are also usually some dark horse candidates to compete for a playoff spot that haven’t quite materialized in the press just yet.

Let’s examine some of the Futures to win the series in 2008.

The Mets’ acquisition of the best left hander in baseball has obviously gotten the whole baseball world buzzing with them set up as the early favorites to come out of the NL. However, as much as the Mets have improved there is one contender within their own division that has been all but overlooked. Namely the Atlanta braves. The recent upsurge in odds makers’ confidence in the Mets wining the division has pounded down the odds on the Braves by enough to make them seem attractive. They currently are sitting at 30-1 and they have historically shown that they can go deep into the playoffs even in years in which the Mets are early on considered the “class” of the division. They finished with 4 less wins then the Mets last season and their top three of Glavine, Smoltz and Hudson stacks up quite favorably against most of the National League rotations. You can pencil them in for around 90ish wins which should be enough to get them in for at least a wild card appearance. At 30-1 they could be one of the bigger money makers with a legitimate shot at winning it all.

Out of the AL the competition looks a little bit stiffer with less bargains to be had. However, the Indians out of the central seem to have the odds against them to come out of the central division. With the trades that Detroit has made odds makers have them pegged to take the central with 7-1 odds for them to win it all. Where as the Indians who have not had any major subtractions from a nucleus that knocked off the Yankees and took the eventual champion Red Sox to seven look to be just as strong this season as last. I am not enamored with the trades that Detroit has made and I don’t feel like it is going to close the sizable 8 win gap between them and Cleveland during the 2007 season. At 10-1 Cleveland looks like a bargain to compete for the 2008 title. Look for Cleveland to be on top of the division come September and make a title run in October.

Now let’s examine some of the divisional races for the upcoming 2008 season.

The NL west may be the most highly contested division in baseball with four teams that can make a legitimate claim that they will be staking claim to the division title. The odds makers have Arizona as the early favorite at 9-5 odds, with Colorado and San Diego close on their heels at 11-5 and LA rounding out the legitimate contenders at 3-1. The Rockies last year showed that they have a young team that we can expect to hit and field the ball well and a pitching staff that is more then adequate. With Los Angeles having as many pitching question marks as they do and San Diego still unable to solve the issue of a complete lack of power in the heart of their lineup, the only other remaining team in contention is Arizona. Expect Arizona to drop a few too many games that Webb and Haren aren’t pitching to catch up to Colorado down the stretch. Colorado at 9-5 looks like the prudent bet in this tough division.

Also on an if you or anyone you know enjoys bingo, have them check out this online bingo site. I was recently introduced to it by a friend and it was a fun way to kill some time playing some free bingo. Give it a whirl and see if that can help satisfy the gambling bug until the wonderful new 2008 season begins!

-Chad signing off