No league commissioner has made more of an immediate impact in bringing transformational changes to his sport than new NBA commissioner Adam Silver.
And that was before he broke ranks from all league commissioners before him by arguing for the legalization and regulation of sports betting.
In a stunning op-ed written in the New York Times tonight, Silver has decided to blaze a new trail once again. After decades of the major professional American sports leagues fighting a losing battle against the massive undercurrent of gambling, Silver has endorsed a new path that would bring the industry “out of the underground and into the sunlight.”
Betting on professional sports is currently illegal in most of the United States outside of Nevada. I believe we need a different approach.
For more than two decades, the National Basketball Association has opposed the expansion of legal sports betting, as have the other major professional sports leagues in the United States. In 1992, the leagues supported the passage by Congress of the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act, or Paspa, which generally prohibits states from authorizing sports betting.
But despite legal restrictions, sports betting is widespread. It is a thriving underground business that operates free from regulation or oversight. Because there are few legal options available, those who wish to bet resort to illicit bookmaking operations and shady offshore websites. There is no solid data on the volume of illegal sports betting activity in the United States, but some estimate that nearly $400 billion is illegally wagered on sports each year.
Silver also made a populist appeal to the many sports fans who take part in wagering on games:
There is an obvious appetite among sports fans for a safe and legal way to wager on professional sporting events. Mainstream media outlets regularly publish sports betting lines and point spreads. Voters in New Jersey overwhelmingly voiced their support for legal sports betting in a 2011 referendum. Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey recently signed a bill authorizing sports betting at local casinos and horse racetracks, a law the N.B.A. and other leagues have opposed — and a federal court has blocked — because it violates Paspa.
There were signs that this might be coming. Earlier this week the NBA announced an agreement with daily fantasy company FanDuel. The daily fantasy industry is growing at a major rate and with the money involved there, the jump to full-fledged betting isn’t so much a leap as it is a hop.
Silver makes sound, logical arguments for the legalization and regulation of the sports betting industry, but it will be an uphill fight to get the rest of his commissioner cohorts on board. It will be very interesting to see how the likes of Roger Goodell, Gary Bettman, and new MLB head honcho Rob Manfred respond. Even still, it makes for a historic precedent coming from the NBA’s commissioner, who is making a habit of this.
