Las Vegas-based sports gambling conference looks to force industry changes

The business of sports gambling is rapidly changing, and the millions of Americans who now participate in the regulated market are trying to keep up. For those who have been around the game long enough, some of the changes are as unwelcome as they are unsettling.

Sports wagering was once confined to Las Vegas casinos, neighborhood bookies or sketchy offshore gambling operations. In 2024, it is legally available to anyone of age in 38 states and the District of Columbia, while residents in 30 of those states (and D.C.) can place bets on their phones.

The massive influx of new sports gamblers has created a multibillion-dollar revenue stream that flows directly to for-profit corporations and government entities, thereby ensuring neither has much incentive to alter the current business model. And, in some cases, the state regulators tasked with enforcing a level playing field have, at best, a rudimentary understanding of the industry and how it works.

So where does that leave the average sports bettor? Where does that leave the legacy industry and its ability to offer a competitive, but fair, product to the consumer?

Those are exactly the questions Gadoon “Spanky” Kyrollos, a seasoned professional sports gambler with a sizeable social media following, started asking a few years ago. Kyrollos, whose experience in the pre-goverment-regulated sports gambling world resulted in multiple run-ins with the law, wanted to understand how to navigate this unfamiliar landscape.

A gathering of ‘like-minded individuals’

Unsatisfied with the answers he was getting — both verbally and in practice — from the new generation of sportsbooks and bookmakers, Kyrollos founded BetBash, a now-annual gathering of “like-minded individuals.” BetBash is designed, as Kyrollos put it, to “help each other learn and overcome — as much as possible — the bookmaker’s vigorish.”

“If you just take it at the theoretical level, you’re not supposed to win. The sportsbook has a theoretical edge of four-and-a-half percent,” he said. “We try to trim down that edge and, in some cases, flip that edge to the players’ advantage with some of our seminars.”

BetBash has multiple breakout sessions, each focused on a different topic ranging from sports gambling and the law to a college football betting preview to the pitfalls of chasing gambling loses.

What started as a “proof of concept,” single-night party at a Jersey City, N.J. rooftop bar in 2021, has grown into a multi-day, well-attended convention at one of the most widely recognized “bettor-friendly” sportsbooks in the business at Circa hotel-casino in downtown Las Vegas.

“The only way we could have done this was if we were hosted at a sportsbook that accepted all action, accepted smart players,” Kyrollos said. “If I ran BetBash at a sportsbook that winds up kicking out smart players, then what’s the point?”

Limiting winning gamblers

In acknowledging BetBash’s host casino, Kyrollos is simultaneously, and not-so-subtly, taking aim at what he and others in the space have identified as the single biggest problem with the regulated, legal marketplace — limiting winning gamblers.

In the six years since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act — thereby opening the door for states other than Nevada to implement their own sports gambling laws and regulations — the practice of limiting and/or banning gamblers who routinely come out ahead has gone from an underground rumor to a publicly debated topic at regulatory and legislative meetings.

But as industry insiders went before green-behind-the-ears lawmakers and regulators to explain why cutting off certain players was necessary to the business model, Kyrollos, once again, felt unsatisfied with the attention — or lack thereof — given to the customer.

Along with Richard Schuetz, a former Las Vegas casino executive/bookmaker and former gaming regulator, and Billy Walters, one of the winningest sports bettors in history, Kyrollos formed the American Bettors’ Voice, a nonprofit advocacy organization focused on representing the average gambler.

Almost immediately, ABV was speaking in front of policymakers on behalf of sports gamblers. The trio of industry veterans has spoken to the National Council of Legislators From Gaming States, the North American Gaming Regulators Association and, most recently, the Massachusetts Gaming Commission, where the topic of limiting and banning players is under heavy scrutiny.

“With the delivery of gaming across the internet, the bettor seems to be left out of the whole process, and we’re just trying to re-establish a position that the bettor has a voice,” Schuetz said. “The way that we are working about accomplishing that is by assembling this community (at BetBash and with ABV).”

Particularly irksome to Schuetz, an outspoken and candid critic of lax regulatory oversight, is how sportsbooks try to justify banning or limiting players as something that has always been done.

“Not that you can’t find exceptions, but I get frustrated when I hear some of the new guys going, ‘Well, they’ve always done this in Vegas,’ and stuff like that. That’s just not true,” he said.

Schuetz would know. He used to run the sportsbook at the Stardust casino-hotel when Walters would come in, place bets and — more often than not — leave with a pile of the casino’s money.

“Here are three facts. One, we let Billy bet to a maximum limit. Two, Billy beat us. Three, Billy was an incredibly important asset to us,” Schuetz said. “And, if that doesn’t make sense, you don’t understand risk management.”

What Schuetz was explaining, in his own unique way, is that the sportsbook operation at the Stardust was gaining invaluable amounts of information from Walters’ action, which served the book’s interests against the rest of the betting public. By limiting winning players, Schuetz said, books are kneecapping themselves.

“When we saw Billy’s action, we had probably better information than anybody on the planet, and then we could manage risk,” he said. “What they’re doing now is they’re just simply avoiding risk.”

Educating everyone

Educating everyone in the industry — legislators, regulators, sportsbooks and bettors — about why this matters is where BetBash and the ABV come into play, Kyrollos said. The concern is that sportsbooks are engaging in a “ban or bankrupt” philosophy that is unsustainable.

The “ban or bankrupt” strategy is common overseas, Kyrollos said, where international bookmakers are facing a regulatory reckoning that could drastically alter their long-established business model of welcoming losing bettors and turning away those who win.

“It’s lazy bookmaking. If you have any degree of sophistication whatsoever, any degree of utilizing just simple line shopping, they’re going to limit you. And then, eventually, the sustainability dies,” Kyrollos said.

BetBash and ABV are succeeding in drawing attention to the issues that matter to average bettors. Beyond the conference’s appeal to punters and sharps alike, BetBash is also starting to attract industry insiders, such as lawmakers and operators.

Shawn Fluharty, a West Virginia delegate and president of NCGLS, was in attendance at this year’s BetBash. So, too, was Thomas Gable, director of race and sports book at the Borgata hotel-casino in Atlantic City, who was on hand to witness his friend Richie Baccellieri be inducted into the Sports Gambling Hall of Fame. He was also attending BetBash for the second consecutive year

Gable said it was important for him to get the opportunity to talk directly to sports gamblers and get their feedback.

“It should be that way in any business and sports betting isn’t any different,” he said. “The bottom line is this industry doesn’t exist without (the customer) and we need to be cognizant of that, and give them the best experience possible.”

Contact David Danzis at ddanzis@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AC_Danzis on X.