Category: News

In 1983, Ted Leonsis was on a plane that lost the ability to use its wing flaps and landing gear. It was right then and there that Leonsis made himself a promise: “If I didn’t die, I’d play offense for the rest of my life.” How would he be the judge of that? Over a…

The leaders of the best tech platforms that received a boost from the COVID sports memorabilia rush are emerging and another winner that has risen to the top announced a boffo round of funding on Tuesday. Live streaming platform Whatnot announced it raised $50 million in Series B financing from the tech world (Y Combinator…

One of the biggest — if not the biggest — bets of the NFL Draft that brought home major money came at the hands of the host of ESPN’s sports betting show. Doug Kezirian, host of “The Daily Wager,” won $297,800 on a $3,500 bet that Tyson Campbell would be the first safety taken in…

NBA Digital today announced a new “NBABet” content initiative, which will feature the debut of a weekly NBA TV show and betting-focused content across NBA.com, the NBA App and social platforms. As part of this multiplatform offering, the NBA, Turner Sports and BetMGM will premiere NBA TV’s first live studio show dedicated to betting-focused information and…

A healthy high-end sneaker marketplace has met the success of the fractional collectible ownership space. On Tuesday came Rares, an app that allows collectors to fractionally invest in extremely limited edition sneakers.  “Sneakers are this generation’s Matisse,” said founder and CEO Gerome Sapp, a former Notre Dame safety who played five years in the NFL…

With media, hospitality and betting playing such a role in sports, it’s no surprise that the Pac-12 hired George Kliavkoff. Kliavkoff, who served as president of entertainment and sports at MGM Resorts for the past three years, has a vast media experience at MLB Advanced Media, Real Networks and NBC Universal. That’s important for the…

When COVID-19 shuttered hobby stores, the big box retailers became the main distributor of trading cards.  But as the stakes rose, and flippers and breakers were able to make serious margins, the lines to buy got longer and the rules got tighter.  On Wednesday, days after a fight over trading card erupted in at a…

“Mattress Mack” is hitting the track. The racetrack, that is.  Jim McIngvale, the Houston mattress and furniture magnate, is offering a full money-back guarantee to anyone who buys a mattress set of $3,000 or more at his Gallery Furniture stores if Kentucky Derby favorite Essential Quality wins. Mack started his betting with $500,000 on Essential…

A sneaker record has been obliterated. Sotheby’s has sold Kanye West’s prototype of a Nike Air Yeezy I for $1.8 million, beating out the previous high for a pair of sneakers — a pair of Michael Jordan game-used Air Jordan I’s, sold by Christie’s, for $615,000. The shoes, which West wore at the 2008 Grammy…

Mickey Mantle was joined by LeBron James on Monday…as the highest-priced sports trading card ever sold. PWCC said it privately sold a 2003 signed LeBron James Exquisite Collection patch card for $5.2 million. That matches the $5.2 million record for a 1952 Mickey Mantle card sold by PWCC for the same amount in January. JUST…

As a 10 million card backup hit card grader PSA, which led to a price increase and then a shutdown of submissions, collectors mused that a machine-graded company would come and compete with the industry giant. Then came Wednesday’s twist. Collectors Universe, parent company of PSA, announced it has purchased Genamint, an artificial intelligence company…

In recent months, DraftKings has added Michael Jordan and Cal Ripken Jr. as special advisors. On Wednesday morning, the Boston-based fantasy and gambling company added former supermodel Gisele Bundchen. Bundchen, who has been known for lending her name and time to many philanthropic causes throughout her career, will spearhead the company’s social and environmental goals…

Topps entered the sports card NFT world on Tuesday by selling more than 74,000 packs on the Wax platform in approximately 70 minutes. The company planned to make packs of cards, which mimic its 2021 Series 1 set, available at 1 p.m. ET, but the amount of people trying to get in overtaxed the site.…

Last week, trading card titan Topps went public through a merger with Mudrick Capital that valued the company at $1.3 billion. This week, Topps is announcing its move into the future with its first sports-related NFTs. Topps announced Monday that on April 20 it will offer 50,000 digital packs containing six cards for $5 each…

Alternative assets have been getting a lot of play recently, led by sports cards and memorabilia. But sealed video games are having their moment, too. On Friday, a sealed copy of a Nintendo Super Mario Bros. game, graded as a pristine copy by video game grading company Wata, sold for $660,000 at Heritage Auctions in…

