PointsBet has posted Overeem as a -170 favorite, with Sakai fetching +135 odds as the underdog.

Overeem Pits Experience Against Sakai’s Youth

Overeem (46-18) has grown familiar with fighting in main events and other big bouts over the years. While he never achieved the kind of results that would make him an all-time great, Overeem has fought many of the best in the UFC’s heavyweight division during the past decade. He has firmly settled into the ranks of second-tier contenders.

Fighting at that level means sometimes serving as a gatekeeper for up-and-coming fighters like Sakai. While Overeem believes he’s still capable of fighting the best, he also knows that he’s nearing the end of his career.

I think I’m the best that I ever was because I’m still learning, I’m still growing,” Overeem said on Thursday’s virtual media day. “But at the same time, I’m 40 years old. I still have a couple more fights. But probably one, two, maybe three years, and then I’m gonna call it quits.”

For Sakai (15-1-1), Saturday’s fight represents an opportunity to establish himself as an elite heavyweight. While he boasts a gaudy record, Sakai hasn’t fought anyone at Overeem’s level just yet. The UFC might use this fight to find out if Sakai is ready for the big time, or if the 29-year-old needs more experience before challenging top competition.

“I’m ready to also become a legend and write my own history inside the heavyweight division,” Sakai told reporters. “After winning against Overeem, the top five is where I’ll be, absolutely.”

Overeem enters the fight with far more experience, while Sakai will be making his first appearance in a five-round fight. That dynamic could give Overeem an advantage, especially since Sakai isn’t known as a knockout artist, meaning there’s an excellent chance that the fight goes to the championship rounds.

Menifield Ready for St. Preux

The co-main event at UFC Fight Night 176 features light heavyweights Alonzo Menifield (9-1) and Ovince St. Preux (24-14). The UFC planned to hold this fight two weeks ago, but St. Preux tested positive for COVID-19, forcing a delay in the bout.

Menifield enters the fight as a -140 favorite over St. Preux (+112). A dynamic prospect with one-shot knockout power, Menifield says he wasn’t bothered by having to wait in order to get his biggest opportunity to date.

That Saturday when I got the news, I was like, ‘Oh man, this is terrible,’” Menifield told reporters. “I quickly got over it because we rescheduled and I was happy – and here we are.”

Also on the UFC Fight Night 176 card, Michel Pereira (-120) takes on Zelim Imadaev (-105) in welterweight action, while Thiago Moises (-165) faces Jalin Turner (+130) in a lightweight bout.

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According to Information Minister Perni Venkataramaiah, the Andhra Pradesh cabinet approved amendments to the state’s Gaming Act of 1974 in order to ban online gambling games.

Andhra Pradesh Cracks Down to ‘Protect Youth’

Under the new regulations, organizers of online gambling games could receive up to one year in jail. Those punishments only grow if offenders persist in running the now-illegal games.

If the organizers are caught for the second time, they will be punished with two years of imprisonment and [a fine],” Venkataramaiah said, via TimesNowNews.com. “Those who play online gambling games will be punished with six months imprisonment.”

The cabinet met under Chief Minister Jagan Mohan Reddy and reached its decision in order to “protect the youth,” according to Venkataramaiah.

The Indian online gambling industry has experienced more than its fair share of ups and downs in recent years. Online poker and rummy sites have flourished, with global poker brands like PokerStars seeing the country as one of the largest potential growth markets remaining in the world.

That growth has only accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic. TimesNowNews.com cited reports that showed the Indian online gaming industry enjoying 21 percent growth during the lockdown, with sites setting new records for traffic and revenue during 2020.

Indian Courts Reject Ban, For Now

Supporters of online gambling in India have won some recent victories. Last year, the Delhi High Court rejected a ban on online wagering, saying they would allow the activity to continue and allow lawmakers to determine the legality of individual games.

The petition claimed that the celebrities were being used to brainwash young people into joining online gambling sites, suggesting that internet wagering had led to an increase in youth suicides.

Indian authorities have also launched a number of raids against illegal live gambling operations across the country. In July, police arrested 23 individuals on gambling and other charges at Green Park Resort. Last October, Delhi police arrested 58 suspects in a similar raid on a gambling den in a Ghitorni village hotel basement.

Organizers of these illegal games typically invite players through private WhatsApp groups to prevent word from spreading to the police or other officials.

Over 49.3 million people live in Andhra Pradesh, a state on the southeastern coast of India. While most forms of gambling remain illegal in the majority of India, Goa and Sikkim both authorize limited forms of legal wagering.

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Rakic enters the fight as a -290 favorite over Smith (+235), according to odds posted by FanDuel Sportsbook.

Rakic Looks to Light Heavyweight Scene

While Rakic (12-2) hasn’t yet become a household name for most UFC fans, he has become one of the most promising light heavyweight prospects in the promotion. After losing his debut fight as a pro, Rakic ran off 12 straight wins, including four in the UFC.

The loss did result in Rakic working harder than ever in the lead up to his fight with Smith. Rakic is determined to ensure that his hard camp results in a win on Saturday.

“This fight is the biggest fight of my career, and the most important fight for me,” Rakic told UFC.com. “[Smith] has the lion heart, like his nickname. He’s mentally very strong, and he can take a beating, plus he can also bring it and finish people. But I’m the most explosive guy in the division – that’s why they call me ‘Rocket’- and I’m going to show that on Saturday night.”

‘Lionheart’ Ready to Prove He’s Still a Contender

Smith (33-15) has lost two of his last three fights, though those losses came to big names in former light heavyweight champion Jon Jones and Glover Teixeira. While Smith is just 32 years old, he is among the most experienced fighters in the division, one that has developed a reputation as a performer who always puts on the best show possible for fans.

When I care less, I’m really hard to beat,” Smith told MMA Fighting. “That’s kind of similar to how I am now. I’m not really focused on beating Rakic. Honestly, he’s super dangerous, so that’s kind of fun for me. I don’t know what it is. Maybe I’m crazy. I really get excited when guys are really dangerous. I don’t know if it’s that adrenaline feeling, or the fight itself. I don’t know.”

Rakic enters the fight as a deserving favorite. While the Austrian fighter is on his way towards becoming a title contender, Smith’s star is fading a bit, as he lacks a signature win over a top-ranked opponent in the prime of their career. But that doesn’t mean Lionheart can’t win the fight. Rakic has shown deficiencies in his defensive skills, meaning there’s always the potential for Smith to land a knockout blow and cause an upset that puts him back in the title picture.

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Paddy Power currently sees Messi as equally likely to stay at Barcelona or to sign with Manchester City, posting -120 odds for both options.

Man City Most Likely to Land Messi

Those are the two possibilities gaining the most traction among bettors and soccer media. Other clubs like Inter Milan (+1200), PSG (+1400), and Manchester United (+2000) are seen as far less likely destinations for Messi.

The drama began on Tuesday, when reports surfaced that Messi had informed Barcelona of his intention to leave. He also argued that he should be able to go on a free transfer based on a clause in his contract. However, Barcelona disagreed, noting that the language specified that he needed to inform the team of his intention to leave in June.

While Messi argues that the COVID-19 pandemic should change these time lines, it’s unclear which side is in the right. Most likely, another club would negotiate with Barcelona to reduce Messi’s €700 million release clause to a more reasonable number, rather than wait for any legal issues to play out.

Man City sits at the top of the list of interested teams. The English club calculates that it can afford to sign Messi without violating Financial Fair Play rules. It even envisions a future in which Messi plays for it for a few years, then ends its career with New York City FC of Major League Soccer, another club owned by the City Football Group.

On Wednesday, Spanish newspaper Sport reported that City might even trade up to three players back to Barcelona in exchange for Messi, including Gabriel Jesus. Such a deal would cause a sensation in the soccer world, where trades of any kind are rare, and especially so for superstar players.

Lionel Messi will NOT continue at Barcelona next season. The announcement, which will arrive in the next few days, will be made official for everyone through the club's social networks.

[@BlazquezFont]

— City Xtra (@City_Xtra) August 27, 2020

Spanish journalist Miquel Balzquez even reported this week that Barcelona had already determined that Messi won’t be back, and that an official announcement would come through the club’s social media channels in the next few days.

Barcelona Clinging to Hope of Retaining Star

But there are signs that Barcelona isn’t giving up just yet. Sporting director Ramon Planes told reporters that the Spanish club still planned on having Messi with the team next year.

As we have said many times, we’re still thinking of Messi as a Barca player,” Planes told reporters. “The marriage between Messi and Barca has given both parties a lot. It has given the fans a huge amount of joy, and we have to fight for that relationship to continue. Internally, we’re working hard to convince Messi to stay. We want to find the best solution for Barca and for Messi.”

Barcelona president Josep Maria Bartomeu responded to supporter protests by offering to resign if it would keep Messi from leaving, according to a TV3 report.

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Casino workers union Unite Here Local 23 raised the complaints, which were similar to reports made by employees at Atlantic City and Las Vegas resorts.

Mississippi Employees Test Positive

The union reported that 10 workers from the Beau Rivage Casino and five more from the IP Casino — both in Biloxi — have tested positive for the coronavirus.

At Thursday’s hearing, two casino employees testified about concerns they have over how the resorts are dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic. IP Casino guest room attendant Carolyn Ford told the commission that the resort had asked her to work even as she was waiting on coronavirus test results to come back.

“On Thursday, they were like, ‘Can I come back to work?’ But they hadn’t gotten my results yet,” Ford said. “They said, ‘Can you come back Friday?’ And I was like, ‘No, I can come back Saturday.’ The nurse called me and told me I was positive. What if I had went back to work? I could have spread it to my coworkers.”

IP Casino told Ford that they had accidentally called her to come in early, she told television station WXXV News 25. But she said she found that unlikely.

The union also showed the gaming commission a survey of workers at the Beau Rivage and IP Casino. According to that poll, 70 percent of workers report that casino guests are rarely following social distancing guidelines at the resorts.

Union Wants Transparency

The Beau Rivage stated the casino had a seven point safety plan and ensured that every employee was thoroughly trained, in a statement touting their health and safety efforts.

The union feels that Mississippi casinos should take more active measures to protect their employees.

“We have to make sure we are having continuous health and safety meetings every other week,” Unite Here Local 23 president Marline Patrick said via television station WXXV. “So, we don’t feel like the company is being transparent, as someone becomes positive or that they test positive or that they are doing contract tracing. So, it can trickle down to many workers, that can trickle down to the guest.”

