Good for Mattress Mack, but not so good for sportsbooks.
Sports betting continues to grow rapidly. It’s becoming legal in more states, being endorsed by sports leagues and advertised just about everywhere we look.
As a result, more bettors are logging into apps or heading to sportsbooks to place bets of all sizes — some big and some small.
One of the bigger bettors around, Mattress Mack, is doing a number on sportsbooks — specifically, to the state of Louisiana. His record-breaking $75 million payout on the Houston Astros winning the most recent World Series has much to do with it.
In a post by Conor Porter of SBC Americas, he details the exact amount of damage caused by the World Series winnings.
“Reporting November’s financials, the Louisiana Gaming Control Board declared a handle of $233.7m from the Bayou State’s eight sports betting operators, up on the previous month’s $219m.
However, due to significant winnings from World Series bets in baseball, including Jim ‘Mattress Mack’ McIngvale’s wagers with several sportsbooks, the state reported a revenue loss for the month of $27.6m.”
As Bet For The Win‘s very own Prince Grimes wrote, perhaps American bookmakers will continue to adopt the European model that limits successful bettors in how much money they can wager on a bet.
Until then, sportsbook are will need to find a way to recover from these hard hits.
They’ll likely be just fine.