A job application filled out by Steve Jobs in 1973 sold for $277,996 on Wednesday.  The application, a one-page sheet filled out for an unknown company, is in Jobs’ handwriting and notes he is an English literature major at Reed College and from the Bay Area. He notes that transportation is “possible, but not probobale…

A piece of digital art, known as an NFT, sold on Thursday morning for more than most Picassos. The piece, called “Everydays: The First 5,000 Days” was auctioned off by Christie’s, an institution in the art auction space that was selling digital art for the first time. The final bid was $69.3 million. With a…

A young bettor who achieved fame for hitting big parlays has pleaded guilty to making threats to the players who compromised his bets. Ben Patz, known in the industry as “Parlay Patz”, pleaded guilty to “transmitting threats in interstate or foreign commerce” on Feb. 15, but the U.S. Department of Justice announced the agreement on…

At 81 years old, John Amos is far from done. The actor is adding “Coming 2 America” onto his resume, as the sequel to the 1988 classic releases on Amazon on Friday. Amos, who played Gordy the Weatherman on the “Mary Tyler Moore” show, James on “Good Times,” Kunte Kinte on “Roots” and Percy Fitzwallace…

PSA, the leader in card grading, dramatically changed its prices on Monday as the uptick in the industry left the company with a backlog of an untold millions of cards. Pricing in most areas has doubled. The lowest level, with the slowest service, goes from $10 a card to $20 a card and imposes a…

The heat and passion surrounding the sports memorabilia world is showing no signs of stopping. Heritage Auctions grossed more than $30 million this weekend in sales. Two cards sold for more than $1 million — a T206 Honus Wagner ($2.5M), once owned by Joe Garagiola, and a 1969 Reggie Jackson rookie, once owned by Dmitri Young,…

As NBA Top Shot takes over the collectible world, with more than $200 million in marketplace sales in the last month, other digital collectibles are seeing a significant bump. The focus has helped Sorare, a digital card site focused on soccer, raise an impressive $50 million from investors including influencer and early tech investor Gary…

A LeBron James highlight over sold Monday for $208,000, a new record for NBA Top Shot, the product that allows fans and collectors to own a highlight of a particular player on the blockchain. It’s the first time that specific highlight, which features James slamming over Nemanja Bjelica in November 2019, has been sold. There…

It’s hard for anything these days to surpass the heat and momentum around basketball cards and yet, there is one product in collecting that, over the last month, has: Digital basketball cards. NBA Top Shot, which gives collectors packs of highlights instead of cardboard, is on fire. In the last four months, the company has…

In a year when so many of us sought to seek comfort in the past, reaching out to our childhood seemed rational. It’s one of the main reasons why trading cards — sports and non-sports — exploded in 2020. On Thursday, eBay released its first State Of Trading Cards report, which, among other things, revealed…

Every year, during early February and mid March, the chicken wing gets expensive. That’s because it’s always during the Super Bowl and March Madness when supply gets strained. This year we’ve reached the perfect storm. Prices have soared to record highs, as wings are now going for $2.71 a pound. So, what happened? First, it…

The skyrocketing sports card market took a back seat this week to a company that sells NBA highlights. The buyers don’t own the highlight — the NBA does — but the fans do own the limited edition numbered version of it, which they can collect, trade and sell. _PromoID=[21,268] Heads turned last week when a…

Famed sports gambler Billy Walters was among the 143 people to which outgoing President Donald Trump granted clemency in his final day in office. Walters was among the 70 people who were commuted, meaning the crime isn’t wiped from his record but his required time served is being reduced. Walters was convicted in 2017 and…

The early August call would seem strange to some, but not to Max, 37, a teacher. It was from his younger brother Willie, a pharmacist by day and a Vegas gambler at night. “He told me that [the bookmakers] in West Virginia had a number of management changeovers and their lines weren’t as sharp.” So…

In 1967, the Cincinnati Reds sent their young catcher Johnny Bench to the Winter League in San Juan, Puerto Rico, to fine tune his skills. It was there, at a show featuring a hypnotist, that Alan Horwitz, a 23-year-old kid just making his name in Philadelphia real estate, met Bench. The two chatted and Bench…

Collectors Universe, parent company of PSA, announced Monday an agreement to sell the company for approximately $700 million to a group of investors including entrepreneur and collector Nat Turner. The group, which will take the company private, also includes the family office of new New York Mets owner Steven Cohen. The deal represents a roughly…