Employees across the gaming industry have raised concerns about COVID-19 safety protocols as casinos have begun to reopen across the United States.

In Atlantic City, Unite Here Local 54 claimed that Caesars Entertainment was actively ignoring at least some of New Jersey’s mandated health and safety guidelines. Meanwhile, Las Vegas Culinary Union employees filed a lawsuit against MGM Resorts International over safety issues, though the two sides reached a settlement earlier this month.

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That money could help make up for budget deficits that were caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The federal government may provide relief for local and state municipalities in an upcoming stimulus package, which could potentially close that gap. But New York’s deficit has grown into the billions, and there’s no certainty that any aid will come, let alone enough to cover the entire shortfall.

Accelerated Timeline

Instead, Skoufis proposed moving up the timeline for New York City’s two casino licenses during a virtual town hall on Tuesday.

The proposal would be to accelerate the license to 2020 or early 2021, and so, we would get those two $500 million one-shots: a billion dollars between the two licenses,” Skoufis said.

“The casinos themselves, their openings, would not be accelerated. They would still open, as the schedule stands now, in 2023. But we would accelerate the licensing payments that are associated,” he continued.

New York residents voted to approve a change to the state constitution in 2013 which allowed for up to seven commercial casinos throughout the state. Initially, however, licenses were only awarded to four operators to build in upstate New York.

That left up to three for downstate areas: namely, New York City and its suburbs. However, the state placed a moratorium on new gambling licenses until 2023. Existing gaming venues like the Empire City Casino in Yonkers — which can only offer video lottery terminals and electronic versions of table games — have signaled a willingness to pay $500 million to get their hands on a full gambling license.

Upstate Casinos Disappoint

So far, Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) has resisted efforts to move up the timeline for those potential downstate casinos. But budget concerns could change that, especially if a potential bidding war develops for what could be one of the most lucrative casino markets in the country.

On the other hand, the existing New York casinos have fallen well short of initial revenue projections. There are fears that the regional casino market may already be saturated, which could drive down the value of further resorts in the area.

In either case, Skoufis says that accelerating the casino licensing process could save New Yorkers from either drastic service cuts or tax hikes.

We are going to have to move forward with one of those very, very soon, because our cash flow problem, forget about even just the fiscal year picture, being able to pay the bills for the state’s operations are becoming strained and nearing an impossible situation,” Skoufis said.

New York’s casinos are currently closed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. While casino workers have pushed for the state to reopen the resorts, Cuomo has yet to announce a timeline for casino gaming to resume.

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Sportsbooks have installed the challenger as the slightest of favorites, with FanDuel listing Cormier as a -112 pick over Miocic (-104).

Both sides can find a reason to be confident after their first two encounters. Cormier (22-2) has dominated most of the action thus far. He scored a first-round knockout in their first fight and was clearly winning after three rounds in the second.

Cormier Defends Legacy

But that’s when things suddenly shifted. Miocic (19-3) changed tactics, throwing punches to Cormier’s midsection over and over again. That wore down Cormier, eventually leading to a TKO victory for Miocic.

Those encounters left plenty for the two heavyweights to fight for coming into UFC 252. For Cormier, a second win would cement his place as an MMA legend, while a loss would drop him to 1-3 against his two most prestigious opponents: Miocic and light heavyweight champion Jon Jones.

I’m a guy with a big ego and that would suck,” Cormier said via Yahoo Sports. “To think that there would be two guys in my career that were better than me and I had multiple chances to beat them and I didn’t get it done. Yeah, that would suck.”

Miocic also sees the fight as a chance to prove he’s perhaps the greatest heavyweight in UFC history. He told The News-Herald that the trilogy bout means “everything” to him and that he knows a loss could erase much of what he’s accomplished in MMA. After all, he experienced that in his first loss to Cormier.

“You never know what can happen,” Miocic told the newspaper. “You work so hard to be the champ. I lost it all, but I got it back. I always knew I could get it back.”

The fight may come down to who wins the exchanges on the feet. While Cormier is the most accomplished wrestler, Miocic has been able to keep the previous fights largely upright, where he has a better chance of victory. If his adjustments prove to be more than a one-round fluke, he could easily defend his title and send Cormier into retirement.

Undefeated O’Malley Favored?

In the UFC 252 co-main event, undefeated bantamweight prospect Sean O’Malley (12-0) gets a showcase fight against Marlon Vera (15-6-1).

O’Malley has won his last two fights by the first-round stoppage and says he wants to follow in the footsteps of other UFC fighters who enjoyed meteoric rises to stardom.

I think obviously [Conor McGregor’s] career went well,” O’Malley told reporters. “We’re pretty similar in fighting styles. We knock people out in the first round. We’re not afraid to say how the fight will play out. We have similar styles. We’re explosive strikers.”

While O’Malley comes in as a -290 favorite, Vera (+235) has the skills to give him a test, something the 25-year-old hasn’t had to deal with much in his MMA career.

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Gamblers in New Hampshire have been able to legally bet on sports since December when DraftKings launched its mobile sportsbook platform in the state. Now, the daily fantasy and sports betting operator is adding a brick-and-mortar presence in New Hampshire.

March Madness Block Out?

The Brook — a casino located on the site of what was once the Seabrook Greyhound racetrack — reopened for business in June after shutting down because of the coronavirus pandemic. Initially, the facility planned to open its sportsbook at the beginning of March Madness. But COVID-19 changed those plans dramatically.

Instead, the casino launched the DraftKings Sportsbook this week, with a slew of health and safety protocols in place. Both employees and guests must wear masks at The Brook, and hand sanitizing stations are available throughout the casino. The facility is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays to allow for deep cleaning.

With professional sports leagues returning to play in recent weeks, The Brook CEO Andre Carrier says the time was right to get the DraftKings Sportsbook up and running.

It’s pretty much a panacea for sports bettors right now with the NBA, the NHL, Major League Baseball, and, hopefully, the NFL next month,” Carrier said to the Casino City Times. “It’s not the NCAA Tournament. But, frankly, this might be even better, with all that’s going on.”

DraftKings opened its sportsbook in The Stadium — the sports entertainment viewing area at The Brook. Bettors can place their wagers either at the window with a teller or via kiosks.

DraftKings Invests Heavily in New Hampshire

DraftKings earned the right to be the exclusive online sports betting operator in New Hampshire in exchange for the state retaining 51 percent of all revenue generated. The state also keeps 50 percent of all revenue from retail locations.

Several municipalities in the state have voted in favor of allowing sportsbooks, and DraftKings has committed to operating at least four in the state. So far, the online platform has generated $65 million in sports betting handle.

In most states, online platforms generate far more revenue than brick-and-mortar sportsbooks. There’s no reason to think that New Hampshire will buck that trend. However, DraftKings officials say that live betting still plays an important role.

DraftKings is a customer-first company that looks at the many ways fans engage with sports,” DraftKings Chief Business Officer Ezra Kucharz said in a statement.

DraftKings says it will hold an official ribbon-cutting ceremony for the sportsbook at The Brook sometime in September.

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Lewis and Oleinik both rank among the top 10 contenders in the heavyweight division, and the winner of Saturday’s bout could become relevant in the divisional championship picture.

For Lewis (23-7), victory would likely set up a major fight — perhaps not a shot at the title, but certainly an eliminator against another contender like Curtis Blaydes or Francis Ngannou.

Lewis’ Unforgettable Interview

Lewis once fought for the heavyweight title, losing to Daniel Cormier via submission in a rather one-sided bout. But most fans know him best for his previous fight when he scored a stunning knockout against Alexander Volkov with just 11 seconds remaining in the fight.

Lewis’ interview after the fight was even more memorable than his performance.

My balls was hot,” Lewis told Joe Rogan when asked about why he took his pants off after the win.

Lewis promises to be a leaner, more explosive fighter going forward and says fans will see that on Saturday.

“I think you’ll see something you haven’t seen from me in a long time in the Octagon,” Lewis told reporters. “I’m going to come out balls blazing.”

Ready for the Octagon

Now 43, Oleinik (59-13-1) continues to be a dangerous fighter for nearly any opponent. While the Russian has lost some of his athleticism, he can steal wins on the back of his strength and wrestling skills. Given that he’ll probably need to surprise Lewis to find victory on Saturday, he isn’t giving anything away about his plans.

Of course, you don’t know my game plan, and I hope Derrick won’t, too,” Oleinik told Cageside Press. “Because if he knows about my game plan, it’s terrible difficulty. This is like chess. You must always [take] different steps. He’s explosive, he’s smart…this is one of the most dangerous fighters in the world.”

In the co-main event, former middleweight champion Chris Weidman (14-5) returns to the division after a short dalliance at light heavyweight. A loss to Dominick Reyes last year ended that experiment, sending Weidman back to his natural division in search of a win that could jump-start another title run.

“I need to get a freaking W,” Weidman told MMA Fighting. “I need to get back on my winning ways. I think I have a lot of advantages in this fight. But when you’re in there, you never know what’s going to happen.

Weidman will face off against Russian talent Omari Akhmedov (20-4-1). The 32-year-old has won five of his last six fights, with only a draw against Marvin Vettori breaking up a winning streak that dates back to 2016.

Akhmedov possesses the power to take out Weidman, though the former champion has the advantage in wrestling and experience. Weidman enters the fight as a slight -140 favorite over Akhmedov (+120).

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According to the union, the four Caesars properties are not conducting temperature checks on guests. Instead, they are only conducting verbal screenings. Unite Here also alleges that management has failed to enforce social distancing and mask-wearing policies.

People are not wearing masks, people are wearing masks down below their nose, not wearing it properly, and when you ask them to wear it they really don’t like to comply,” Harrah’s bartender Jason McKnight said during a virtual press conference. “You’re definitely fighting an uphill battle. I don’t see security guards, managers, or anyone else going around and enforcing it.”

Caesars owns four of the nine casinos in Atlantic City today, including Bally’s, Caesars, Harrah’s, and the Tropicana.

Mixed Messages?

The union’s secretary and treasurer, Donna DeCaprio, told reporters that other Atlantic City casinos are performing better when it comes to enforcement. The Borgata, Golden Nugget, Hard Rock, and Resorts casinos have all been administering temperature checks on guests. Ocean Resort Casino has performed only verbal checks, but has taken steps towards being in compliance with regulations, according to DeCaprio.

Still, the alleged lax enforcement of safety standards shows a disregard for employee health, the union says.

“We can’t rely on these companies to do the right thing,” DeCaprio said. “The workers are at risk and they need to be protected.”

