Sports Betting in Ohio: All Bets are Still On

By DON ROLLINS

Last Jan. 1, Ohio joined the District of Columbia and 30-plus other states having greenlighted almost unfettered sports betting. It was a bitter outcome for the grassroots opponents that had for years staved off Big Sports Betting and its predatory ways.

Citing independent studies linking commercial wagering with spikes in compulsive gambling, personal bankruptcies and suicide rates — especially within communities of color and economically disenfranchised areas — an underfunded network of anti-sports betting agents was at least still holding its own.

But after a decade of bipartisan, gambling-friendly, dollar-sign legislative majorities in Columbus — paired with COVID-driven isolation and boredom (a gift from the gambling gods) — Goliath won the day. Draftkings, Caesars, BetMGM and their ilk could set up shop with near total impunity. (The only exceptions to date are the $150,000-per wrist slaps incurred by those three companies. The infractions were false-advertising related.)

Ohio and its sister states were largely set on this path by the Bush- and Trump-packed Supreme Courts that in 2018 reversed a federal ban on commercial sports betting. Well ahead of the anticipated ruling, Big Sports Betting hit the ground running and now its in full sprint: Gratis online betting apps a five-year-old can navigate, total revenues rose from $.43 billion in 2018 to a staggering $7.56 billion by year’s end 2022.

Yet these figures tell us little by way of the human suffering wrought on by easy access to sports betting. Here in Ohio the sports gambling industry has been quick and consistent in defending its products (with small byline warnings) as no more addictive than alcohol — which is morally akin to saying the other kids do it too.

But the pain is real, so too the burden of picking up the pieces when controlled betting become full blown addiction. As a spokesperson representing Gambling Problem Network of Ohio forecasted soon after sports betting became law, “We anticipate and have seen problem rates rise in the other states that have legalized it in the past few years, so we anticipate that as well … We’re making a new previously illegal form legal, but we’re also making it incredibly accessible.”

That forecast has come true as indicated in a new state-administered survey of nearly 15,000 adult Ohioans:

• 82.9% participated in some form of betting compared to 74.9% in 2017;

• 19.8% are at risk of problem gambling, up from 5.7% in 2017;

• 254,729, or 2.8%, of Ohioans meet the diagnostic criteria for gambling disorder;

• The prevalence of problem gambling (2.8%) is more than triple from 0.9% shown in 2017.

Clearly Ohioans love their betting, and clearly its costing them dearly. If these trends increase, or even level off, they and their loved ones will continue to suffer, while the corporations and politicians that inflict them are rewarded.

Postscript: It was a mere 17 days after sports betting became legal in Ohio when the University of Dayton men’s basketball team lost by a single point. The Flyers blew a 14-point halftime lead, which meant scores of before, and in-game bets went from winners to losers.

Four days later, head coach Anthony Grant called a press conference to defend his players — not from their second half play, but the multiple bodily threats made against them by outraged sports bettors, who’d lost some treasure.

In response, the Ohio Casino Control Commission issued a general warning. No in-depth investigations, no bans, no arrests. All bets are still on.

Don Rollins is a retired Unitarian Universalist minister in Jackson, Ohio. Email donaldlrollins@gmail.com.

From The Progressive Populist, December 1, 2023

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