In the past month, the Las Vegas Sands Corp. has hired a powerhouse team of some of Texas’ most well-connected lobbyists in what could be a push to open the first casinos in the nation’s largest state without full-scale commercial gambling. Sands became the client of at least 10 Texas powerbrokers in just the past…

Famed sports bettor Billy Walters, who was convicted of insider trading back in 2017, contends that the federal government illegally leaked information to the media. Walters says that FBI agents leaked stories about him, and purposefully inflated the scope of the investigation, to push him to reveal more over a wiretap, Walters’ lawsuit filed Thursday…

Before moving from New Jersey to Atlanta, 26-year-old Ryan Wright went to the Meadowlands and put down $40 on one of his crazy parlays. He took the Kansas City Chiefs to beat the Denver Broncos in Week 7 and added the Washington Nationals to beat the Houston Astros in the World Series. He then added…

When Will Sports Return? The Latest News… Tuesday, June 23: After some contentious negotiations and plenty of posturing from both MLB owners and the players union, the two sides officially agreed to a deal that calls for a 60-game regular season schedule that will begin on the weekend of July 24-26 and end by Sept. 27.…

Shares of DraftKings exploded on Tuesday after news dropped that billionaire investor George Soros bought 2.7 million shares of DKNG last week through an investment vehicle managed by his fund. DraftKings shares closed at $26.30 on Tuesday, up 7.5%, one of its best days since going public on April 23. DraftKings filed details of the…

Despite a lack of games to bet on, the stock market is very bullish on sports gambling. DraftKings, which is now live in five states after launching its mobile sportsbook in Colorado last week, had its best day since its debut and second-best as a public company, as another analyst took a bullish take on…

Numbers published by the Nevada Gaming Control Board on Wednesday showed just how much the shutting down of sports affected the state’s sportsbooks last month. The total amount of money bet on sports in Nevada in March was $141.2 million, down 76.3% from last March, which brought in a record $596.8 million. Nevada’s gaming business…

You can now bet on DraftKings … as a company. The sports betting and daily fantasy operator, which was combined with betting tech platform SBTech to create a first-of-its-kind entity based in the U.S., started trading on the NASDAQ under the symbol DKNG on Friday morning. Shares opened at $17.81 on Friday morning and closed…

An adult website’s offer to Joe Buck went viral Friday morning, when the company offered the announcer $1 million broadcast sexual acts on their live cameras. Buck responded to The Action Network, which was the first to report the offer. Depending on the site they could just be handing some of my money back to…

DraftKings is one step closer to becoming a publicly listed company. The Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) has approved DraftKings’ registrations statement, and shareholders will hold an April 23 vote on approving the combining of DraftKings and SB Tech. The company that is putting the merger together, Diamond Eagle Acquisition Corp., will then give way…

For the first time ever, the SuperBook will not be confined solely to the Westgate in Las Vegas. Months after Colorado voted to legalize sports betting within the state, the industry powerhouse and home of the famous SuperContest has announced that it will be opening new doors at The Lodge in Black Hawk, Colorado. The…

It’s likely that the state of New York will go another year without having mobile sports betting as Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he wouldn’t be making up the $7 billion deficit with any new revenue as the budget closed last week. Cuomo’s attention is obviously elsewhere as the state deals with being the U.S. epicenter…

Editor’s note: The British Open was canceled on April 6. The R&A reported has pandemic insurance, and that’s why the event was canceled instead of postponed. As the coronavirus wreaks havoc on every sector of the economy, businesses big and small are examining their insurance policies and contracts to see what recourse they have amid…

Nevada governor Steve Sisolak on Wednesday shut down the state’s non-essential businesses through April 30, meaning the robust sports gambling business will be shut down in the state for two weeks longer. Sisolak originally shut down non-essential businesses, including all casinos, on March 18, with a 30-day minimum closure period until April 16. March is…

In 2004, FEMA Director Craig Fugate came up with a smart way to monitor how operational cities were in the path of a hurricane. Enter The Waffle House Index. Since its founding, Waffle House had prided itself on staying open and serving customers in the toughest of times. That means 24 hours a day, 365…

It has been almost two weeks since it was announced that Rudy Gobert had tested positive for the Coronavirus, stopping the sports world in its tracks. Saddled with the obligation to continue their business, gambling operators have tried to generate action through creativity and by elevating lesser-known markets. This past weekend, bettors in the United…