Differing Protocols

Some Atlantic City casino employees find the supposed disregard for state regulations particularly disappointing because of the steps they must take to go to work.

I go in every day. I get my temperature checked,” Tropicana bartender Janey Negron told reporters. “So, you’re protecting the guests from me, but I’m not being protected?”

The union also claims it has documented 75 cases in which Atlantic City resorts failed to thoroughly clean hotel rooms on a daily basis, which state regulations require.

Caesars fired back at the allegations, saying that they are fully complying with all health and safety protocols.

“In addition to our enhanced cleaning protocols and other requirements that apply to our valued team members, all of our guests must pass a screening process before being allowed into our properties, and must wear face masks in compliance with the governor’s orders,” Caesars regional president Steve Callender said in a statement.

The state of New Jersey allowed Atlantic City casinos to reopen with a reduced capacity of guests on July 2. However, the venues were required to follow health and safety protocols to do so. Most resorts chose to reopen on that date, while the Borgata waited until July 26 to invite guests back.

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The critical middleweight matchup should send the winner into the title picture. Shahbazyan has established himself as one of the most promising prospects in the UFC. He is a potential champion who benefits from the guidance of manager Ronda Rousey – perhaps the most iconic female MMA star of all- time.

It’s not if, it’s when,” Rousey told UFC president Dana White in an interview, speaking of Shahbazyan’s championship potential. “This kid is special. He is one in a generation. I know what I’m looking at, and you know what you’re looking at. It’s interesting to finally be in this time where everyone is starting to take notice.”

At 22-years-old, Shahbazyan already ranks as the No. 9 contender in the UFC middleweight division. He can prove he belongs with the division’s elite by beating Brunson, whose only losses in the UFC have come to elite middleweights. Some see Brunson as a gatekeeper. But he believes that a big win over the strongly hyped Shahbazyan could make him a real contender again.

Shahbazyan (11-0) and Brunson (20-7) headline Saturday night’s card at the UFC’s Apex facility in Las Vegas.

Path to the Title

The fight will likely see Shahbazyan push the action early. Brunson has shown an ability to calmly take the fight into the later rounds as of late. If he can continue to follow that game plan, he might have a chance of upsetting Shahbazyan’s run towards the middleweight title.

“I know what I’m capable of when I’m prepared and dialed in,” the 36-year-old Brunson told Yahoo Sports. “I’m a dangerous guy. I still feel like there is a lot out there for me. By no means have I written myself off. I think I’ve got a lot more left in me, and you’ll see some great performances in these next couple of years.”

Title Shot Contention?

In the co-main event, women’s flyweights Joanne Calderwood (14-4) and Jennifer Maia (17-6-1) face-off in what looks to be a dangerous matchup for Calderwood. The 33-year-old title contender was in line to take on champion Valentina Shevchenko. But Shevchenko backed out of a title fight because of an injury, and Calderwood instead chose to take a fight against Maia rather than wait for a championship bout.

I get it. I’m in a great position and a great opportunity ahead of me. But at the same time, I’m not getting paid and people aren’t thinking I’m relevant to this spot,” Calderwood told MMA Fighting. “I want to go out there and prove to myself and to the fans as well and I want to stay active.”

Calderwood is capable of controlling the fight against Maia, as she is the better striker, even if she isn’t an elite athlete. Calderwood comes into the bout as a -160 favorite against Maia (+128) in what figures to be a competitive fight.

Also on the UFC Fight Night card, Vicente Luque (-195) faces off against Randy Brown (+155) in a welterweight bout, and lightweights Lando Vannata (-160) and Bobby Green (+128) also fight on the main card.

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The 40-year-old Zakhour enjoyed VIP status at the Crown Casino in Melbourne, Australia. She was living at the resort when she met her first victim. Three weeks later, he gave her A$110,000 ($79,000) to help her purchase a blueberry farm, then another A$41,000 ($29,500) the next day to supposedly complete the sale.

But those were only the first of her requests. Zakhour told the 54-year-old man that a “Malaysian worker” had threatened to go to the police if he wasn’t paid off. The man gave Zakhour A$40,000 ($28,900).

Zakhour confessed to the scams during a pre-sentencing hearing at the Victorian County Court on Thursday.

Threats Kept Money Flowing

As the requests went on, Zakhour threatened the first man and his family via email if he didn’t continue to pay her.

Tell your ex-wife you will kill yourself if she doesn’t give you the money,” Zakhour wrote in one message.

Zakhour also met her second victim on Tinder. She continued telling stories about her supposed blueberry farm, this time claiming she needed money to pay her workers. The 45-year-old financial planner sent her A$50,000 ($36,000).

Zakhour told police that she made up the story about the blueberry farm because her first victim continued to give her cash each time she asked for it. At one point, she gave him a Rolex watch to prove that she was not scamming him. The watch was a fake.

“He knew what type of girl I was,” Zakhour told police.

Attempted Amends

During the pre-sentencing hearing, Zakhour’s barrister explained that the money was actually going to fund her gambling addiction. According to the lawyer, Zakhour has already written an apology letter to the two men, paid back about 10 percent of what she took from them, and had spent 18 months volunteering at a soup kitchen.

According to media reports, Zakhour wiped away tears in her eyes during the hearing. A judge will sentence her at a later date.

Many high-rolling gamblers have made their way through the Crown Casino. But the money they’ve spent hasn’t always been on the level.

Last year, Australia’s ABC News reported that Crown had allowed Indonesian businessman Joseph Wong Kiia Tai to play in its high-stakes rooms despite the fact that he was facing international sanctions, including a travel ban. Kiia Tai allegedly provided financial and military support to former Liberian president Charles Taylor, who is serving 50 years in prison for crimes against humanity. According to the report, Kiia Tai lost over $6 million at Crown venues between 2004 and 2015.

Currently, the Crown Melbourne remains closed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In early July, the state of Victoria reentered Stage 3 lockdown procedures, which will keep the casino closed for at least another six weeks.

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The Lakers and the Clippers will follow to complete opening night, with the Lakers entering the all-LA matchup as 4.5-point favorites.

The NBA shut down its season on March 11 because of the coronavirus pandemic. From the beginning, NBA commissioner Adam Silver expressed confidence that the league would find a way to finish its season and crown a champion. In June, the league’s Board of Governors approved a return-to-play format for 22 teams.

Those teams will play at Walt Disney World, where players and staff will live in a “bubble,” isolated from the outside world. Only teams within six games of the playoffs are participating in the restart, with each remaining squad playing eight regular-season games for seeding purposes.

Partial NBA Restart

Once the teams complete the regular season, the playoffs will begin with the usual best-of-seven series format. There’s one exception: if the ninth-place team in either conference is four games back or closer when the regular season ends, they will play a short series against the eighth-place team for the final playoff spot.

The team in eighth place must win just one game to advance; the ninth-place team must win twice in a row to steal the final spot.

That’s far from the only quirk in this NBA restart. Because teams played a different number of games before the season halted, they will also end the year having played anywhere from 71 to 75 games. Because of that imbalance, the NBA will seed teams for the playoffs based on winning percentage.

Lakers Put to the Test

The marquee matchup for reopening night features the Lakers and the Clippers squaring off in a battle between two of the favorites for the NBA title. At 49-14, the Lakers hold the best record in the Western Conference, 5.5 games ahead of the Clippers (44-20), who sit second in the West.

Clippers coach Doc Rivers told ESPN that if his team has to be short-handed, there’s no better time than now.

“Guys have the virus, guys have family stuff, and so you have all of this, what I call ‘clutter’ in your lives, and it’s part of life,” Rivers said. “But adversity is not all bad. You’re going to go through hard stuff, and if it’s at the beginning, then let’s do it now.”

While this game is far from do-or-die, Lakers coach Frank Vogel is still placing plenty of importance on getting off to a strong start.

More than anything, I think it’s going to be a great measuring stick for where we’re at,” Vogel told reporters. “You don’t sharpen yourselves as well against teams of lesser opponents as you would against a great team. It’s definitely going to be a good test for us.”

The Lakers (+260) and the Clippers (+320) trail only the Milwaukee Bucks (+240) in the odds to win the NBA Championship this year.

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When Whittaker last stepped into the Octagon, he lost his belt to Israel Adesanya, who knocked out the former champion in the second round at UFC 243.

That loss wasn’t nearly enough to knock Whittaker (20-5) out of the title picture. But the 29-year-old will need to beat Till this weekend if he wants to stay on the shortlist of contenders in the middleweight division.

Whittaker enters the bout as a -135 favorite over Till (+108), according to PointsBet.

Whittaker Rebounds

Whittaker considered retirement after the loss to Adesanya. But after taking time to reflect on his situation, he regained his hunger for competition.

It was a natural decision,” Whittaker told Yahoo Sports. “It was a combination of me talking to my team, of me talking to my family. Soul Searching. It was a mixture of the lot. That’s the journey of this sport, to just get better.”

Till (18-2-1) has lost two of his past three fights but is looking to work his way into the middleweight title picture. Till says a win over Whittaker should immediately rocket him into a championship fight.

“If I win, I’m fighting Israel Adesanya, and that’s all there is to it,” Till told reporters on Tuesday’s media day. “If I beat Whittaker, I don’t want to hear any name come out of anybody’s mouth other than Israel Adesanya.”

Rua, Nogueira Finish Trilogy?

Mauricio “Shogun” Rua will look to beat Antonio Rogerio Nogueira for a third time in the UFC on ESPN 14 co-main event. Rua enters as a -195 favorite over Nogueira (+155) in the light heavyweight fight.

The two men first fought while in Pride FC in 2005, then took a rematch in the UFC in 2015. Rua won by unanimous decision on both occasions.

“I fought Nogueira [at] the start of my career, the middle, and the final,” Rua told reporters on Tuesday. “I’m happy because Rogerio is a legend of the sport, and I know this fight motivates him. But for me, too, and I’m very happy for this fight.”

The 44-year-old Nogueira has announced that this will likely be his final professional MMA fight.

I think it’s a good time to stop now. I think it’s going to be the last one,” Nogueira told reporters. “In my last three years, it was very difficult to train, because I had a herniated disc. I had to cancel a lot of fights. Every year I fought one time, then the second one I would have to cancel.”

Also on the UFC on ESPN 14 card, Fabricio Werdum (+260) takes on Alexander Gustafsson (-350) in a heavyweight tilt, while the undefeated Marina Rodriguez (-185) is favored over Carla Esparza (+145) in women’s strawweight action.

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Bettors at the Bellagio took advantage of a manual entry error to get wagers in on games in the KBO League and Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL) after they were well underway.

