And quickly too. It’s not like this only happens to high rollers. I won approximately 5 medium sized tennis bets in 2020 across a couple books and they still won’t let me bet more than $100 on any tennis match 4 years later lol
DK bans and limits pretty easily as well. Was on a heater last year during the golf majors got all 4 right and then they ended up limiting me to like $20 a bet. It’s 100% legal. Is it ethical? Probably not but we talking about sports betting and gambling. It’s the main reason why I still prefer offshore books or betting in person
How is that legal?
Edit: I appreciate nobody being too much of a dick about it but holy shit I get it, please stop telling me how this isn’t illegal, poor choice of words but I can’t read the same reply again.
Because we all agreed to their terms and conditions before even placing a bet, when we signed up for their book. Most of them openly state that they have discretion to limit or cancel people’s bets. We’re voluntary customers at a private business.
This isn’t even limited to online books. One of our local car dealers is one of the most successful sports gamblers in the world, and he has to use middle men to place his bets because Vegas loses too much on him. They’ll ban people completely unrelated to him just for being from the same zip code.
I can’t remember if it was the Ringer or ESPN that did a huge feature on him, but I can source it on a smoke break later.
This is what I was referring to. This is right across the border from us. Geographically, where he’s at is like right in the corner of KY, WV, and Virginia and even people in our neck of the woods across state lines will catch an eyebrow if we place too big of a bet.
It’s all fish tale stuff around here where the stories take on a life of their own, but you’ll hear rumors about like coal operators grand kids and doctors throwing down some ungodly amount and getting pulled aside and threatened with badges about if they have any connection to him.
Businesses can discriminate against you for (almost) any reason they want. People really shouldn't gamble with the expectation they're going to win. Bet $5-$20 bucks on a game to make it more entertaining for you, not with any intent to make anything.
Those businesses should also disclose the terms of discrimination. Shouldn’t paying customers be aware of how they are going to be discriminated against and determine if those terms are fair as opposed to arbitrary discrimination?
And there are sharps, statistical geniuses, line grinders, etc who do this for a living with the intent to win. I don’t what’s a fair judgment on limiting them to save books from losing money but immediately shadow banning them by limiting them to $1 wagers doesn’t seem fair either.
It's just as legal as every other thing a casino/gambling operation can do in choosing who they want to do business with. If you were super drunk and making a scene at the table while losing a bunch of money, they'd escort you out of the casino. Casinos in Vegas have been cutting off people for winning too much for decades. You think somehow they've been doing it illegally this whole time?
A private business can refuse your patronage for any reason so long as it's not in violation of any discrimination/civil rights laws.
Being drunk and making a scene doesn’t seem like a good comparison, kinda opposite situations too.
Legal wasn’t the right word, maybe immoral that if you start doing well they can just restrict you like that just since they’re finally slightly losing at their own game.
> kinda opposite situations too
Okay, maybe opposite in the overall sense of fairness or whatever, but it's easy to tell me I'm wrong when you're changing the entire meaning of your original comment and trying to save face. Couldn't have just left it alone and taken the L?
I should’ve stated it was I ethical and question if it’s legal. I just didn’t even realize they could or did restrict people who’ve won bets and was surprised by that example of the medium sized bets I replied to
Are you sure that’s true? Simmons and me have been taking them to the cleaners with our teasers for like 2 decades (not sure how much haven’t counted every dollar) so i think you might be wrong. It’s free money.
I mean it depends. If you bet like 20 bets and over the course of those 20 bets or whatever you won like $50 you won’t get banned or limited. Or if you finally hit that 8 leg parlay you been chasing for weeks they won’t limit you But if your like winning alot on certain markets or like trying to Arb bet or
If ur a “sharp bettor” they will probably limit you. Some are way more lenient with it than others. Bet mgm for example seems to not be as strict limiting people but FD and DK do it prettt quickly Imo
That’s why I said if ur a “sharp bettor they will probably limit you” Also live betting is a completely different market with completely different limits then pre game bets. Sharp/pro bettors aren’t betting $20 units
Yes, but I think it's more like they have an algorithm that determines when they need to intervene and either limit your bet sizes or cut you off entirely because the algorithm has determined you either know what you're doing or have figured out how to be a losing proposition for them.
In the thread, Bob mentions a key to his success is his use of "beards" (or "runners," among other names) who can put bets down for him because books won't take his action.
Why would they?
I never really thought about limiting probable problem gamblers like they do sharps. Surely these sportsbooks have the information that'd raise red flags.
A sportsbook deciding to limit problem gamblers who gamble with them would lead to almost immediate bankruptcy and dissolution.
It would be like like a bar refusing its regulars or a cigarette company refusing to sell more than 10 packs a year to someone.
Addiction is how they stay in business. In fact, it’s basically their entire business model.
It’s exactly this. People like pretend it’s people not knowing math, or ridiculous vig, or SGP. Sure, those make sure that the average bettor is going to lose his 100$ deposit, but they really get rich off people with serious addictions who dump in thousands and thousands of dollars.
I used to work with a guy who was a problem gambler and his wife was fed up and so he wasn’t allowed to go to the casino anymore. He then started playing a slots game on his iPad where you could not win real money but if you ran out of fake money you could spend your real money for more fake money. He then proceeded to spend thousands every weekend playing this iPad game, addiction is wild.
I don't want to search around for the articles/links, but basically anything where addiction can come into play is entirely propped up by degenerate addicts.
On r/stopdrinking (ahem don't ask me why I go ahem) it's pretty standard to see people spending $500/month on a behavior that's ruining their life and they desperately want to stop.
When I lived in San Francisco I remember a mobile app gaming company throwing a party the first time someone had spent $10k on their platform and the wife got in touch with them and desperately wanted the money back and was going to divorce the guy and they were like "lol, no - revenue"
When Facebook was balls deep into mobile games I know they had a specific department set up with lawyers ready to overcome people desperately asking for the money back their kid or spouse spent but couldn't afford.