Faced with 95% of commercial casinos closing and 76% of tribal casinos closing due to COVID-19 shutdowns, the American Gaming Association estimated Thursday that a two-month shutdown would cost the U.S. economy $43.5 billion worth activity. Most of the nation’s commercial casinos have been shuttered, including every one in Las Vegas as of Wednesday morning.…

Las Vegas casinos are famously short on locks. That’s because the last time Sin City closed up shop was on Nov. 23, 1963, the day after JFK was assassinated. It was business as usual the next day and for everyday after that until March 17, 2020 when Nevada governor Steve Sisolak announced that all non-essential…

We’re on Day 3 without sports, and you’ve probably already deep-cleaned the house twice, learned to play the piano, built a new deck and stocked up on food. So what now? Our friends at PointsBet have offered up five leagues to bet on Saturday (and we’ve got horse racing). The sportsbook, available in Indiana and…

The sports landscape is changing rapidly in response to COVID-19, with leagues and conferences suspending play or canceling major events. Here’s an updating list of cancellations or suspensions that each sport has announced. Sports Canceled for Coronavirus Last updated: Friday, 12 p.m. ET College Basketball Updated, 4:15 p.m. ET: The NCAA Tournament is officially canceled.…

With the mass cancellation of championship events, sportsbooks will be issuing a whole lot of refunds in the coming days. But it’s not as simple for secondary markets like PropSwap, which allows bettors to sell their tickets to others. PropSwap issued a statement Friday saying that since it’s not the sportsbook, and is just a marketplace,…

Editors note: The NCAA has announced that Tournament games for men and women will be played with only essential personnel in arenas. Over the next couple weeks, as states, cities and leagues urge caution with spreading the highly contagious coronavirus, it’s possible that we see American sporting events played inside empty arenas. Which begs the…

Thursday morning update: Ben “Parlay” Patz turned himself into a federal marshall on Thursday and will appear in federal courthouse in Tampa this afternoon for an initial hearing, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office confirmed to The Action Network. Patz’s attorney, David Weisbrod, told The Action Network that Patz will attend a two-part hearing on…

A Maine state senator is believed to have mistakingly voted to overturn Maine Gov. Janet Mills’ veto of a sports betting bill, giving legalization one final chance at becoming a reality. All along, Senator Lisa Keim had opposed sports betting legalization, but she voted last Thursday to reject the governor’s veto of the bill. The…

Almost three weeks after the biggest daily fantasy contest controversy yet, DraftKings ruled Saturday that two former “Bachelor” contestants cheated to win the $1 million prize. “DraftKings has decided to update the standings for several contests,” the statement said. “All customers affected by the updated standings will be notified directly. It is our general policy…

An initial budget proposal unveiled this week by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo failed to mention mobile sports gambling as a way to aid the state’s $6 billion shortfall. “This is not the time to come up with creative although irresponsible revenue sources to solve a problem which doesn’t really exist,” Cuomo said. Cuomo accounted…

Just call New Jersey “Vegas East.” On Monday, the Garden State announced that December’s sports betting handle was $557.8 million. That means, in 2019, bettors wagered $4.5 billion in the state. A remarkable 84% of those dollars were bet on mobile devices. The year was capped off by three months where the state beat out…

We are on Day 5 of the “Bachelor” DraftKings $1 million winner controversy, and there’s no sign that a resolution will happen any time soon. DraftKings has more on the line in this decision than anything in its history since battling states over daily fantasy not being “gambling” threatened its livelihood. And while the contest…

Daily fantasy scandals are nothing new. With everything publicly available, the winners, who often pocket seven figures in cash, tend to have their lineups scrutinized by the daily fantasy (DFS) community. After the NFL Wild Card games ended on Sunday, DraftKings showed that the winner of its Fantasy Football Millionaire contest was Jade Roper. The…

DraftKings announced Monday that it would merge with sports gambling tech firm SBTech and go public. The transaction was facilitated by Diamond Eagle, a publicly traded acquisition company on the Nasdaq that will change its name to DraftKings and trade under a DraftKings symbol. Once the transaction closes, which the parties expect to happen in…

A copy of the book that every bettor would dream to own sold for $8,320. Grays Sports Almanac from “Back to the Future II,” a book that provided a small betting plot to the sequel of the classic film, was purchased in a Thursday auction. The almanac was one of many used in the making…