The error didn’t guarantee a win for those gamblers. But it did give bettors a massive edge over the sportsbook. According to ESPN, around 50 parlays were placed on the games after they began. One 10-leg parlay would have cash $137,000 if BetMGM honored the ticket.

Some Bettors Cashed Tickets, Most Lose Out

ESPN first reported the NGCB decision on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the Las Vegas Review-Journal confirmed that the board ruled in BetMGM’s favor.

I can confirm that we’ve now received word from the NCGB that it has approved our request to rescind and refund the past-post wagers,” a BetMGM spokesperson told the Review-Journal via email.

In total, gamblers booked about $250,000 in winning bets. Some bettors cashed their winning tickets before BetMGM stopped honoring the KBO and CPBL tickets. Others hoped that those early payouts would lead sportsbooks to honor all of the bets.

https://twitter.com/AudreyR2d2/status/1280418321234444291

“Two players paid over $40K already at the cage,” Twitter user @AudreyR2d2 wrote on July 7, days after showing an 8-team parlay that paid over $11,000. “Other player tickets are frozen. #payonepayall”

The incorrect starting times led to perhaps the largest past-posting loss in the history of the Las Vegas sports betting industry. Sportsbooks often deal with smaller mistakes of this type by negotiating a private settlement with bettors. ESPN reported that one common resolution is for the bettor to choose between keeping their winnings and accepting a ban from the sportsbook or simply voiding the bet to get a refund.

‘The Perfect Storm’ for BetMGM Error

However, those informal settlements are not covered by gaming regulations. In general, bookmakers can’t void outstanding wagers without written permission from the NGCB.

Gaming attorney Mac VerStandig told ESPN that while sportsbooks and bettors welcomed having foreign leagues to bet on, the situation was likely to result in errors.

“This is sort of the perfect storm, where you have reduced staffing because of the pandemic,” VerStandig told ESPN. “You have international events that are being wagered upon heavily because of the pandemic, and the large potential payouts of the parlays are not raising suspicions because there’s absence of domestic action. With the four major American sports on hiatus, a gambler has to gamble.”

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Figueiredo defeated Benavidez in their first matchup in February, but failed to make weight before the fight, meaning he was ineligible to win the flyweight title.

That initial fight ended early, with Figueiredo (18-1) winning by TKO a minute and 54 seconds into the second round.

William Hill lists Figueiredo as a -220 to win the rematch as well, with Benavidez fetching +180 odds as the underdog

Figueiredo Won’t Overlook Benavidez

Figueiredo won the first fight after a controversial clash of heads just moments before he put away Benavidez. Figueiredo knows the danger that Benavidez poses, and is hungry to show he can beat his illustrious opponent a second time.

Benavidez is truly dangerous and cannot be underestimated,” Figueiredo told MMA Junkie. “We’ve mapped out his game. He’s not too versatile, and always brings the same game in every fight. We’re confident that he’ll try a new strategy against me for July 18, but we’re getting ready with that in mind.”

On the other side, Benavidez (28-6) stands ready to take the second meeting against Figueiredo, who came up heavy at the weigh-in and thus could not take the flyweight title when he won back in February. Benavidez sees Figueiredo as a “villain” after the first fight, and his mind is set on revenge in the rematch.

“It just makes me actually want to hurt him,” Benavidez told ESPN. “So yeah, that is a different feeling towards this fight. Typically I don’t have that toward an opponent. I’m like, hey if I win, I win. If I hurt him, obviously that’s what we’re trained to do. But for this one, that’s the difference.”

Recognition in Middleweight Division

Kelvin Gastelum (15-5) comes in as a slight favorite against Jack Hermansson (20-5) in the co-main event. The two middleweights both sit on the fringes of the title picture, with the winner likely to get serious consideration for a title shot, while the loser falls into the lower ranks of numbered contenders.

William Hill sees the fight as a pure toss-up, with Hermansson and Gastelum listed at -1110 to win the bout. Gastelum enters with a reputation as a bit of a fringe contender and a gatekeeper, while Hermansson is on his way up, needing a signature win to put him among the true candidates for a championship run.

I’m expecting the best Kelvin,” Hermansson told reporters on Thursday. “His performance against Adesanya, even though he lost, was a great one, and I think that’s the Kelvin that I’m going to face on Saturday.”

Gastelum remembers how close he came to once winning the UFC middleweight title, and wants to get back into that picture with a win over Hermansson.

“I’m actually in a really good place, mentally and physically, which really wasn’t the case for my last two fights,” Gastelum told MMA Fighting. “Now I’m in a good place mentally, physically. I feel really good coming into this fight. I battled [my demons], I conquered them, and here I am, ready to go.”

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University of York professor David Zendle authored the study, which looked at the gaming and gambling habits of a representative sample of 1,081 UK adults.

The study found that 18.5 percent of respondents engaged in behaviors that were related to both gambling and gaming. That included spending money on loot boxes, but also activities including social casino games, esports betting, and watching others gamble or open loot boxes online.

The term “loot boxes” refers to any element in a game where players purchase (either with real money or in-game currency) a randomized reward that they can open without knowing what they will receive. The rewards can range from cosmetic items to players for multiplayer modes in sports games like FIFA.

Study Links Video Game Activities to Problem Gambling

The study also measured gambling tendencies in participants. Zendle found a significant link between video-game related gambling practices and problem gambling. Several individual behaviors shared that link as well, including watching gambling on Twitch, social casino spending, and esports betting.

These findings suggest that the relationship between gaming and problem gambling is more complex than many people think,” Zendle said in a statement. “When we go beyond loot boxes, we can see that there are multiple novel practices in gaming that incorporate elements of gambling. All of them are linked to problem gambling, and all seem prevalent.”

Zendle called for closer scrutiny of what he called “loopholes” that allow some aspects of games to avoid being regulated as gambling.

“For example, social casinos are ‘video games’ that are basically a simulation of gambling: you can spend real money in them and the only thing that stops them being regulated as proper gambling is that winnings cannot be converted into cash,” Zendle said. “We need to have regulations in place that address all of the similarities between gambling and video games.”

Zendle was among a number of academics from the University of York who contributed to a House of Commons inquiry last year which led to a report calling for loot boxes to be regulated as a form of gambling. Zendle also contributed to the recent House of Lords select committee report that made a similar recommendation.

Professor: ‘Apocalyptically Stupid’ Policy

Not everyone agrees that loot boxes amount to gambling.

If loot boxes are bad I want to know why they’re bad,” professor Andrew Przybylski of the Oxford Internet Institute told Business Insider. “I want harmful things in games to be identified and removed. But I just get a sense people are going to pat themselves on the back, say ‘job done,’ and a decade from now there’ll be more than 55,000 problem gamblers between the ages of 11 and 16.”

Przybylski also called a blanket definition of loot boxes as gambling would be “apocalyptically stupid,” because it would impact a wide range of games with very different elements.

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Lottery officials offered the first round of approvals after a preliminary review of the proposed projects. Developers have targeted casinos in Bristol, Danville, Norfolk, and Portsmouth so far. But regulators made it clear that this isn’t a sign that they are throwing their wholehearted support behind the projects.

Pre-certification should not be viewed as an endorsement of a specific proposal or of any city’s choice of a preferred casino partner,” Virginia Lottery executive director Kevin Hall said, via WAVY. “It also does not represent a guarantee that a casino license ultimately will be awarded.”

The Virginia Lottery will begin more extensive reviews in April 2021, at which point it will approve emergency casino regulations and begin taking applications. Those probes will include criminal background checks along with investigations into the financial performance of gaming operators.

The initial approvals were still an important step for local officials who want to bring casinos to their municipalities. The approvals will allow voters to have their say in referendums on Election Day this November. For instance, Bristol’s City Council voted Tuesday night to file a petition to hold a referendum on casino gaming.

Rush Street Gaming, the Pamunkey Indian Tribe, and Hard Rock International are among the developers aiming to build casinos in Virginia.

Virginia Lottery Releases Draft Sports Betting Rules

The Virginia Lottery also released partial draft regulations for sports betting on Wednesday night. Final regulations are due by Sept. 15, but the public can comment on proposals between now and then.

Some observers worried that Virginia might implement a minimum hold percentage similar to the policy of neighboring Tennessee. Regulations there require a mandatory minimum 10 percent hold for all sportsbooks, a rule that may force bookmakers to provide inferior odds in order to increase profits.

Virginia’s General Assembly approved casinos and sports betting in April. That process required some back-and-forth with Gov. Ralph Northam (D), who sent back the first version of the bill with amendments that were signed off on by the legislature.

Under the law, only cities that met guidelines related to unemployment, poverty rates, and population decline could potentially host casinos. Only five cities fit the bill: Bristol, Danville, Norfolk, Portsmouth, and Richmond.

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Colorado gaming regulators took the same precautions by asking sportsbooks in the state to take Ukrainian table tennis off the board on Thursday.

ESPN obtained the notice that New Jersey regulators sent to sportsbooks in the state.

“While there is not yet any evidence that any match-fixing occurred in New Jersey, due to the nature of the alert, the Division is suspending approval for wagering on all table tennis events in the Ukraine, including, but not limited to, the Setka Cup, WIN Cup, and TT Cup,” the notice said.

Big Betting?Business During Pandemic

Table tennis rose to the forefront of the sports betting industry during the COVID-19 shutdowns. With most other sports leagues shuttering during the early months of the pandemic, oddsmakers turned to ping-pong and other obscure sports in order to fill the void.

Bettors responded by showing heightened interest in one of the few options available. Table tennis offered fast action and plenty of matches to bet on, even if gamblers knew next to nothing about the sport. At one point in late March, DraftKings reported that 60 percent of all money bet on their platform was on ping-pong.

Table tennis is the No. 1 draw by a country mile,” William Hill sportsbook director Nick Bogdanovich told the Las Vegas Review-Journal in early April. “There’s 90 matches a day, so it adds up.”

But there may have been problems lurking beneath the surface of these Russian and Ukrainian table tennis events. Organizations like the International Table Tennis Federation, European Table Tennis Union, and even the Ukrainian Table Tennis Federation had shut down all of their sanctioned events by late March, just like most other sporting authorities.

Questionable Events Don’t Scare Away Bettors

Yet unsanctioned events continued to be played. Some sportsbooks show matches over live streaming video. These contests typically take place in empty, tarped rooms, with just a scorekeeper and the two players present.