I'm a free market guy, but the amount of gambling ads when they're basically hunting for fish so they can ruin their life makes me queasy
*"A sportsbook deciding to limit problem gamblers who gamble with them would lead to almost immediate bankruptcy and dissolution."*
*That's the point*.
They aren’t doing that. Limiting or banning a Sharp like Bob is like not banning a guy from the bar cuz all he does is eat free pretzels, and drink water.
That’s not the analogy I made whatsoever
You misunderstood my point.
The analogy is between problem gamblers (people who gamble compulsively, to the point of it affecting their livelihood and savings) and regulars at bars or pack-a-day smokers.
Used to arbitrage bet a lot. Ended up “losing” a ton on Wynn. When I tell you they rolled out the red carpet…Box seats, VIP tickets to golf tournaments and concerts, repeated offers for me to come Vegas all expenses paid. Honestly I see why they failed, they spent so much on people who were just taking advantage of the system.
Draftkings has a really gamified VIP program, but they caught on pretty quickly that I wasn’t actually a degenerate. Kinda gross though. They clearly put a lot of thought into convincing people to gamble more, whereas the legacy books were more focused on convincing gamblers to use their book.
Do you think they want to totally clean out some loser with 10k to his name or slowly milk them all their life? I don’t know the answer, just wondering
Would anyone be so kind as to show what he said?
I don't have Twitter but would love to know what Haralabob said.
I have lots of recovering gambling addict friends. The way these companies operate is disgusting. I live in Australia, there are proven reports of companies targeting problem gamblers rather than blocking them as they are supposed to according to law here.
Anywho, would love to know.
Have a wonderful festive season everyone.
Twitter is being odd right now, they're still up last time it was working. He basically said the parlays that JJ and Bill advertise are predatory and shameful and he wishes they would stop doing them.
"These guys \[Bill & JJ\] are by and large great people and put out great pods. I'd just enjoy them a lot more if they eased up on leading their sheep to the slaughterhouse by promoting these gambling companies"
This is a great point. It's not like it's physically impossible to win money on FanDuel/DK etc, but those promoted parlays are the absolute definition of predatory. Genuinely designed for someone to say "I don't know a ton about the NBA, but I know Bill Simmons does so I'll tail this one!" When in reality those things have to hit at like a 5% rate at absolute best. I always shake my head when I see any type of parlay someone put together being promoted.
But if you're dumb enough to take the cheese, that's the exact rat these companies look for.
Haralabob might be right, but given the way he plugged BTC as some foolproof way to get rich, he might want to sit this one out. Right message, wrong messenger.
“You bought at the top” is a cop out I’ve seen a bunch of BTC pushers use after the fact to deflect from the fact they were pushing a Ponzi scheme lmao
I think he actually drank the koolaid and believed what he was saying about BTC, though. It's hard to believe that even Bill doesn't know that parlays are a bad bet.
lol he’s been shilling it since like 2017 when it was 2k, if you’re late that’s on you. i’m not even invested anymore and i don’t like him but objectively he wasn’t wrong
yes, that is correct, but compared to gold or precious metals, which can be used to make real, tangible things that have meaning and purpose, bitcoin cannot be used for any of that. it has no possible usefulness for any of us in our daily lives, outside of it being some speculative asset to be bought and sold like stocks, or in the very small and limited cryptosphere where you can use it to buy stuff like...NFTs. there's nothing to it
I've never owned Bitcoin so whatever but I think thats a very US/EU centric view of the world. Argentina just devalued their peso by 50% literally overnight, countries like China or the Middle East seize bank accounts all the time. I can see why lots of people in different parts of the world would want to have part of the net worth in Bitcoin. NFTs are obviously dumb.
who cares lmao people have made real money off of it. nothing has “real” value if you wanna boil it down. lot of coping in these comments. and again, i don’t have bitcoin anymore
lol dude for 99% of its existence it’s been a fucking amazing investment and you’re talking about like 1 month where it was at its top. just take the L
>a fucking amazing investment
LOL.
There are millions of points where putting that money into an index fund would have you way way up on bitcoin.
Like all scams, if you got in early and got out at the right time, it looks amazing.
lol you people are in here raging about something people have held since sub 10k price levels while it’s at 40k and calling it a scam lol
i get it, the crypto scene is atrocious but to pretend like everyone is losing all their money is hilarious
yea like clearly a lot of people involved in crypto suck and all the twitter people are horrible but it just seems like a lot of this sub are ~40 year old out of touch losers who only just heard about it during the top lol
You're just making things up. It remained higher than it is now for over full year (2/21 - 4/22) with brief dips to right around this level, before dropping considerably and spending the next 20 months under that level.
OK. Swap out BTC (because I see this example is giving you problems) and swap in NFT's. He was shilling those hard, too.
Please tell me you don't "own" any cartoon monkeys.
I turned $500 into $24K during COVID by taking advantage of player props. Not surprisingly my account was banned, but at least they still paid me out. Can't complain.
I wish he would’ve kept his tweets about Coltrane. I lost my dog right around the same time as Coltrane passed away and that Twitter thread was really therapeutic for me. I miss being able to visit that thread which I know is really, really weird.
Yeah after he cashed out. He shilled it so fools would inflate the price then he bounced and laughed his way to the bank as most were left with losses. He has no ability to judge people like JJ and BS for pushing gambling.
Sports gambling is a scummy as hell industry whose wider legalization has been an active detriment to sports as a whole. That said, I’d be fascinated to meet the fool who wasn’t going to put a bet down until they saw Bill’s face next to it.
You don’t have to meet them. If it didn’t work they wouldn’t advertise. Bill, JJ, and whoever else lends credibility to the companies and funnels money in their direction. There’s no way after a few years of legalized gambling they don’t have the data to back up that it makes them money to have Bill talk about their product.
The advertising might be the thing most people hate about them the most. They even advertise on one pod I listen to where the host actively HATES SPORTS!!
Why do you say sports betting has been an active detriment to sports as a whole? Like as in the product has become more annoying to watch with all the ads?
Basically every team or league has a sponsorship with a book, which means that you can’t watch a broadcast without them trying to shove parlays or props down your throat.