The CEO of bet365, Denise Coates, gave herself the largest yearly compensation in business history. The private company’s filings, which were revealed by The Guardian, showed that Coates was paid a total package of $422 million from March 2018 to March 2019. Here’s a rundown of her compensation the past four years, during which she’s…

NEW JERSEY — It’s 3 p.m. ET on Sunday afternoon and Ben Patz is sitting in the corner of a VIP section inside the FanDuel Sportsbook at the Meadowlands. There’s yelling and screaming all over the sportsbook as bettors are living and dying with their every dollar. But Patz is showing very little emotion, even…

NEW YORK — Adam Sandler and Kevin Garnett star in “Uncut Gems,” a story of a New York City jewelry dealer whose life unravels around a valuable gem he acquired. Sandler, playing a jeweler named Howard Ratner, makes bet after bet — many of which don’t work out. In the beginning of the movie, he…

New Jersey sportsbooks took in $562.7 million in bets in November, breaking their record set last month by $75 million. November’s handle is just $34 million short of the all-time record handle set by Nevada in March 2019. Nevada’s numbers aren’t in for November yet, but New Jersey has a shot to win head-to-head as…

On the final day of the year for the Michigan state Legislature, the Senate voted, 35-3,  to pass a bill that includes the legalization of sports betting and fantasy sports. The House concurred later on Wednesday, and Governor Gretchen Whitmer is expected to sign the bill into law before the end of the year. The…

Less than 24 hours after pocketing $183,892 on an 8-team moneyline parlay, the 23-year-old college student they call “Parlay Patz” has done it again, cashing a $116,260 ticket in New Jersey. Ben Patz risked $25,000 on a 5-leg parlay, which included the following bets on Sunday: Vikings moneyline vs. Lions Packers moneyline vs. Redskins Browns…

It’s doubtful that there will be betting allowed on the newly announced show called “Jeopardy! The Greatest is All-Time.” That’s because the shows, which were announced on Monday and will first air on Jan. 7, will be taped. The fact was not mentioned in the announcement, but it was confirmed Tuesday to The Action Network…

It’s Wednesday and Ben Patz is in his all too familiar spot: Behind the wheel of his spanking new 2019 Mercedes C63 coupe in the parking lot of the H-Mart Korean Grocery in Fort Lee, N.J. He doesn’t live around here. He actually has been to this parking lot more than 20 times and he…

As New Jersey enjoyed a record monthly sports betting handle in October, New York State senator Joe Addabbo could only shake his head. New Jersey’s nearly $490 million in bets generated $46.4 million for the Garden State in October. Meanwhile, Addabbo saw his state’s gross sports betting revenue decline by more than 4% to $2.2…

New Jersey shattered its sports betting handle record in September, as the state’s Division of Gaming Enforcement said on Tuesday that a whopping $445.5 million was bet for the first full month of the football season. If you break out that total by day, it equates to $14.9 million bet per day in New Jersey.…

Americans have flip flopped on how much they embrace legal sports betting. In February 2017, results of a Seton Hall Sports Poll revealed that only 46% of Americans believed betting on sports should be legalized. Some 32 months later, the latest version of the poll published Thursday reveals that 80% are in favor of sports…

John Murray has been in Vegas long enough that he thought he has seen it all. Then came the 2019 Miami Dolphins. This week the Dolphins are playing at home and coming off a bye against a team that is 0-5 and just lost its head coach. “And they’re a 3.5 point underdog,” Murray said.…

On Thursday, Monumental Sports & Entertainment — the parent company of the Washington Wizards, Capitals, Mystics and Capital One Arena — announced that it will have a William Hill sportsbook inside the arena doors. It marks a first for American major pro sports. There are a lot of elements to the deal and it’s quite…

Ted Leonsis — owner of the Washington Capitals, Wizards and Mystics — and William Hill, the largest retail sportsbook operation in the U.S., announced Thursday that they are bringing the first-ever sportsbook to an American pro sports arena. Leonsis’ company Monumental Sports & Entertainment, which owns Capital One Arena, has leased a two-story space (around…

Hi there. It’s Darren Rovell from The Action Network and I’m super excited to be doing a weekly newsletter on all the happenings in the sports betting space. Why am I doing this? Well, I see more gambling content than anyone in the world. And, between the great stuff we make here at Action and…

On Monday, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed a bill into law that will allow college athletes in the state to profit off their name, image and likeness. The NCAA has been threatened many times with an assault on their amateurism model, but this is its greatest threat. A state law that would supersede the NCAA’s…