The Ukrainian Table Tennis Federation even attempted to crack down on the Setka Cup, threatening players with bans from future sanctioned events if they participated. The players took part anyway, and the federation disqualified 365 individuals as a result.

Despite the lack of transparency, bettors seem to enjoy betting on ping-pong. Some even won big by doing so. On March 28, someone in Nevada hit a 10-team, $50 parlay to win $9,676 by wagering on 10 slight favorites in Ukrainian table tennis matches.

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Usman expected to be fighting Gilbert Burns on Monday. But Burns had to drop out after testing positive for the coronavirus. Thankfully, the UFC found a suitable replacement option in Masvidal, who was willing to take the fight on short notice after resolving his contract issues with the company.

Masvidal needed to cut 22 pounds in just one week to make weight. But he remains a dangerous opponent despite the lack of preparatory time. Usman certainly isn’t taking the holder of the “BMF Belt” lightly heading into UFC 251.

Each and every time you step in there, there’s always a risk, especially in my situation,” Usman told Yahoo Sports. “There’s always a risk to step in there, but especially doing it on seven, six, seven days notice after you just trained for a different opponent [with] a different style and now having to make that mental switch. But at the end of the day, this is what champions are made of.”

Masvidal has his work cut out for him if he wants to leave Fight Island with the championship belt. Usman’s wrestling skills have overwhelmed most opponents, and Masvidal will need to find a way to keep the fight on its feet if he wants to pull off the upset.

Holloway Looks for Revenge

The featherweight championship is also on the line at UFC 251, as Alexander Volkanovski (-220) will defend his crown against Max Holloway (+180) — the same man he beat to claim the title in December. The 28-year-old Holloway has lost two of the last three fights but remains confident that he’ll be back on top before long.

I’m only 28, I’m only getting better,” Holloway told CBS Sports. “UFC is going to be seeing a lot of my face for many years to come, so I ain’t worried about it.”

If Holloway wants to walk out with a win on Saturday, he’ll need to find a way to neutralize Vokanovski’s leg kicks, which proved decisive in the Australian’s unanimous decision win last year.

Yan Takes Centerstage?

The UFC 251 card contains a rare third title fight, though this one is for a vacant crown. Bantamweights Petr Yan (-230) and Jose Aldo (+190) will face off for the belt previously held by the now-retired Henry Cejudo.

Yan comes in as the favorite despite the fact that Aldo is the bigger name in MMA. The two previously trained together, and Yan now believes he’s ready to outclass the veteran.

“I’m glad to be fighting Aldo, who is a legend of the sport,” Yan told reporters. “It was a great experience, training with him. We sparred, we grappled. I think it was four years ago, and I have become a better fighter since that time. I don’t think he has become a better fighter. He’s stayed the same.”

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Eight La Liga clubs currently sport gaming firms as their primary shirt sponsor.

Valencia and Sevilla are the most prominent teams partnered with gambling concerns, with Alaves, Leganes, Granada, Mallorca, Osasuna, and Levante also featuring gaming companies on their shirts. However, the agreement will also impact all 17 teams that have some form of sponsorship deal with betting firms.

Spain Sets Strict Gambling Ad Restrictions

The new restrictions are part of Spain’s Royal Decree on Advertising, a piece of legislation that mandates that licensed gambling companies can only advertise between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m. each day. Alberto Garzon, the country’s Minister of Consumer Affairs, set down the tough new rules on clubs in La Liga, the top soccer league in Spain.

The only small bright spot for gaming firms is the possibility of advertising on the outside of each team’s pitch. Local regulations will determine if those sideline ads can remain.

Spanish officials believe that the advertising bill will pass muster with the European Union in Brussels in time for the new regulations to apply to the 2020-2021 season. The eight La Liga teams with betting logos on their shirts have already had to block or remove those marks based on a temporary ban that began on March 31.

Real Madrid Poised to Capture La Liga Title

Like almost all sports leagues worldwide, La Liga has faced difficulties related to the COVID-19 pandemic. The league suspended play on March 12, with clubs resuming matches on June 11. La Liga plans to wrap up its season on July 19.

Real Madrid currently leads La Liga with 77 points, one ahead of Barcelona at the top of the table. Real also has a game in hand over Barcelona. The SugarHouse Sportsbook lists Real Madrid as a -2000 favorite to win La Liga, with Barcelona at +700.

The issue of sports betting sponsorships has proven to be a thorny one in Europe. Earlier this year, Premier League executive Richard Masters said that he wants to protect the right of clubs to have partners from the gaming industry, even as the UK government cracks down on gambling regulation.

The whole area does need, I think, probably, slightly firmer regulation, particularly around the most vulnerable,” Masters told reporters in February. “But I don’t necessarily think that the answer should be that clubs should no longer have betting partnerships.”

However, a recent House of Lords Select Committee report on gambling disagreed with that assessment. It recommended banning gambling sponsors in the Premier League, and eventually for all soccer teams –- though it acknowledged that lower level clubs would need time to adjust to the potential loss of revenue.

“We therefore think they should be given time, perhaps three years, to adapt to the new situation,” the report said of lower level soccer clubs. “They would not be allowed in that time to enter into new sponsorship contracts with gambling companies. But any existing contracts could continue until they terminate, and clubs would have time to seek alternative sources of sponsorship.”

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On Sunday morning, bettors could put money down on games in the KBO League and the Chinese Professional Baseball League hours after teams had taken the field.

Dozens of Bets Posted After Games Start

But a manual entry error led to the incorrect start times in the BetMGM software. Most of the resulting past-post bets were made at self-bet kiosks in the Bellagio sportsbook.

The games in the Asian leagues began at 1 am and 2 am Pacific Standard Time (PST) Sunday morning. But bettors placed wagers on those games as late as 3 am PST, long after the action in the first few innings had changed the odds.

By 2:30 am PST, the NC Dinos had taken a 3-0 lead over the Doosan Bears in the fifth inning. That made it easy for gamblers to pick both the Dinos (-110) and the under (nine runs) on a number of tickets, with a huge edge over the sportsbook. Both of those bets held up, as the Dinos won 5-0.

None of the bets were guaranteed winners, though bettors had a massive advantage. One of the wagers of the 10-leg parlay was a bet on the total in a CPBL game between the Rakuten Monkeys and the Uni Lions, which started at 2 am The bettor took the under at 15 runs. The score was 10-2 in the sixth inning, but neither team plated a run over the final three innings, keeping the parlay alive.

Report: Investigation Opened into Baseball Parlays

The Nevada Gaming Control Board hasn’t commented on the situation. However, ESPN’s source says that gaming regulators have opened an investigation into the matter.

Some bettors have already posted pictures on Twitter of tickets they say they’ve cashed. Gaming regulations make it difficult for sportsbooks to do anything about the bets unless the Control Board weighs in first.

“A book may not unilaterally rescind any wager without the prior writer approval of the Chair,” states Regulation 22.115.

One anonymous executive from a Las Vegas sportsbook told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that books had to do a better job of protecting themselves by making sure their data was correct. However, he showed little sympathy for the bettors, saying authorities would definitely identify and prosecute them.

“This was like going to the casino cage and sticking a gun in their faces,” the executive told the Review-Journal. “What these guys did was pure theft.”

ESPN cited a source as saying that the investigative process will likely result in the Gaming Control Board discussing the case. Chairwoman Sandra Douglass Morgan would then determine whether or not to void the bets.

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The recommendation came as part of a wide-ranging report in which the committee suggested a number of changes to the gaming industry it says would better protect British gamblers.

Committee Links Loot Boxes, Problem Gambling

Video games implement loot boxes in a variety of formats. The basic principle is usually the same, however: players open a box to receive a randomized reward. In some games, players can spend real money to purchase loot boxes. Rewards can range from in-game buffs to cosmetic items, and can often be traded with other players.

That means these items have sometimes taken on real world value as well. That can make the opening of a loot box akin to spinning a slot machine — a resemblance that is too close to gambling for some regulators.

If a product looks like gambling and feels like gambling, it should be regulated as gambling,” the Lords report reads.

The report suggests that ministers create new regulations that would explicitly define loot boxes as games of chance. The Lords also recommended applying the same definition to any in-game items that can be bought with real money.

The committee expressed a particular concern that children might develop gambling problems because of exposure to loot boxes.

“There is academic research which proves that there is a connection, though not necessarily a causal link, between loot box spending and problem gambling,” the report says.

Most UK Players Don’t Spend Money In Games

Developers often include loot boxes in video games as a secondary income stream after the sale of a title. However, most players never spend real money on these in-game products.

Only four percent of adults and three percent of children aged five to 15 in the United Kingdom have spend money on loot boxes in premium video games, according to the Online Nation report from UK communications regulator Ofcom. Six percent of children have purchased them in free-to-play games, compared to four percent of UK adults.

The committee recommendations went far beyond loot boxes.

The committee also recommended requiring house edges to be displayed prominently on all gaming machines, both in brick-and-mortar casinos and online.

Some other governments have defined loot boxes as gambling, causing developers to modify their games. Fortnite eliminated the randomness in loot boxes in 2019 after both Belgium and the Netherlands classified the in-game products as illegal gambling.

The leading UK video game industry group said it was aware of the report and was working to address lawmakers’ concerns.

“The majority of people in the UK play video games in one form or another, so we take these concerns seriously,” Ukie chief executive Jo Twist told the BBC. “We’ve worked hard to increase the use of family controls on consoles which can turn off or limit spending, and we will be working closely with the DCMS during its review of the Gambling Act later this year.”

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A total of 71 percent of Americans said gambling is morally acceptable, while 27 percent found it morally wrong in the survey of 1,028 American adults.

Gallup didn’t ask whether or not people felt gambling — or other issues — should be legal. In fact, the wording of the questions specifically guides respondents away from that interpretation. Instead, individuals are only to consider whether or not a given activity is morally acceptable.

The differences were relatively small across party lines and gender. The biggest demographics that believe gambling is morally wrong include non-white respondents (37 percent) and those with no college education (37 percent), along with conservatives (36 percent).

Overall, Gallup found a higher level of moral support for gambling than at any time since it started asking the question in 2003. Over that period, acceptance ebbed in 2009, when just 58 percent said gambling was acceptable.

Americans Like Birth Control, Less Fond of Cheating

The Gallup Values and Beliefs poll asked about the morality of a broad range of topics. Issues ranged from the overwhelmingly accepted practices of birth control (90 percent) and drinking alcohol (86 percent), down to the detested act of married men and women having affairs (nine percent).