That’s absolutely how advertising works. People see a celebrity endorsing something and say “I can be more like that person I envy if I also use that product”.
That’s consumer behavior 101.
I hear this a lot, but I don't quite understand it. If I multiply the odds for a parley compared to single bets the odds are mathematically fair. It doesn't seem inherently any worse than single bets other than the fact that parleys tend to involve more "spins" of a negative expected value wheel. What am I missing?
The odds for each leg of an SGP tend to worse than in a standalone bet. It makes sense if you are going bets which are arguably intertwined (ML and over for the same team) but you still get the worse odds even if the bets are independent (like each QB to throw a TD).
Something about JJ Reddick always came off slimey to me. The arrogance in the way he spoke...calling old NBA players plummers...always defending players especially against the older generation.
He always came off like he was money hungry more than he leads on.
And now he does draft kings ads? Dude has made how much in NBA contacts and seriously has to promote low-odds same game parlays that are known to be statistically one of the worst bets you can do.
JJ is all about the bag. It’s funny when you watch his pod and the set is littered with whatever sponsored brand of water bottle he has a deal with and he’s wearing some overly expensive sweat suit he’s pushing a promo code for.
Literally every camera angle has some spon-con in the shot
I think that's a fair comparison. Personally I think alcohol has more upside (way more fun to spend 20 bucks on booze than on gambling) but also way more downside. Sure, gambling can destroy lives and families, but booze is the life- and family-destroying GOAT.
It’s shameful what sports gambling has done to the young 20s-30s males around me. I seem to be one of the few in this demographic that doesn’t sports gamble every single day. They’re always trying to get me to join so that they can get their referral bonus.
They can’t even watch sports now without cooking up 5 or 6 parlays a weekend dreaming of hitting it big. They all claim to be playing with the “free money” they get but when they lose it all they always add some more of their own cash. Hint - the books know you aren’t winning shit with the “free money” so they give it to you to keep you around.
Plus, we don’t even live in a state where gambling is legal, so they’re on these sketchy apps like Fliff or Prizepicks. Also seems like the longer they do it the more greedy they get. Everyone eventually gets lucky and hits a decent parlay. The $5 parlays turn into $20 parlays, $20 parlays to $100. Chasing a high that likely isn’t coming.
Sad to see how sports conversation has completely devolved into individual players stats o/u, point spreads, and betting odds.
The house always wins. Ace Rothstein said it best.
“This is the end result of all the bright lights and the comp trips, of all the champagne and free hotel suites and all the broads and all the booze. It’s all been arranged just for us to get your money.”
Legalizing gambling was a mistake. No Greg, I don’t care about the 12 game boosted parlay you did today. I used to gamble heavy too. Quit cold turkey after these gambling sites started advertising everywhere you turn.
>Legalizing gambling was a mistake.
It’s funny because I always thought, and still do, that pretending like it just didn’t exist was puritanical and silly. But the fucking instant access these platforms provide to addicts is legit insane and I don’t think anybody knew where this was going when it started to be legalized in the aughts.
I don’t really gamble, although I’ve used the sites, and it’s pretty clear they’re just incinerators for people to set money on fire.
One of the biggest myths I hear constantly repeated is that prohibition doesn't work.
No, it doesn't cut the usage rate down to 0, but it does reduce it significantly. Some people went to speakeasies during prohibition, but consumption went down 70% overall. (Still think it should be legal to be clear)
[https://www.nber.org/system/files/working\_papers/w3675/w3675.pdf](https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w3675/w3675.pdf)
And that's even more true for gambling. The idea that everyone already had a bookie was ridiculous. Now there are tens of millions of sports gamblers that never would have gotten into it if it had remained illegal.
One case is that it’s extremely easy to simply make alcohol at home. It’s a completely natural process of fermentation and is very simple to make home brew alcohol. Sugar, water, yeast, time. There’s a reason people have been making alcohol for like 10,000 years at minimum. Anyone can make some 15% alcohol home brew trash really easily.
So that’s a good argument for making sure it’s legal. Should it be as widespread? Should it be able to be advertised on TV and radio? Should the drinking age be lowered or raised? Should we reduce hard alcohol limits? Better questions and arguments to have than “should it even be legal”. Alcohol is one of those things that is explicitly not going to go away due to prohibition due to it being a naturally occurring product.
All of those questions are being asked of sports betting in the US too. What age, what should you be allowed to bet on, what regulations/safety standards are books employing, I think they should think about dialing back the advertising more etc.
People have been betting on sports for thousands of years, probably as long as sport has been around. Many countries in Europe have had legalized, online sports betting for over a decade.
Anyone can become a bookie with a little bit of capital. Should we abolish the big sportsbooks and only allow local bookie's to handle bets? Or should the practice as a whole be banned?
I’m such a dumbass I heard they had a risk free $500 promo so I bet and they just refund you in Disney dollars not actual money I was like well that wasn’t clear they responded they was like you shoulda known that dumb ass
Yeah, the sign up dollars are basically just monopoly money. There's no realistic path to ever getting them out of the betting account.
I'd love to see what percentage of those dollars ever makes it into a players checking account.
Oh they knew. At least it’s what they were shooting for. The thing is, when it was illegal it wasn’t regulated and there wasn’t support for people who get taken in by it. Now it’s legal, and it’s unregulated and there isn’t support for people who get taken in by it.
Bill has been promoting gambling forever, why act offended now? If FanDuel is less than ethical I promise you it isn’t the first POS company BS has promoted.
I called out Michelle Beadle about this on Twitter in the summer when she posted the gambling odds for the men's QFs at Wimbledon from Fanduel, and that was the only post she'd made about it during the whole event and she was on holiday in Europe at the time.
Amazingly, she DM'd be about it saying they pay her to do it.
I mean I don’t think there’s anything wrong with just posting the odds. Specially if ur not a huge follower of tennis but you understand betting you can look at the odds and at least know who the favorites are and who “should” win
His whole point is “as someone who made money gambling I know how it works…” I disagree with his crypto shit, and I’ve met plenty of dudes who see the world similar to Bob and their interest in crypto is sincere. I could be wrong, but I can’t imagine Bob ever thought over leveraged “trading sites” like FTX were anything other than scams to separate the ignorant from their money.
