Comment by nonethewiser a day ago
I fully support sports gambling being legal but holy shit, the legalization of sports gambling in the USA had such a terrible effect on sports coverage.
I have not watched the MLB in a while so I don't know specifically what you are talking about but I can imagine.
Sports gambling should be legal. But only in-person. No apps or websites.
Gambling advertising should be completely banned. Gambling is a zero-sum activity. Actively promoting it benefits no one except the betting house.
I was just having this conversation with friends a few days ago. We do still watch games, but we all used to also watch sports news/talk shows (e.g. morning pre-football coverage, SportsCenter, and the like) and most of us have stopped. Some of the shows are now exclusively focused on betting.
I'm all for consenting adults to be able to legally place wagers at outlets that are not swindling them, or offering the kinds of loans that could get a person's legs broken.
But I'm so tired of ALL THE COVERAGE being about betting. It was more fun when the coverage was mostly sports, and Al Michaels had to sneak in the odd mention of what the point spread was for a game he was broadcasting.
Even my friends who enjoy gambling don't like the media coverage of it. I guess we're not a representative sample.
> Even my friends who enjoy gambling don't like the media coverage of it.
You may well be representative; it’s just that all these parties directly invested in gambling would rather expand gambling as much and as fast as they can, at the expense of turning off their whole audience.
Yes this is exactly what I mean. Coverage of the sport has been replaced with coverage of the gambling games around the sport.
Honestly it's a lot like the alcohol ads being everywhere. I don't have a problem with drinking alcohol but this is supposed to be a sport enjoyed by the whole family, and there are broadcasts where the inning break is filled almost entirely with hard liquor advertisements. Even at the ballpark it's hard to avoid advertising for beer and other drinks.
Sort of? I mean the actual news shows have been replaced by things like ESPN Bet Live[1], which are focused on betting. I'd also like the alcohol ads to be fewer and farther between, but the gambling thing has expanded into shows too, not just ads.
in addition to what Jeremy said, some broadcasts even show the betting line or chances for certain things to happen as the inning is being played (like what are the chances a player hits into a double play or hits a home run, etc.) specifically for the betters.
There is an ad for a sports book on screen no less than 50% of a broadcast, not including ad breaks, for the majority of teams. Either it's an ad behind home plate, a jersey patch, the broadcasters themselves reading the latest odds, or a combination of those and more. It is absolutely insane.