Perhaps the best measure of where gambling stands in the United States is looking at the other issues that rank similarly in the survey. Some 72 percent found sex between an unmarried man and woman just fine, while 70 percent see smoking marijuana as morally acceptable.

The main difference between those issues and gambling is in just how much public opinion has changed in the last two decades.

The results of the Gallup poll mirror the trends seen from other organizations in recent years, which have found broad support for gaming expansion – especially when it comes to sports betting. A Seton Hall Survey from October 2019 found that 80 percent of Americans supported at least some legal sports betting.

That’s not always the case when it comes to all forms of gambling, though: a 2019 Siena College poll of New Yorkers discovered that residents were evenly split on the issue of online sports betting, with 44 percent for and 44 percent against legalization.

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William Hill sees Poirier as a -220 favorite over Hooker (+180) in a bout that could eventually lead to a title shot for the winner.

Poirier Promises Not to Overlook Hooker

Poirier (25-6) has already had one shot at the crown, losing last September to Khabib Nurmagomedov by submission. Still, he remains firmly established in the upper crust of UFC lightweights. In a sense, that makes Hooker (20-8) a slight downgrade in competition, though Poirier has been careful not to frame it that way.

This guy is dangerous. This guy is a top opponent, a top-five ranked fighter in the UFC for a reason,” Poirier told MMA Junkie. “I don’t like the fact that fans and stuff are just passing him over, because this is a dangerous guy I’ve been preparing very seriously for.”

On the other side, Hooker has the opportunity to establish himself as a lightweight title contender. Wins over the likes of Al Iaquinta and Paul Felder have shown he’s a real contender; another victory over Poirier will put him squarely in the title picture.

“I don’t think I’ve been overlooked,” Hooker told Yahoo Sports. “People saw that I went 3-3 in my first six UFC fights and they saw I’m beatable. They, as a result, never could see me developing into this super unbeatable, larger-than-life creature they like to create. I’ve never viewed the sport that way.”

Hooker has upped his game throughout his time in the UFC. He has settled on a kickboxing-based game plan that makes him dangerous against any opponent. But this represents a clear step up in competition for Hooker, and unless he continues to improve even from his recent victories, Poirier should be able to get a finish sometime in the late rounds.

Undercard: Perry Favored Over Gall in Co-Main Event

In the co-main event, Mike Perry (13-6) and Mickey Gall (6-2) face off in an interesting welterweight clash that could end very early. Perry (-340 at William Hill) has the knockout power to finish the fight with one blow, and Gall (+270) is aggressive enough to step right into one of those punches. But if Gall can actually turn this into a grappling contest, the submission specialist should have a chance to pull off the upset.

The main card kicks off with a featherweight bout between undefeated prospect Sean Woodson (-490) and Julian Erosa (+370), a late replacement who has bounced between smaller promotions and the UFC, decisively losing his last three bouts win the promotion.

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Nagasaki officials want to win one of three IR licenses available in Japan, which will allow the construction of a large resort complex, including a casino and other amenities.

Nagasaki Catches Up with Partners

The Nagasaki government wrapped up a three-week meeting period earlier this week, during which officials met with potential IR operators who are interested in building in the prefecture. Officials say those meetings were especially important given the COVID-19 pandemic, as they got the chance to hear where the gaming firms stood during an uncertain time.

These explanatory meetings were an important step as a prefecture to prepare for the RFP,” a Nagasaki spokesperson told Inside Asian Gaming. “The briefings were also a great opportunity to hear first-hand the operational situations of the participants, especially considering that the global gaming industry is only now gradually reopening after a long period of closure.”

Nagasaki isn’t the most glamorous or lucrative location for a resort in Japan. Tokyo, Osaka, and Yokohama have all emerged as more desirable targets for some of the world’s premier gaming operators like MGM and Melco Resorts.

Affordable Option for Operators on a Budget

But building in those cities comes with an exorbitant price tag, with some operators pledging to spend $10 billion or more. That prices cut out all but the biggest firms, and even some giants like Las Vegas Sands have pulled out of the race for an IR in Japan due to the cost.

No matter who emerges as the preferred partner, there’s no guarantee that one of the three available licenses will go to Nagasaki. But officials believe they have advantages that could help them leap over a larger competitor.

By selecting a partner this coming winter, Nagasaki will be able to work on an implementation plan with its operator for several months before submitting a proposal to the national government sometime in 2021. The prefecture has boasted that it could have an integrated resort up and running by 2025, faster than other regions have suggested, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic has slowed the pace of business in Japan. Osaka, for instance, has signaled that a casino there might not open until 2027 or 2028.

Officials in Nagasaki have tabbed land at the Huis Ten Bosch theme park in Sasebo City as the site of a future integrated resort in the prefecture.

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DraftKings Sportsbook lists Blaydes as a massive -435 favorite over Volkov (+318) in the main event of Saturday’s edition of UFC Fight Night, which will take place at the company’s Apex facility in Las Vegas. The UFC is holding all of its events at the Apex until the company moves on to Fight Island next month.

Blaydes Sees Grappling as Key Edge vs. Volkov

Outside of two losses to Francis Ngannou, Blaydes (13-2) has run through the heavyweight division, scoring six TKO wins in the past four years. While Ngannou has served as something of a gatekeeper that has kept Blaydes out of true title contention, wins over Alexey Olynik, Alistair Overeem, and most recently Junior dos Santos have firmly established the 29-year-old American as a legitimate top-five heavyweight in the world.

While Blaydes knows that Volkov is a dangerous opponent, he believes he has the formula to beat the Russian.

I respect every opponent,” Blaydes told MMA Junkie. “I know he’s got skills. I know he’s efficient in striking. But I also know he’s not the best grappler in the world. I know he’s not the caliber grappler I am, and I believe I have the better conditioning.”

That analysis should ring true. The taller Volkov figures to have the advantage while the fight remains on its feet. But Blaydes should be able to take Volkov to the mat, where he can expect to dominate the action.

That doesn’t leave many paths to victory for Volkov (31-7). But the veteran ranks among the top 10 heavyweights in the world and believes he can wear down Blaydes over 25 minutes.

“I’ve already done the required preparatory work,” Volkov told UFC.com. “Now I just have to put in a strong performance. I am going to fight in the Octagon and defeat my opponent. I feel up to showing a strong performance for all five rounds. The question is, how long can he withstand?”

Big Opportunities Await Burgos vs. Emmett Winner

In the co-main event, featherweights Shane Burgos (13-1) and John Emmett (15-2) face off in what could be a test of quality vs. quantity. Burgos is known to pepper his opponents with striking volume. But Emmett – who has originally a lightweight before moving down a division in 2017 – is one of the hardest hitters at 145 pounds.

“This is a huge fight,” Burgos told MMA Junkie. “Everybody knows who Josh Emmett is. He’s a staple in the division at this point. He’s only been in the division for a little bit, but he’s made his name known. He’s had some big fights and some big wins, and I want to leapfrog myself over him.”

Emmett sees the fight similarly: as an opportunity to leap up the UFC rankings.

“I just need to go in there and continue what I’ve been doing, and go in there and make another statement,” Emmett told UFC.com. “And then I think I’ll finally get one of those top-five opponents. I believe I’m one, two fights away from fighting for the title.”

Also on the main card, Raquel Pennington (-180) and Marion Reneau (+140) face off in a bantamweight battle, while Belal Muhammad (-130) and Lyman Good (+105) meet up in a welterweight clash.

The post UFC Odds: Curtis Blaydes Poised for Victory vs. Alexander Volkov in Heavyweight Main Event appeared first on Casino.org.

Alyssa Ball and John Prignano claim that Skillz refused to pay out hundreds of thousands in cash and prizes, while cheaters kept their ill-gotten winnings.

Skillz Claims Legal Gaming in 38 States

Skillz offers players real money competitive play in a variety of mobile games. These include apps based on casino games like blackjack, sports games, traditional board games, puzzles, or just about anything else you might find in your favorite app store. Skillz claims their site offers legal gaming in 38 states since it features games of skill under the definitions of chance and gambling in those jurisdictions.

Ball further claims that when she found Skillz CEO Andrew Paradise on Instagram to confront him about the situation, he sent her an inappropriate response.

“Have we met somewhere? I feel like I’d remember as you’re too beautiful to be forgettable,” Ball alleges Paradise to have written. “Haha and if we haven’t met, we should, I’m in Vegas all the time.”

Ball says that Skillz terminated her account, seizing her $28,000 balance.

Ball, Prignano Seek Millions in Damages

Prignano makes similar claims, minus the personal interactions. According to Prignano, he earned enough rewards points on the site to redeem them for a Porsche Boxster, worth approximately $60,000. But when he tried to claim his reward, he alleges that Skillz increased the number of points needed for the car without warning. Skillz later accused Prignano of cheating, then banned him from the site and confiscated the $286,000 in his account.

In addition, Prignano claims he lost about $950,000 to the same individual named by Ball, in addition to another $350,000 to two other alleged cheaters, named only as John Does 2 and 3 in the lawsuit.

In a statement released to multiple media outlets, Skillz says that it was only doing its job to prevent cheating.

This suit was filed by two people who colluded to cheat the Skillz community,” a spokesperson for Skillz said. “They were caught by our trust and safety team and kicked off of our platform in accordance with our terms of service and commitment to honesty, integrity and fairness. Their case has no merit and is an attempt to intimidate our company and obtain illegitimate gains.”

Lawyer Mac VerStandig is representing the two plantiffs. VerStandig is the same lawyer who represented a group of poker players who sued Mike Postle and Stones Gambling Hall over alleged cheating during livestreamed games. A judge dismissed that lawsuit earlier this month.

Ball and Prignano seek $5.9 million in damages and are asking for a jury trial on nine counts, including consumer fraud, fraud, and unjust enrichment.

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The PPI Council discussed a number of potential avenues for economic growth, including privatizing airports, taking advantage of Brazil’s abundant natural resources, and building new tourism projects.

Brazil Puts Sports Betting Licenses Up for Bid

When it comes to sports betting, the PPI Council outlined a plan that would allow operators to bid on licenses to offer sports betting legally in the country.

We include a sports lottery called fixed-odds betting, which will be structured so we can have a concession system,” special secretary for the PPI of the Ministry of Economy Martha Swiller told reporters at a press conference last week. “In accordance with the legislation for these services, the goal is to attract private partners, in view of the existing regulations, so we can collect taxes and contribute to the fiscal effort of the government.”

Brazil legalized fixed-odds sports betting in December 2018. However, that bill did not include regulatory or licensing rules, where were left for further legislation. The bill set the tax rated for sports betting operators at 3 percent of turnover, despite calls for a lower rate.

