“The devil’s in the details,” warned Senate President Karen Spilka back in March of 2022 as sports betting legalization neared legislative approval.
Three-and-a-half years later, the devil is on a winning streak, the details of state law ignored as the sports bookies hustle local suckers eager to throw their money away.
The latest embarrassment for the state’s loophole-ridden regulatory regime came last week as officials reported to the state Gaming Commission that gamblers who regularly beat the odds are “likely” to have their betting limit lowered by the sports betting operators, while consistent losers are “more likely” to have their cap raised. No wonder one of the key arguments for legalizing this shell game – steering betting dollars away from illegal bookies into a regulated and taxed system – has yet to deliver as promised.
The commission’s response: drafting a regulation requiring sportsbooks to let a bettor know when they’ve been capped, as if a mark’s futile efforts wager more on the app isn’t already a tip-off.
And you can bet the sports betting moguls are quaking at the commission’s reaction to their recent finding that the bookies have taken more than 229,000 illegal wagers on a sketchy Filipino basketball league unauthorized for betting. Total take between March 2023 and April 2025, a stretch that included the banning of 47 team officials and players for game fixing: more than $11,770,000.
Not a bad business model, when the commission’s “punishment” was to refer the violation to their Investigations and Enforcement Bureau, a fearsome unit that typically doles out paltry $10,000 and $20,000 fines for rule-breaking. “Robust,” MGC spokesman Tom Mills calls that response. “I’m proud of my colleagues, they do a really good job of overseeing.”
What does a poor job look like?
None of this is surprising. Some of the books were taking illegal bets on local colleges within days of opening for business. Just recently, the MGC slapped DraftKings with its biggest fine yet, $450,000 for “flagrant” violations of the ban on betting with credit cards. That’s .0003% of the company’s market cap. Speaking truth to power!
It’s a sad commentary on the impotence of the commission, a well-meaning group allegedly overseeing a wealthy, aggressive industry that is both popular with the marketplace and an engine of tax revenue, producing $116 million for the state in FY ’24.
It’s a combination that makes eunuchs of its regulators. And with Beacon Hill likely to be starving for revenue for some time, expect more funny business to come.
And Spilka, a longtime sports-betting opponent, can’t help but gag at the sight of her warnings coming true. “We need to come on strong and make sure that it’s fair and even handed, and that the players, whether they be an actual player or the companies, follow the law,” she says.
Odds against that happening, now that the MGC has demonstrated its determination to slap the industry’s wrist with a turkey feather?
Sorry, no wagering.
Massachusetts law prohibits betting on fixed games.