Sportsbooks often take measures to limit risk and exposure in the markets offered to sports bettors. One of those measures is to limit the maximum amount of money a sports bettor can place on a specific bet. Anyone who has spent a reasonable amount of time in a casino or sportsbook has likely heard or seen this in action. Take a blackjack table for example, typically, a player can bet raise or lower the amount they wish to wager per hand, but there is a minimum threshold that must be met. For the common person, this is usually $5 or $10 a hand, meaning a player can’t bet less than that each hand, and can bet more than that if they wish. We have likely all heard stories about a person wagering larger amounts of money, whether that be at a blackjack table, or in the sportsbook. When it comes to table games such as blackjack, there is not only a minimum but a maximum amount that can be wagered per hand. For those looking to wager larger amounts, say $100 or $500 per hand or higher, it often requires playing at a table with a higher minimum bet threshold that must be met per hand, and there is a reason for this.
Casinos and sportsbooks are tasked with limiting their exposure when it comes to the amount of money they can possibly lose. For a table game like blackjack, a higher minimum bet increases the amount of money the player hands over on losing hands, offsetting the potential for what can be won by the player, and thus is the cat and mouse game of trying to beat the house. AS we all have heard, “the house always wins”, and there are reasons for this. The science and mathematics behind offering these games and wagers are designed to work in favor of the “house”. Sportsbooks are no stranger to this, but there is a dirty little secret that sportsbooks try to keep out of public consumption.
Just like with table games sportsbooks have limits in place to limit their exposure to potential losses. The main difference between most table games and a sportsbook boils down to the odds offered to players. This creates a scenario that is more favorable to the bettor than the sportsbooks when it comes to the amount of money that can be won. Your average bettor isn’t walking into a casino or sportsbook looking to place a $1,000 bet or more. These limits are often in place for that small percentage of people that do place such wagers, the “pro bettors”. The issue arises when non-pro bettors are hit with drastically lower maximum limits they can wager. Now comes the rub, the quiet part sportsbooks pray no one says aloud, and that would be the reason these players are given such drastically lower limits. Sportsbooks hate winners with a passion.
The worst kind of customer in the eyes of a sportsbook is a person that can win more than they lose. A sad truth for those people is limits that are reduced to the point of lunacy. On average the maximum limit for most of the markets made available to bettors in the sportsbooks is $1,000, but for a winning player that has been “limited” by sportsbook the number is often lower than $10. Meaning that Joe Schmo who might only wager $25 on a bet, can now only wager a maximum bet of $10, or less. Routinely there are instances of bettors being treated in such ways by sportsbooks, and because the person wins more than they are losing. The truly telling part about this hypocrisy that sportsbooks are allowed to operate within appears in the manner in which sportsbooks handle bettors that lose. Winners are shunned away while losers and welcomed back with open arms, frequently inedited with incentives to get that person back betting with the sportsbook, from “bonus” offers to VIP-like treatment, and all in an effort to draw back in these specific players.
This egregious behavior has existed for as long as sportsbooks have been around, and to the point that there have been bettors completely turned away from sportsbooks all together. All of this due to, not sort of nefarious action by the bettor; but simply because they beat the sportsbook more times than not. In a day and age where customer levels for sportsbooks are at all-time highs such a practice would appear to be counterproductive for sportsbooks, but that hasn’t been the case. If anything, mobile sports betting has only magnified this issue. The act of physically walking to a window in a sportsbook to place a bet did not come with any sort of registration or verification beyond being of legal age to wager.
Now with mobile betting, sportsbooks know exactly who it is placing that bet. Oh, you’re pretty sharp at betting on NBA games, guess what? Now you would be lucky to be able to bet more than a dollar or two on NBA games with that sportsbook. While at the same time, the exact same bettor, who may not be as skilled at betting the NFL, will be allowed to bet without any of the before-mentioned imposed limits, and why would that be? Because they are likely losing on those NFL bets while it’s the sportsbook losing on the NBA bets placed by that bettor. The goal of sportsbook is to make money. There are a number of ways that this can be accomplished, but it seems that the philosophy of limiting winning bettors has become the go-to move in many cases. The average bettor is not wagering enough money to affect the bottom dollar of a sportsbook.
As legalization of sports betting is advanced across the country a variety of issues have come about in regards to how sportsbooks conduct themselves. This however has been primarily focused on advertising by state regulators. The “pearl-clutching” of bleeding-heart politicians concerned with the targeting of underage people through advertising. Yet, there is little to nothing being done in an attempt to protect consumers once they are of legal age. This has allowed sportsbooks to proceed as they wish when it comes to the matter like limiting bettors. Sports betting, where losers receive the red-carpet treatment, and winners are blacklisted from the building.
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