Frictionless sports betting and the NFL: the twin obsessions targeting young men
A new NFL season marks the peak sports betting months. Recent studies show the strain legalized gambling is putting on financially constrained households and young men
O n Thursday night, the NFL season will kick off in a rematch of last year’s AFC Championship Game between the Baltimore Ravens and the Kansas City Chiefs, as fans tune in to see if Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes can lead his team to a fourth Super Bowl victory in seven years – possibly, even, to an unprecedented “three-peat”.
It’s about as enticing a storyline as the league could hope for. And yet, it seems that most of the action will be taking place off the field, as Thursday also marks the beginning of the busiest time of year for those who play the game-within-the-game: sports bettors.
Five years after the 2018 US supreme court decision that threw sports betting back to the states, over $300bn has been wagered, with $120bn thrown in 2023 alone – a record that 2024 is poised to break, with more than 70m Americans expected to try their hand at beating the oddsmakers. Though companies do not disclose the amount wagered on each sport, the American football season is widely considered the industry’s marquee event.