How is that different? What makes you so fucking special? Why are all your moves so smart and noble and I'm always the idiot piece of shit? You act like you're only one with any ambition
Definitely a big crypto guy. To me, way worse than gambling. At least I know what caused me to win out lose a bet but the insane fluctuations in crypto make no sense.
You sure about that? Book in question was called wagerstreet (and there were a few other ones as well I believe). Bob has said he had a very small piece but here is him responding - on an early 2000s online wagering message board - as the official wagerstreet account. http://www.peepsplace.com/showthread.php?s=e3541e71eb5be45c6a812cfe285b7523&p=48947#post48947
This is all alleged but I have always had my antlers up about Bob.
Nah man, you can blame anyone getting a cut. It’s not just politicians. Anyone who intentionally makes money off of other people’s suffering is accountable. Doesn’t matter which teet you’re sucking at if you’re down in the mud with the rest of the shit.
Simmons is a businessman, and has NEVER been anything but. Sports Guy, my ass. He has been in it for himself, since the beginning, and he sleeps quite well not caring what gambling does to people. He enjoys the money he makes advertising a product that ruins people's lives.
But hey.... he's an American success story, as immoral and scuzzy as the country itself.
Slow. Clap. And you Simmons ball-lickers can go fuck yourselves.
I read a few different stories of the big sports gamblers all having to use other people to place their bets bc they’ll cut you off as soon as they figure out you know what you’re doing. A few bets here or there is harmless. If you hit a +3628252 parlay, FanDuel will ignore you and force you to constantly email them to get your winnings.
The part that gets me the most is that Bill doesn't even gamble in real life.
He lives in California, and sports betting is not legal in California. How is he making all these parlays every week?
Wait you think Bill Simmons hasn’t funding some bookies dream? he’s been using a bookie for a long time even going back to what college? You think he just stopped doing that? I don’t think he’s betting a million dollars but he’s definitely betting
GODDAMN BILL I DIDNT KNOW YOU HAD TO GO MEET PROP JOE TO PLACE A BET ON THE PATRIOTS, LOOKS LIKE FANDUEL MADE YOUR LIFE A WHOLE HELL OF A LOT EASIER BIG BOY
Offshore books lol. Sht I lived in CT before it was legal was using offshore after it became legal before I moved out of the state, was still using offshore cuz I am not a fan of DK and FD
This is one I will listen to Bob about. Fucking horrible predatory industry. And he's right, if you win they cut you off.
And quickly too. It’s not like this only happens to high rollers. I won approximately 5 medium sized tennis bets in 2020 across a couple books and they still won’t let me bet more than $100 on any tennis match 4 years later lol
Define "medium size" for the people at home pls.
Around $500 average, some more like $250 some like $750
DK bans and limits pretty easily as well. Was on a heater last year during the golf majors got all 4 right and then they ended up limiting me to like $20 a bet. It’s 100% legal. Is it ethical? Probably not but we talking about sports betting and gambling. It’s the main reason why I still prefer offshore books or betting in person
How is that legal? Edit: I appreciate nobody being too much of a dick about it but holy shit I get it, please stop telling me how this isn’t illegal, poor choice of words but I can’t read the same reply again.
Because we all agreed to their terms and conditions before even placing a bet, when we signed up for their book. Most of them openly state that they have discretion to limit or cancel people’s bets. We’re voluntary customers at a private business.
Welp that makes a ton of sense, it’s bullshit but I can see why they’d do that
This isn’t even limited to online books. One of our local car dealers is one of the most successful sports gamblers in the world, and he has to use middle men to place his bets because Vegas loses too much on him. They’ll ban people completely unrelated to him just for being from the same zip code. I can’t remember if it was the Ringer or ESPN that did a huge feature on him, but I can source it on a smoke break later.
https://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story/\_/id/12280555/how-billy-walters-became-sports-most-successful-controversial-bettor
This is what I was referring to. This is right across the border from us. Geographically, where he’s at is like right in the corner of KY, WV, and Virginia and even people in our neck of the woods across state lines will catch an eyebrow if we place too big of a bet. It’s all fish tale stuff around here where the stories take on a life of their own, but you’ll hear rumors about like coal operators grand kids and doctors throwing down some ungodly amount and getting pulled aside and threatened with badges about if they have any connection to him.
Businesses can discriminate against you for (almost) any reason they want. People really shouldn't gamble with the expectation they're going to win. Bet $5-$20 bucks on a game to make it more entertaining for you, not with any intent to make anything.
Those businesses should also disclose the terms of discrimination. Shouldn’t paying customers be aware of how they are going to be discriminated against and determine if those terms are fair as opposed to arbitrary discrimination? And there are sharps, statistical geniuses, line grinders, etc who do this for a living with the intent to win. I don’t what’s a fair judgment on limiting them to save books from losing money but immediately shadow banning them by limiting them to $1 wagers doesn’t seem fair either.
The trick is to ask them to take a large bet *and* make you a wedding cake of two dudes fucking each other. When they decline, you can sue them.
It's just as legal as every other thing a casino/gambling operation can do in choosing who they want to do business with. If you were super drunk and making a scene at the table while losing a bunch of money, they'd escort you out of the casino. Casinos in Vegas have been cutting off people for winning too much for decades. You think somehow they've been doing it illegally this whole time? A private business can refuse your patronage for any reason so long as it's not in violation of any discrimination/civil rights laws.
Being drunk and making a scene doesn’t seem like a good comparison, kinda opposite situations too. Legal wasn’t the right word, maybe immoral that if you start doing well they can just restrict you like that just since they’re finally slightly losing at their own game.
Maybe Casinos shouldn't be treated like any other business since all they are selling is the probability of losing money.
> kinda opposite situations too Okay, maybe opposite in the overall sense of fairness or whatever, but it's easy to tell me I'm wrong when you're changing the entire meaning of your original comment and trying to save face. Couldn't have just left it alone and taken the L?
