*By Michael Teich*
The NBA is continuing its push into the sports betting market. On Friday, the league announced on Cheddar that it inked a deal with UK-based Bet365, bringing its total partnerships with sports betting operators to five.
"Their brand is huge internationally," Kaufman-Ross told Cheddar. "They're one of the biggest players throughout Europe and other parts of the world."
The deal with Bet365 follows the same framework as its previous deals with MGM, FanDuel, FOX Bet, and William Hill. Each of these operators has the right to use official NBA data, utilize marks and logos to create a more authentic product, and will be promoted from NBA.com.
The NBA has been quick to embrace legalized sports betting after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the federal ban in May 2018. It became the first major U.S. sports league to partner with a sportsbook operator after signing a deal with MGM in July 2018. The NBA monetizes these partnerships in a number of ways.
"In some of our deals, yes we get a royalty on the betting volume," Kaufman-Ross said. "In others, it's more like a flat fee, or a per state fee."
Currently, thirteen states have up-and-running legalized sports betting. Only four of those have true mobile betting. Five more states, plus Washington, D.C., have approved the practice, but sports betting in those regions is not yet operational. The U.S. has handled a total of $12.4 billion in sports bets since June of last year, and the legalization by more states will fuel growth even more, said Kaufman-Ross.
"There's a lot of growth that we think is going to come when new states come online and new states pass mobile betting. And I think what'll be really interesting is that what we've seen thus far, is once a state does pass a law with true mobile betting, it happens very quickly."
With the Beijing Winter Olympics set to get underway on Friday, Dan Wolken, a national columnist for USA Today, joined Cheddar News to break down the big storylines as the pandemic and international conflicts threaten to cast a cloud over the event that is aspirationally seen as a beacon of international cooperation. Wolken noted specific issues over cybersecurity for visiting athletes and disputes over human rights leading to a diplomatic boycott have been making waves even before the opening ceremony. "So you've got sort of these barbs going back and forth already between the Americans and the Chinese, and things haven't even started yet," he said. "We don't even know what's going to happen once the games start and people actually start winning medals."
We are a week away from the 2022 Beijing Olympics, and China has already faced a host of problems leading up to the opening ceremony of the Beijing games. DJ Peterson, president of Longview Global Advisors, joins Cheddar News to discuss the many concerns and controversies surrounding the event.
The Los Angeles Rams and the Cincinnati Bengals will be the two teams competing at Super Bowl LVI after both survived their respective nail-biting conference championships. The Big Game will be held at the SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, home of the Rams, potentially granting them a home-field advantage. Frank Schwab, a sportswriter for Yahoo Sports, joined Cheddar to discuss what bettors should be looking for at this year’s NFL finale. "Super Bowl, unlike any other game on the NFL schedule, where if people bet once a year, it's going to be on the Super Bowl, especially with so many states having legal betting now," Schwab said.
It's a big weekend for sports betting, with the NFL conference championships and Australian Open finals expected to bring the industry even more traffic. And if record viewership of the divisional playoff game between the Chiefs and Bills was any indication, sports betting will only continue to grow as football season comes to an end. Joe Raineri, sports betting analyst at SportsGrid, joined Cheddar to discuss how these sporting events could impact the industry, which is expected to get even bigger in 2022.
Trysta Krick breaks down the Bengals-Chiefs matchup while Lester Ricard Jr. dissects what will be the third meeting of the season for the 49ers and Rams. Meanwhile, on the hardwood, Brian Bennett says that college basketball bettors should focus on a team's road wins as an early indicator for success in March.
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Trysta Krick, host of BetMGM Tonight, joins Cheddar Bets to break down her best plays in the AFC Championship game and gives a fix for the NFL OT rules.
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Wednesday marked two years since the basketball legend Kobe Bryant, his daughter Gianna, and seven others died in a tragic helicopter crash. In remembrance, a bronze statue has been temporarily placed at the site with all of the passenger's names included on the memorial.
With the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics right around the corner, experts are warning that climate change is threatening not only the event but also the future of snow sports. Despite being the world's top polluter, China is hoping to use the event to demonstrate the country's commitment to fighting climate change, and pledging to host a "low carbon" games. Xubin Zeng, professor of hydrology and atmospheric sciences at the University of Arizona, joins Cheddar News.
As the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics inches closer, sponsors are facing mounting pressure to pull out of the games with China is under fire for controversies like the alleged human rights abuses against its Muslim minority population and the disappearance of tennis player Peng Shuai. Rick Burton, professor of sport management at Syracuse University, joined Cheddar to discuss what he expects to happen once the games begin. Burton said China is too large of a market for American advertisers to ignore, and he doesn't expect any of them to pull out of the games. "Olympic sponsors right now I think are really just trying to hang on and get through these 17 days, come out the other end," he said.
As controversy dogs the run-up to the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, China is hiring TikTokers and other social media influencers to promote the nation's history, culture, diplomatic efforts, and current trends.