The sports betting initiative is part of a PPI plan to raise more than 37 billion Brazilian Real ($6.9 billion) to help the nation recover from the coronavirus pandemic.

The council didn’t specify how much of that money it expects to generate from sports betting fees and taxes. However, it did note that gamblers spend about BRL 2 billion ($370 million USD) each year on illegal sports betting. The hope is that legalization will attract enough betting handle to bring significant funds into government coffers.

Brazilian Government Warms to Gambling Expansion

When exactly this will happen is still an open question. Until February, Brazil appeared to be moving towards a system in which any sports betting operator could apply for a license, as long as it met conditions set by the Secretariat of Evaluation, Planning, Energy and Lottery (SECAP). That all changed when officials announced that prospective operators would bid on a limited number of licenses.

That late change, combined with the pandemic and the realities of any bidding process, could delay the implementation of sports betting in Brazil. While officials were aiming for a late 2020 start date, it now appears that 2021 is a more realistic goal.

“It would generate taxes, income for the government, and it would help us recover the economy,” Mattos said of casinos during a radio interview. “It’s a perfectly possible, viable, and necessary alternative to rebuild the economy after the coronavirus crisis.”

Officials have confirmed more than 955,000 COVID-19 cases and have attributed more than 46,500 deaths to the disease, according to data collected by The New York Times.

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Eye and Calvillo are both fetching -110 odds at William Hill, while some sportsbooks have installed each of the two as the favorite.

Eye, Calvillo Excited to Take Main Event Slot

The unique circumstances of the fight make it difficult to handicap. Calvillo (8-1-1) is making her first appearance as a flyweight, moving up from the strawweight ranks after having trouble making weight in recent bouts. Eye (15-7) has emerged as the No. 1 contender in the UFC strawweight division. But that’s as much by default as anything else: while she has had success in the division, she – like everyone else – is no match for flyweight champion Valentina Shevchenko.

Many fans and observers have ranked the Eye vs. Calvillo clash as one of the weaker main events in recent UFC history. But Eye says that she’s amped-up to take center stage a week after Amanda Nunes dominated Felicia Spencer in the UFC 250 main event.

I just think it’s awesome that we have two weeks in a row where women are main-eventing,” Eye told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. “It’s such an evolution in the world. Women are just as much of a draw as the men, and I think it’s just cool.”

Calvillo sees the fight as a chance to establish herself in the flyweight division. She says that fighting at 125 pounds makes more sense for her if she wants to have a successful MMA career.

UFC Odds (Via William Hill)

• Cynthia Calvillo (-110) vs. Jessica Eye (-110)
• Karl Roberson (+180) vs. Marvin Vettori (-220)
• Merab Dvalishvili (-650) vs. Gustavo Lopez (+475)
• Andre Fili (-220) vs. Charles Jourdain (+180)
• Jordan Espinosa (-165) vs. Mark De La Rosa (+140)

“I’ll go down back to 115 for the right fight. But I just think that for my longevity as a professional athlete, I don’t think it’s a good idea for me to continue killing myself at strawweight,” Calvillo told MMA Junkie. “My body has changed a lot since then, and it is very difficult for me to make that weight.”

A former bantamweight, Eye often physically bullies her opponents at flyweight, and she figures to have a significant size advantage on Saturday as well. Calvillo’s most likely path to victory is to get the fight on the ground, where her superior wrestling could win rounds.

Vettori Looks to Dominate Co-Main Event

In the co-main event, Marvin Vettori takes on Karl Roberson in what should be a heated fight. Roberson failed to make weight for a scheduled bout with Vettori in May. While both men said they would fight at a catchweight instead, medical officials ruled Robertson medically ineligible to compete.

The two then found themselves in a hotel confrontation on the day they had expected to fight. While the beef will inevitably bring extra emotion into the fight, Vettori says it won’t distract him from his game plan.

You’ll see a lot of action, but I’m not stupid,” Vettori told MMA Junkie. “At the end of the day, you have to think, the worst thing you can do to him is to beat him and walk away with a dominant, super beautiful-fashioned win. That’s it. That’s what I’m going to do.”

William Hill has posted Vettori as a -220 favorite over Roberson (+180) in the middleweight clash.

The UFC is holding Saturday’s event at the company’s Apex facility in Las Vegas. The Apex will also host a June 27 card before the UFC turns to Fight Island in Abu Dhabi for its July slate of events.

The post UFC Odds: Little to Choose Between Jessica Eye, Cynthia Calvillo in Saturday’s Main Event appeared first on Casino.org.

The Illinois Gaming Board did not announce an opening date for the state’s casinos, saying that each operator must first submit a plan showing how they will follow the new regulations.

Deep Cleaning, Social Distancing Required

The new rules are similar to those casinos are implementing in Nevada, where gamblers began returning to resorts on June 4.

All Illinois casinos must cap themselves at 50 percent capacity, just as in Las Vegas and Indiana, among other jurisdictions. The guidelines require both employees and gamblers to wear “some types of face covering.” Several common allurements won’t be able to reopen immediately, including buffets, poker rooms, and any promotions that can’t be conducted while maintaining social distancing.

Behind the scenes, operators will take on added responsibilities. Casinos must screen employees daily and provide workers with free personal protective equipment. They must also regularly disinfect dice, chips, cards, and other gaming equipment.

While the guidelines don’t provide a reopening date, operators are hoping that they can get back to business as quickly as possible. Illinois Casino Gaming Association executive director Tom Swoik told the Chicago Sun-Times that he’s hopeful casinos will be able to reopen on June 26, when the state could advance to Phase 4 of its COVID-19 reopening plan, provided there are no new setbacks.

Our public health officials are talking to casino owners and other experts to try to figure out how you could do it,” Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker told reporters last week. “We’ve heard a lot about this out of Las Vegas, of course. But, look: the goal here is to get everybody back to work, but to do it safely.”

When casinos reopen, they may have a new offering for their visitors to try. On Thursday, the Illinois Gaming Board granted sports betting licenses to seven casinos. However, each casino will still have to separately request approval if they want to take online or mobile bets.

Several States Tentatively Opening Casinos in June

Regulators also set reopening guidelines for the thousands of video gaming locations throughout Illinois. Operators must either space out their slots or install partitions between the machines before customers can return.

Illinois casinos closed on March 16, around the same time as gaming venues across the country. Casinos in the state lost more than $100 million in the first month they were shuttered, according to an estimate by Swoik.

In recent weeks, the casino industry has taken tentative steps toward a return to normalcy. Louisiana casinos began reopening on May 18. In Indiana, casinos may reopen as early as June 15, provided they enforce social distancing by spacing slot machines and limiting the number of people at tables. Meanwhile, Maryland casinos can begin opening on June 19.

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Bettors can get odds of +475 on Spencer, a sign that few expect the challenger to overcome perhaps the most dominant woman in the history of mixed martial arts.

Spencer Confident Against ‘Living Legend’

Nunes (19-4) has fought the best competition available to her across her legendary career. Miesha Tate, Ronda Rousey, Cris Cyborg and Holly Holm have all faced Nunes. None made it out of the first round.

Spencer (8-1) has no illusions about who she is facing. She has called Nunes a “living legend,” and knows she comes into UFC 250 as a decided underdog. But she remains confident in her ability inside the Octagon.

“I’m confident that I’m a great mixed martial artist,” Spencer told Yahoo Sports. “I might not be the most impressive athlete. I might not be the most impressive striker, wrestler, or even grappler. But I feel like in the cage I know how to put it together in a great way. I’m not blindly confident. I just know what I’m capable of.”

The odds on Spencer could tempt bettors looking to score big on an underdog in Saturday’s main event. But are there reasons to believe the Canadian could pull off a monumental upset?

Nunes’ Partner Expecting First Child in September

You could wonder whether Nunes might overlook her opponent. Perhaps there are other things on her mind: Nunes’ partner, Nina Ansaroff, is pregnant with their first child, who is due to be born in September.

“I think about her so much and what I’m going to say to her and what we’re going to do together,” Nunes told Yahoo Sports. “This is the best time of life, knowing you have a child on the way. I was telling Nina there are so many things we need to do and to think about it. Everything is going to be about the kid now.”

Or maybe Nunes won’t be at 100 percent. Nunes told Combate that she believes she contracted COVID-19 while at a convention in Las Vegas, though she says she has recovered fully.

“I’ve been sick before, but I never felt the way I did when I got back from Vegas,” Nunes said. “Then I got sick, I was bedridden for two, three days, and later on, Nina caught it and got sick, too. So I believe I had a fast case of coronavirus.”

Are there any competitive reasons to think Spencer has a shot? In her only loss to Cyborg, she took an incredible amount of punishment, but kept coming, surviving the full 15 minutes before losing by unanimous decision. Spencer’s best chance to win the fight is probably in a long, five-round slog. At the very least, she may prevent Nunes from picking up a quick finish.

UFC 250 Heavy on Bantamweight Action

Much of the UFC 250 card – the second the company is holding at its Apex facility in Las Vegas – is devoted to men’s bantamweight fights, including a bout that sees top prospect Sean O’Malley (-490) take on Eddie Wineland (+370). That culminates in the co-main event, where former champion Cody Garbrandt (-150) battles Raphael Assuncao (+125) in a battle of two men looking to stay on the fringes of the bantamweight title picture.

For Garbrandt, a win over Assuncao would provide much-needed momentum after three straight knockout losses.

“I don’t need to reinvent the wheel,” Garbrandt told MMA Fighting. “I truly believe I’ve corrected a lot of my errors that I needed to correct. When I’m at peace with myself, I can cause a lot of chaos inside that Octagon, because I know that my life is good, it’s in order, and I can let that savagery out in the Octagon, and that’s what I’m prepared to do.”

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Potential private sector partners now have until January 2021 to submit proposals for an integrated resort in the Osaka prefecture. Officials previously set a July RFP deadline.

Osaka Won’t Meet World Expo Casino Goal

This marks the second time that the RFP deadline has been postponed. While officials haven’t declared a specific reason for the delays, the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic through Japan is a likely reason.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe lifted the emergency order in Osaka two weeks ago. The state of emergency in Tokyo and Hokkaido – the final areas impacted – expired a few days later. Health and safety measures have still made traveling for business difficult throughout the country.

Initially, Osaka officially wanted to attempt to open a casino before the World Expo 2025, which will be hosted in the city. But delays in both the legislative process and the RFP phase have made that impossible. On Thursday, Osaka mayor Ichiro Matsui said that city officials now believe that the earliest an IR could open would be in the second half of 2027, and 2028 may be a more realistic goal.