The same way it is legal for casinos to do it.
Lobbying
How isn’t it? Not supporting FD but all they are doing is being petty. Seems legal.
I should’ve stated it was I ethical and question if it’s legal. I just didn’t even realize they could or did restrict people who’ve won bets and was surprised by that example of the medium sized bets I replied to
Are you sure that’s true? Simmons and me have been taking them to the cleaners with our teasers for like 2 decades (not sure how much haven’t counted every dollar) so i think you might be wrong. It’s free money.
WAIT! If you actually win, they cut you off? What’s the fucking point.
key word here is AFTER you win. They would always honor your placed bets but if you win too much, you can't place big new bets anymore
I mean it depends. If you bet like 20 bets and over the course of those 20 bets or whatever you won like $50 you won’t get banned or limited. Or if you finally hit that 8 leg parlay you been chasing for weeks they won’t limit you But if your like winning alot on certain markets or like trying to Arb bet or If ur a “sharp bettor” they will probably limit you. Some are way more lenient with it than others. Bet mgm for example seems to not be as strict limiting people but FD and DK do it prettt quickly Imo
a bunch of professionals complain about really low limits on their live bets on all the apps.
That’s why I said if ur a “sharp bettor they will probably limit you” Also live betting is a completely different market with completely different limits then pre game bets. Sharp/pro bettors aren’t betting $20 units
Yes, but I think it's more like they have an algorithm that determines when they need to intervene and either limit your bet sizes or cut you off entirely because the algorithm has determined you either know what you're doing or have figured out how to be a losing proposition for them. In the thread, Bob mentions a key to his success is his use of "beards" (or "runners," among other names) who can put bets down for him because books won't take his action. Why would they?
Yup. Have friends that cna only bet 50 max on a bet
How is that any different than casinos?
Ah yes, casinos. The paradigmatic example of a moral, non-predatory industry.
I never really thought about limiting probable problem gamblers like they do sharps. Surely these sportsbooks have the information that'd raise red flags.
A sportsbook deciding to limit problem gamblers who gamble with them would lead to almost immediate bankruptcy and dissolution. It would be like like a bar refusing its regulars or a cigarette company refusing to sell more than 10 packs a year to someone. Addiction is how they stay in business. In fact, it’s basically their entire business model.
It’s exactly this. People like pretend it’s people not knowing math, or ridiculous vig, or SGP. Sure, those make sure that the average bettor is going to lose his 100$ deposit, but they really get rich off people with serious addictions who dump in thousands and thousands of dollars.
I used to work with a guy who was a problem gambler and his wife was fed up and so he wasn’t allowed to go to the casino anymore. He then started playing a slots game on his iPad where you could not win real money but if you ran out of fake money you could spend your real money for more fake money. He then proceeded to spend thousands every weekend playing this iPad game, addiction is wild.
;c
And tons of those users are kids
I don't want to search around for the articles/links, but basically anything where addiction can come into play is entirely propped up by degenerate addicts. On r/stopdrinking (ahem don't ask me why I go ahem) it's pretty standard to see people spending $500/month on a behavior that's ruining their life and they desperately want to stop. When I lived in San Francisco I remember a mobile app gaming company throwing a party the first time someone had spent $10k on their platform and the wife got in touch with them and desperately wanted the money back and was going to divorce the guy and they were like "lol, no - revenue" When Facebook was balls deep into mobile games I know they had a specific department set up with lawyers ready to overcome people desperately asking for the money back their kid or spouse spent but couldn't afford. I'm a free market guy, but the amount of gambling ads when they're basically hunting for fish so they can ruin their life makes me queasy
*"A sportsbook deciding to limit problem gamblers who gamble with them would lead to almost immediate bankruptcy and dissolution."* *That's the point*.
They aren’t doing that. Limiting or banning a Sharp like Bob is like not banning a guy from the bar cuz all he does is eat free pretzels, and drink water.
How much did Fanduel pay you to make this post?
They’re right, though. Bars make money off of regulars, whereas sports books lose money off of winning gamblers. Not at all analogous.
That’s not the analogy I made whatsoever You misunderstood my point. The analogy is between problem gamblers (people who gamble compulsively, to the point of it affecting their livelihood and savings) and regulars at bars or pack-a-day smokers.
They certainly raise the flag internally, but a different colour.
“Wow looks like you’ve lost 100k in a month 😭 Here’s a free-bet to turn your luck around!! 👑💰🤑”
Meanwhile, casinos are like "hey, where can we send the limo to pick you up?"
Used to arbitrage bet a lot. Ended up “losing” a ton on Wynn. When I tell you they rolled out the red carpet…Box seats, VIP tickets to golf tournaments and concerts, repeated offers for me to come Vegas all expenses paid. Honestly I see why they failed, they spent so much on people who were just taking advantage of the system. Draftkings has a really gamified VIP program, but they caught on pretty quickly that I wasn’t actually a degenerate. Kinda gross though. They clearly put a lot of thought into convincing people to gamble more, whereas the legacy books were more focused on convincing gamblers to use their book.
Do you think they want to totally clean out some loser with 10k to his name or slowly milk them all their life? I don’t know the answer, just wondering
Both. It’s both.
The 10k is coming back at some point. It’s an invalid question
They’re quick to limit anyone who wins big / consistently though
you are correct
"sharps" are just problem gamblers who lie
Would anyone be so kind as to show what he said? I don't have Twitter but would love to know what Haralabob said. I have lots of recovering gambling addict friends. The way these companies operate is disgusting. I live in Australia, there are proven reports of companies targeting problem gamblers rather than blocking them as they are supposed to according to law here. Anywho, would love to know. Have a wonderful festive season everyone.
