As a new football season kicks off, it’s hard not to notice just how enormous sports betting’s footprint has become.
Every game features discussion of favorites, spreads, and over/unders. Every commercial break reminds us the game is brought to us by some betting app—sometimes with two or three different brands sponsoring the same game.
Pre- and postgame shows and podcasts all dedicate a segment to gambling advice, presented by FanDuel/DraftKings/Bet365/BetMGM/ESPNBet/whoever.
As a sports fan, it becomes hard to separate the game from the gambling. That only gets worse every time a player gets banned for betting on their own games or fixing results to help their friends to an easy payday.
We’re a few more scandals away from sports losing whatever shred of legitimacy they have left. Soon we’ll have to question everything we see - “Did he drop that pass on purpose?” “Why did the defense get suspiciously bad as the point total neared the over?” etc.
But as frustrating as it is to have gambling taking the fun out of sports, that is far from the worst of it.
Sports betting is ruining the lives of countless men who don’t know better than to stay away from it.
A St. Bonaventure University study found that half (48%) of American men aged 18-49 have an online betting account. When you consider that it’s not even legal in all 50 states yet, it gives you an idea of the growing problem we have on our hands. A staggering number of men have bought in to what all those ads are selling.
Kellogg Institute points out, “the hundreds of billions of dollars that consumers pour into online sports betting overwhelmingly come from money that used to be spent on more stable, long-term investments, like retirement accounts.” In a Southern Methodist University study, fewer than 5% of the 700,000 people studied withdrew more money than they put in.
You’d be hard-pressed to find a study that says “Lifelong sports fans win big since they obviously understand the game,” but that’s what everyone who gets sucked in thinks is going to happen.
The Bible says, “A faithful man will abound with blessings, But he who makes haste to be rich will not go unpunished” (Proverbs 28:20), and of course there is the warning about the love of money (1 Timothy 6:10).
But I’m not even going to get into the “is it a sin?” debate, but rather appeal to plain, simple logic.
What you have to understand
The house doesn’t lose
How do you think they get all the money to run advertisements 24/7 on thousands of games, TV shows, radio broadcasts, podcasts, and websites? It’s certainly not because they’re losing.
If you’re paying attention, they’ll tell you up front they expect you to lose. On my favorite teams’ podcasts, they regularly run promotions offering hundreds of dollars in free bets for new customers. Do the math here… if they’re handing you, say, $300 up front, they’re only willing to offer that because it makes them money. So, they are confident you will lose at least $300 more than you earn. If you can’t understand that simple math, you shouldn’t be gambling in the first place.
Here’s the other dirty little secret of the industry: if you actually are sharp enough to beat the sports books… well, they know it, they don’t like it, and they’re going to stop it. They openly admit they throttle the accounts of people who get too far ahead. They conveniently fail to mention that on all their ads. So, to recap, they offer you money at a loss, knowing most people will lose it back—but if you don’t, they’re not going to let you win too much. Insanity.
Even worse, some bettors have figured out how to get extended access—and it’s by acting like an addict: “they’re simply looking to identify and encourage customers who are likely to spend—and lose—the most. This just happens to be a good way to find and enable addicts, too.” (Source: MSN)
If you can’t see the system is rigged to extract as much of your money as possible, you aren’t paying attention.
Winning is great, until…
Everybody loses eventually. What happens if you get behind? How many men have started an account without their wives’ knowledge to make a few bucks, and suddenly found themselves digging the hole deeper and deeper while trying to get the money back?
The sunk cost fallacy is easy to spot, but hard to avoid. 52% of the men surveyed in the St. Bonaventure study had “chased a bet,” meaning they bet even more to try to offset a loss.
On the other hand, winning is its own little form of addiction. The dopamine hit of getting one right and making a few quick bucks soon outweighs everything else. Watching your favorite team win with a highlight reel, game-winning score suddenly isn’t nearly as fun as a running back picking up an extra 5 yards in a meaningless game, thereby depositing $20 in your account.
And once the old joys aren’t enough, the chase is on for the next one—to the point that the LITTLE LEAGUE WORLD SERIES had to urge people not to bet on TWELVE YEAR OLDS. That’s how bad it gets for some bettors.
Not everyone who bets gets addicted, but how do you know whether you will or won’t?
It’s just not worth it. The “math ain’t mathin’,” as they say these days. Wisdom helps us know when we are being taken advantage of, and one gambling ad is enough for the discerning to say who the real winner is in this situation.
Notes
This week’s Think Deeper Podcast takes a look at the mind of today’s seekers and makes the case for the church of Christ. I think this episode will age quite well in the years to come.
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Good article. This is one of those topics that many Christians want to justify as not being sinful. But even if someone could make the case that no sin is committed by betting on sports, our responsibility to be good stewards and to exercise wisdom should be more than enough for us to avoid it.
I just got back from a work trip to Vegas. I didn’t gamble once. Not because I’m a prude but because it’s stupid. I like to make money, not lose it. Why would I willingly play a game that gives me a <50% of winning? I’d rather put that money in the stock market.