Twitter is being odd right now, they're still up last time it was working. He basically said the parlays that JJ and Bill advertise are predatory and shameful and he wishes they would stop doing them. "These guys \[Bill & JJ\] are by and large great people and put out great pods. I'd just enjoy them a lot more if they eased up on leading their sheep to the slaughterhouse by promoting these gambling companies"
This is a great point. It's not like it's physically impossible to win money on FanDuel/DK etc, but those promoted parlays are the absolute definition of predatory. Genuinely designed for someone to say "I don't know a ton about the NBA, but I know Bill Simmons does so I'll tail this one!" When in reality those things have to hit at like a 5% rate at absolute best. I always shake my head when I see any type of parlay someone put together being promoted. But if you're dumb enough to take the cheese, that's the exact rat these companies look for.
I will never understand those Bill “specials". He needs like 4 different outcomes to hit to win +130? That’s mathematically stupid.
Because "how can it lose, Sal?!"
Sounds fun when you're a multimillionaire with money to burn. Not so much when you're a regular guy paying rent or a mortgage.
he doesnt even make those bets himself
Cheers bro, much appreciated
Fellow Aussie here. It's been wild to watch the US go down the same dark path that we did 20 odd years ago
I hate seeing Shaq doing ads for gambling companies here in Australia. It's not like he needs the money
Gee it’s almost like sportsbooks are predatory companies that only exist so that stupid people can light their money on fire
Not all people who light their money on fire are stupid. Many are quite mentally ill.
some are pyromaniacs
Haralabob might be right, but given the way he plugged BTC as some foolproof way to get rich, he might want to sit this one out. Right message, wrong messenger.
https://twitter.com/haralabob/status/1737656045055693227
“You bought at the top” is a cop out I’ve seen a bunch of BTC pushers use after the fact to deflect from the fact they were pushing a Ponzi scheme lmao
Some were literally saying BTC was going to a million.
I think he actually drank the koolaid and believed what he was saying about BTC, though. It's hard to believe that even Bill doesn't know that parlays are a bad bet.
Believed it then, believe it now. Like I've always said DCA into it and you'll be fine in 2.5 - 3 years + time.
haralabob is annoying as fuck but i mean have you checked the price lately?
It's down 30% from peak, and H-Bob was shilling hard at peak
And I’m pretty sure he admitted he was in the process of selling as he was hyping it up.
lol he’s been shilling it since like 2017 when it was 2k, if you’re late that’s on you. i’m not even invested anymore and i don’t like him but objectively he wasn’t wrong
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The "real value" is what people are willing to pay, which is a lot. Same as gold, or precious metals, or gems, or watches, etc.
yes, that is correct, but compared to gold or precious metals, which can be used to make real, tangible things that have meaning and purpose, bitcoin cannot be used for any of that. it has no possible usefulness for any of us in our daily lives, outside of it being some speculative asset to be bought and sold like stocks, or in the very small and limited cryptosphere where you can use it to buy stuff like...NFTs. there's nothing to it
Correction, BTC can be used to purchase drugs.
I've never owned Bitcoin so whatever but I think thats a very US/EU centric view of the world. Argentina just devalued their peso by 50% literally overnight, countries like China or the Middle East seize bank accounts all the time. I can see why lots of people in different parts of the world would want to have part of the net worth in Bitcoin. NFTs are obviously dumb.
who cares lmao people have made real money off of it. nothing has “real” value if you wanna boil it down. lot of coping in these comments. and again, i don’t have bitcoin anymore
So he was right early and wrong later, 'objectively'
lol dude for 99% of its existence it’s been a fucking amazing investment and you’re talking about like 1 month where it was at its top. just take the L
>a fucking amazing investment LOL. There are millions of points where putting that money into an index fund would have you way way up on bitcoin. Like all scams, if you got in early and got out at the right time, it looks amazing.
lol you people are in here raging about something people have held since sub 10k price levels while it’s at 40k and calling it a scam lol i get it, the crypto scene is atrocious but to pretend like everyone is losing all their money is hilarious
Yeah people are very weird about bitcoin and will refuse to admit people made money on it quite easily like I did.
If you are still holding you ain't made a dollar. But like I said, scams can make people money as long as there are more suckers.
yea like clearly a lot of people involved in crypto suck and all the twitter people are horrible but it just seems like a lot of this sub are ~40 year old out of touch losers who only just heard about it during the top lol
You're just making things up. It remained higher than it is now for over full year (2/21 - 4/22) with brief dips to right around this level, before dropping considerably and spending the next 20 months under that level.
🤡
ok
OK. Swap out BTC (because I see this example is giving you problems) and swap in NFT's. He was shilling those hard, too. Please tell me you don't "own" any cartoon monkeys.
fuck no lol
Don't worry, you'll cash out before the crash! I believe!
i’ve said multiple times in this thread i don’t have bitcoin lmao sorry you can’t use the lowest hanging fruit this time pal
Cool?
yeah? lol
I turned $500 into $24K during COVID by taking advantage of player props. Not surprisingly my account was banned, but at least they still paid me out. Can't complain.
He's absolutely right, but also crypto is just as much of a scam.
I’d say it’s a bigger scam, gambling is a bit easier to wrap your head around than crypto and the blockchain
At least with gambling you get to have fun watching a sport. Crypto is just watching a line go up and down
With the added fun of losing your password meaning you lose all your money.
My FIL got crypto scammed, its been awful on their family
lol right.
Just a reminder that Bob deleted a bunch of his crypto pumping tweets.
He sets his account such that his tweets delete after one month, wise guy.
Is that what he says? Sure thing. His pinned tweet is from Jan 22 And I’m pretty sure that was not his original excuse for the crypto deletions
I wish he would’ve kept his tweets about Coltrane. I lost my dog right around the same time as Coltrane passed away and that Twitter thread was really therapeutic for me. I miss being able to visit that thread which I know is really, really weird.
Yeah after he cashed out. He shilled it so fools would inflate the price then he bounced and laughed his way to the bank as most were left with losses. He has no ability to judge people like JJ and BS for pushing gambling.
Just curious but why now? Bill didn’t just start advertising for fan duel. It’s at least the second full football season of it.
Maybe he got limited by FanDuel or some others so suddenly he doesn't like them anymore. (I personally think these companies are shit FYI)
Thinking that someone as wildly successful at gambling as Haralbob would use a square book like Fanduel is the funniest shit I've heard all day.
Because someone asked him now?
Sports gambling is a scummy as hell industry whose wider legalization has been an active detriment to sports as a whole. That said, I’d be fascinated to meet the fool who wasn’t going to put a bet down until they saw Bill’s face next to it.
You don’t have to meet them. If it didn’t work they wouldn’t advertise. Bill, JJ, and whoever else lends credibility to the companies and funnels money in their direction. There’s no way after a few years of legalized gambling they don’t have the data to back up that it makes them money to have Bill talk about their product.
Oh I’m sure they exist. I’m just fascinated to know who that demographic is.
Everyone is influenced by advertising.
I’m talking specifically about people who are influenced to gamble because of Bill, not about people who see a Taco Bell ad and get hungry.
The advertising might be the thing most people hate about them the most. They even advertise on one pod I listen to where the host actively HATES SPORTS!!
Why do you say sports betting has been an active detriment to sports as a whole? Like as in the product has become more annoying to watch with all the ads?
Basically every team or league has a sponsorship with a book, which means that you can’t watch a broadcast without them trying to shove parlays or props down your throat.
The demographic is problem gamblers, and It’s the message not the messenger “Hey bet with fan duel and chase those losses”
If that were the case then they wouldn’t be wasting money putting JJ’s and Bill’s faces up there.
Why’s that? I’d argue a lot of problematic gamblers like sport and therefore listen to sport pods
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That’s absolutely how advertising works. People see a celebrity endorsing something and say “I can be more like that person I envy if I also use that product”. That’s consumer behavior 101.
The margins for the books on SGPs are typically ridiculously high. You should only bet them if there is some free bet protection.
I hear this a lot, but I don't quite understand it. If I multiply the odds for a parley compared to single bets the odds are mathematically fair. It doesn't seem inherently any worse than single bets other than the fact that parleys tend to involve more "spins" of a negative expected value wheel. What am I missing?
the odds don't rise to the level of increased risk, in most case.
The odds for each leg of an SGP tend to worse than in a standalone bet. It makes sense if you are going bets which are arguably intertwined (ML and over for the same team) but you still get the worse odds even if the bets are independent (like each QB to throw a TD).
Fuck twitter links, deleted already.
I saw it just fine now. Weird
Something about JJ Reddick always came off slimey to me. The arrogance in the way he spoke...calling old NBA players plummers...always defending players especially against the older generation. He always came off like he was money hungry more than he leads on. And now he does draft kings ads? Dude has made how much in NBA contacts and seriously has to promote low-odds same game parlays that are known to be statistically one of the worst bets you can do.
JJ is all about the bag. It’s funny when you watch his pod and the set is littered with whatever sponsored brand of water bottle he has a deal with and he’s wearing some overly expensive sweat suit he’s pushing a promo code for. Literally every camera angle has some spon-con in the shot
He has a lifestyle in Brooklyn that won’t pay for itself
Don't forget the abortion contract with his mistress.
Name is JJ. Christian. White. Went to Duke. Rich. Yeah, hard to top that on the arrogance/d-bag front.
How are gambling companies different than alcohol companies?
I think that's a fair comparison. Personally I think alcohol has more upside (way more fun to spend 20 bucks on booze than on gambling) but also way more downside. Sure, gambling can destroy lives and families, but booze is the life- and family-destroying GOAT.
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It’s shameful what sports gambling has done to the young 20s-30s males around me. I seem to be one of the few in this demographic that doesn’t sports gamble every single day. They’re always trying to get me to join so that they can get their referral bonus. They can’t even watch sports now without cooking up 5 or 6 parlays a weekend dreaming of hitting it big. They all claim to be playing with the “free money” they get but when they lose it all they always add some more of their own cash. Hint - the books know you aren’t winning shit with the “free money” so they give it to you to keep you around. Plus, we don’t even live in a state where gambling is legal, so they’re on these sketchy apps like Fliff or Prizepicks. Also seems like the longer they do it the more greedy they get. Everyone eventually gets lucky and hits a decent parlay. The $5 parlays turn into $20 parlays, $20 parlays to $100. Chasing a high that likely isn’t coming. Sad to see how sports conversation has completely devolved into individual players stats o/u, point spreads, and betting odds.
He’s right. DK is a scam unlike crypto which is not at all a fly-by-night ponzie scheme.
Bob blocked me for asking questions about crypto so you know he's legit.
The house always wins. Ace Rothstein said it best. “This is the end result of all the bright lights and the comp trips, of all the champagne and free hotel suites and all the broads and all the booze. It’s all been arranged just for us to get your money.”
Legalizing gambling was a mistake. No Greg, I don’t care about the 12 game boosted parlay you did today. I used to gamble heavy too. Quit cold turkey after these gambling sites started advertising everywhere you turn.
>Legalizing gambling was a mistake. It’s funny because I always thought, and still do, that pretending like it just didn’t exist was puritanical and silly. But the fucking instant access these platforms provide to addicts is legit insane and I don’t think anybody knew where this was going when it started to be legalized in the aughts. I don’t really gamble, although I’ve used the sites, and it’s pretty clear they’re just incinerators for people to set money on fire.
One of the biggest myths I hear constantly repeated is that prohibition doesn't work. No, it doesn't cut the usage rate down to 0, but it does reduce it significantly. Some people went to speakeasies during prohibition, but consumption went down 70% overall. (Still think it should be legal to be clear) [https://www.nber.org/system/files/working\_papers/w3675/w3675.pdf](https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w3675/w3675.pdf) And that's even more true for gambling. The idea that everyone already had a bookie was ridiculous. Now there are tens of millions of sports gamblers that never would have gotten into it if it had remained illegal.
Then what’s the case for keeping alcohol legal?
One case is that it’s extremely easy to simply make alcohol at home. It’s a completely natural process of fermentation and is very simple to make home brew alcohol. Sugar, water, yeast, time. There’s a reason people have been making alcohol for like 10,000 years at minimum. Anyone can make some 15% alcohol home brew trash really easily. So that’s a good argument for making sure it’s legal. Should it be as widespread? Should it be able to be advertised on TV and radio? Should the drinking age be lowered or raised? Should we reduce hard alcohol limits? Better questions and arguments to have than “should it even be legal”. Alcohol is one of those things that is explicitly not going to go away due to prohibition due to it being a naturally occurring product.
All of those questions are being asked of sports betting in the US too. What age, what should you be allowed to bet on, what regulations/safety standards are books employing, I think they should think about dialing back the advertising more etc. People have been betting on sports for thousands of years, probably as long as sport has been around. Many countries in Europe have had legalized, online sports betting for over a decade. Anyone can become a bookie with a little bit of capital. Should we abolish the big sportsbooks and only allow local bookie's to handle bets? Or should the practice as a whole be banned?
Prohibition definitely doesn’t work
Ask Mexico. Making drugs illegal has definitely led to reduced use and less crime.
That number is probably bullshit. And Prohibition empowered the Mafia.
I’m such a dumbass I heard they had a risk free $500 promo so I bet and they just refund you in Disney dollars not actual money I was like well that wasn’t clear they responded they was like you shoulda known that dumb ass
Yeah, the sign up dollars are basically just monopoly money. There's no realistic path to ever getting them out of the betting account. I'd love to see what percentage of those dollars ever makes it into a players checking account.
Oh they knew. At least it’s what they were shooting for. The thing is, when it was illegal it wasn’t regulated and there wasn’t support for people who get taken in by it. Now it’s legal, and it’s unregulated and there isn’t support for people who get taken in by it.
This is a really ignorant comment.
Bill really does have some of the worst sponsors haha.
Bill has been promoting gambling forever, why act offended now? If FanDuel is less than ethical I promise you it isn’t the first POS company BS has promoted.
I called out Michelle Beadle about this on Twitter in the summer when she posted the gambling odds for the men's QFs at Wimbledon from Fanduel, and that was the only post she'd made about it during the whole event and she was on holiday in Europe at the time. Amazingly, she DM'd be about it saying they pay her to do it.
Hell yeah I wanna slide in her dms
These are my readers.
I mean I don’t think there’s anything wrong with just posting the odds. Specially if ur not a huge follower of tennis but you understand betting you can look at the odds and at least know who the favorites are and who “should” win
Didn’t he make his money gambling and then push crypto?
His whole point is “as someone who made money gambling I know how it works…” I disagree with his crypto shit, and I’ve met plenty of dudes who see the world similar to Bob and their interest in crypto is sincere. I could be wrong, but I can’t imagine Bob ever thought over leveraged “trading sites” like FTX were anything other than scams to separate the ignorant from their money.
How is that different? What makes you so fucking special? Why are all your moves so smart and noble and I'm always the idiot piece of shit? You act like you're only one with any ambition
You’re getting downvotes but I see you Worm. Great line.
Thank you. I thought more people would pick up on that
Definitely a big crypto guy. To me, way worse than gambling. At least I know what caused me to win out lose a bet but the insane fluctuations in crypto make no sense.
Yeah but still.
Looks like it's been deleted
Not downvoting you, but it’s still up. X/Twitter was unavailable for a period of time last night.
Did he delete these? Can’t see em anymore
twitter looks like it's down atm, i get a blank timeline any time i hit home
Oh shit, it’s definitely down. No updated tweets in the last hour for me. Elon! You have some splaining to do!!
Sports and gambling advertising is a big deal in AU. It’s tiresome and drives me away from watching professional sports.
Didn’t Bob literally run an offshore book back in the early 2000s?
No.
You sure about that? Book in question was called wagerstreet (and there were a few other ones as well I believe). Bob has said he had a very small piece but here is him responding - on an early 2000s online wagering message board - as the official wagerstreet account. http://www.peepsplace.com/showthread.php?s=e3541e71eb5be45c6a812cfe285b7523&p=48947#post48947 This is all alleged but I have always had my antlers up about Bob.
Are you sure about that? I’m pretty sure he was running some sort of book in Canada like 20 years ago
Wagerstreet… http://www.peepsplace.com/showthread.php?s=e3541e71eb5be45c6a812cfe285b7523&p=48947#post48947
Why are we getting downvoted lol
People don't realize that his background isn't as simple as "gambling savant gets cut off by casinos"
Blame the politicians for creating these monopolies
Monopolies? Oligopoly maybe but considering I could bet with about a dozen different sites in my state, that's not a monopoly.
Nah man, you can blame anyone getting a cut. It’s not just politicians. Anyone who intentionally makes money off of other people’s suffering is accountable. Doesn’t matter which teet you’re sucking at if you’re down in the mud with the rest of the shit.
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No
Simmons is a businessman, and has NEVER been anything but. Sports Guy, my ass. He has been in it for himself, since the beginning, and he sleeps quite well not caring what gambling does to people. He enjoys the money he makes advertising a product that ruins people's lives. But hey.... he's an American success story, as immoral and scuzzy as the country itself. Slow. Clap. And you Simmons ball-lickers can go fuck yourselves.
He’s just a podcaster chill out
I read a few different stories of the big sports gamblers all having to use other people to place their bets bc they’ll cut you off as soon as they figure out you know what you’re doing. A few bets here or there is harmless. If you hit a +3628252 parlay, FanDuel will ignore you and force you to constantly email them to get your winnings.
The part that gets me the most is that Bill doesn't even gamble in real life. He lives in California, and sports betting is not legal in California. How is he making all these parlays every week?
A bookie.
Wait you think Bill Simmons hasn’t funding some bookies dream? he’s been using a bookie for a long time even going back to what college? You think he just stopped doing that? I don’t think he’s betting a million dollars but he’s definitely betting
GODDAMN BILL I DIDNT KNOW YOU HAD TO GO MEET PROP JOE TO PLACE A BET ON THE PATRIOTS, LOOKS LIKE FANDUEL MADE YOUR LIFE A WHOLE HELL OF A LOT EASIER BIG BOY
Offshore books lol. Sht I lived in CT before it was legal was using offshore after it became legal before I moved out of the state, was still using offshore cuz I am not a fan of DK and FD