National IR Deadline Rapidly Approaching

It’s unlikely that Osaka officials will extend their RFP period much further. The central Japanese government will begin taking IR implementation plans on Jan. 4, 2021, with a deadline of July 30, 2021. While that time frame once seemed generous, local governments now must move quickly to select partners and develop proposals in an effort to secure one of the three IR casinos coming to Japan.

“Assuming that travel restrictions are eased enough within the next two months, there is just enough time for local governments to select their IR partner and come up with a reasonably sound business plan to submit to the central government,” Joji Kokuryo, managing director of Bay City Ventures in Tokyo, told The Japan Times last month.

Local governments and operators which can generate compelling plans should have a good chance of securing one of the available licenses. The level of competition has dropped in recent weeks, as Las Vegas Sands decided in May that it would no long pursue a Japanese casino. Sands chairman and CEO Sheldon Adelson cited issues with the nation’s policy framework, which made the company’s goals “unreachable” in Japan.

Despite that withdrawal, several heavy hitters remain in the hunt for a Japanese casino slot. Along with MGM, Melco Resorts, Wynn, Genting, Hard Rock, and other major operators are still showing interest in Japan, with Yokohama seen by many as the most attractive location for a resort.

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The former champion enters the bout as a solid favorite, with PointsBet Sportsbook posting Woodley as a -190 pick to beat Burns (+150).

Woodley Ready to Rebound from Usman Loss

Woodley is returning to action after a layoff of about 15 months. Last time he fought, Woodley lost his welterweight crown to Kamaru Usman after having successfully defended the belt four times. According to Woodley, it took time for him to recover mentally from the crushing loss.

I had to deal with the fact that I lost my belt,” Woodley said during the UFC on ESPN 9 media day. “It was something that I didn’t expect to happen. I expected to retire as UFC champion after trying to chase down the record of Georges St-Pierre.”

Woodley (19-4-1) remains the No. 1 contender in the UFC welterweight division, even if the long layoff has put him on the back burner in conversations about the title picture. Now, a win over the sixth-ranked Burns (18-3) could put him at the top of the list for a rematch with Usman.

Burns Looking to Earn Championship Opportunity

To get that win, though, Woodley will have to stop the red-hot Burns, who has won five straight fights to put himself into the championship hunt. A win would mean just as much for Burns, who knows he is in for the toughest test of his career so far.

“I knew the next one would be a tough guy. It couldn’t be tougher,” Burns told MMA Junkie. “He’s the No. 1 contender and a former champion. I’m ready for whatever I have to go through. If I have to go five rounds, I’m ready to. I’m confident.”

Burns says he’s looking to make a statement by finishing Woodley, a tough task considering the former champion’s defensive prowess. But if he can do it, the Brazilian thinks a big performance might just get him a title shot.

“If I go out there and kill Tyron Woodley in a couple rounds, for sure I’m next in line,” Burns said. “If it goes to a tough fight or a split decision, maybe I’ll have to do another one.”

“I have more experience and that will be the key in this fight,” Ivanov told BJPenn.com. “I’m taking him into deep waters and he better be ready. His first loss in the UFC is coming on Saturday.”

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The effort to finish the 2019-2020 season will begin with two games on Wednesday, June 17, and bookmakers have already set odds on the announced matchups.

Sportsbooks Waste No Time Posting Odds

William Hill lists Manchester City as a -250 favorite over Arsenal (+600) in one of the opening day matches, while Aston Villa (+195) hosts Sheffield United (+140) in the other. The rest of the Premier League schedule is still to be determined.

However, those first two games will put all 20 teams in the league on equal footing, having played 29 matches each. After that, matches will be played during weekends and mid-week, with all games televised and no two contests happening at the same time. This will allow fans to enjoy as much of the action as possible in a world where they will remain unable to attend matches in person.

Sadly, matches will have to take place without fans in stadiums, so we are pleased to have come up with a positive solution for supporters to be able to watch all the remaining 92 matches,” Premier League chief executive Richard Masters said after Thursday’s meeting of league shareholders. “The Premier League and our clubs are proud to have incredibly passionate and loyal supporters. It is important to ensure as many people as possible can watch the matches at home.”

The return of the EPL could provide a significant boost for bookmakers. That’s primarily true in the UK. But American sportsbooks will also benefit, as the Premier League is the most popular foreign soccer league in the United States.

Liverpool Running Away With League Title

Bettors will mainly be interested in individual match betting, as there’s not much of a title race to speak of. Liverpool currently holds a 25-point lead over Manchester City at the top of the EPL table, with American sportsbooks largely not even offering odds on who will finish first. Even at foreign bookmakers, you won’t make much by betting on Liverpool at this point: Paddy Power is offering just 1/1000 (or -100000 in American odds) on the Reds winning the league.

Premier League clubs have been ramping-up activities to prepare for the likelihood of starting the season this summer. Earlier this week, clubs voted to allow players to train in close contact with each other.

The EPL won’t be the only league to resume play in June. Italy’s Serie A announced Thursday that it would return to action on June 20, following an agreement between the league and the Italian government.

“Italy is starting up again, and it’s only right that football can also get going,” Italian Sports Minister Vincenzo Spadafora told reporters on Thursday. “In the light of this, we can say that the championship can start again on June 20.”

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The virtual NASCAR game was created by Leap Gaming, and features re-creations of some of the most famous tracks on the circuit, including Daytona International Speedway and Watkins Glen International.

NASCAR Joins Stable of IMG Virtual Sports Games

IMG Arena already offers a selection of simulated sporting games that provide bettors with virtual action at any time. Offerings in the IMG portfolio include horse racing, soccer, tennis, and cycling. NASCAR will be the first auto racing brand to officially partner with the company.

Adding NASCAR to our client roster is a proud achievement,” IMG Arena executive vice president and managing director Freddie Longe said in a statement. “The partnership significantly bolsters our streaming and official virtual sports offering with a product that we expect to be popular in a number of different markets.”

Beyond the virtual racing, the partnership will also allow international sports betting operators the option of livestreaming NASCAR Cup Series races. This is the first time that NASCAR has been offered via stream to bookmakers outside of North America.

The deal comes as NASCAR returns to action in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. NASCAR held its first races since March over this past week, with two events at Darlington Raceway. Kevin Harvick won the Real Heroes 400 on Sunday, May 17, while Denny Hamlin took first place in the Toyota 500 on Wednesday.

For the time being, fans are not in attendance for NASCAR races. The series next stops at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Sunday for the Coca-Cola 600.

Virtual Sports Gain Market Share During Pandemic

Virtual sports betting offers players the opportunity to wager on simulated sporting events at any time. These games can vary in complexity: while basic versions might just allow gamblers to bet on a match at particular odds and then see the result, others – like the IMG Arena NASCAR game – actually show simulated action on the screen.

Many such games offer the ability to make a number of prop bets on in-competition action or futures bets on the outcome of an entire league of games or matches. Behind the scenes, these games use random number generators to produce results at previously fixed odds that give the operator an edge, much like slot machines.

“This is never going to replace real sports, but it’s something we can do for now, to give people their fix,” Ray Marino, trader for offshore sportsbook Bookmaker.eu, told Sports Illustrated earlier this month. “It’s sick! We’re talking about the strengths of virtual teams right now! But this is the current landscape.”

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The lawsuit continues a long battle between the two tribes over whether the Catawba – based in South Carolina – should be allowed to build a casino in North Carolina.

Catawba Have Pursued Casino For Years

The EBCI is the only federally recognized tribe in North Carolina, and already operates two casinos in the state in partnership with Caesars Entertainment. According to a report by the Smoky Mountain News, the EBCI filed its lawsuit on March 17, just days after the Department of the Interior approved the Catawba application.

“Instead of abiding their trust duties and obligations under federal law to consult with the EBCI concerning the issues and concerns the EBCI raised with regards to Defendants’ proposed final agency action, Defendants ran roughshod over the Administrative Procedures Act, National Environmental Protection Act and the National Historic Preservation Act…without issuing a Final Environmental Assessment or Finding of No Significant Impact, in direct violation of the APA and NEPA,” the lawsuit says.

The Catawba have been attempting to gain approval for a casino in Kings Mountain, North Carolina for years. Under the Settlement Act of 1993, the tribe must abide by South Carolina gaming laws. State law allows only for a lottery, meaning the tribe cannot build a casino on its reservation in Rock Hill.

That led the Catawba to apply to take the land in North Carolina – just 34 miles away from the tribe’s current reservation – in 2013. That first application was denied in 2018. However, the tribe applied against under a different process in 2018, gaining approval this March.

The EBCI responded with its lawsuit, calling the decision to approve the application “rushed” and “flawed.”

ECBI Sees Infringement on Historic Cherokee Land

Much of the dispute comes down to where both tribes believe they have historical ties. The EBCI cited the Cherokee Treaty of 1777 and the 1884 Royce Map of Cherokee Land Sessions in its complaint. They claimed it as showing that the Cherokee’s historical territory included what is now Cleveland County in North Carolina. However, the Catawba have claimed that members of its tribe have historically lived in both South and North Carolina as well.

The EBCI also argues that the discovery of historic human-made tools on the Kings Mountain site in 2005 should have triggered a broader archeological survey to find religious or cultural items.

“If the Kings Mountain site is taken into trust for the Catawba Nation, the land will fall under the sovereign governance of the Catawba Nation, and the EBCI THPO [Tribal Historic Preservation Officers] will lose the right to consultation on and protection of Cherokee religious and cultural sites,” EBCI Tribal Historic Preservation Officer Russell Townsend wrote in a declaration attached to the lawsuit.

In a statement, Catawba Nation Chief Bill Harris said the issue shouldn’t be one that pits tribe vs. tribe.

“The Catawba Nation has reached out many times to the leadership of EBCI to try to work together,” Harris said in a statement on March 13, after the EBCI had signaled an intent to take legal action. “Eastern Band has the right to react however they want to the decision from DOI. But we have done and will continue to do all we can for the betterment of our nation, as well as extend the hand of friendship and cooperation to other native nations.”

New Casino Would Create Competition

Regardless of intent, the EBCI sees a Catawba casino as an economic threat. Cherokee Principal Chief Richard Sneed told the Smoky Mountain News that a new casino in Kings Mountain could siphon off the one-third of customers at their casinos that come from the Charlotte area, creating an impact on both the EBCI and the region as a whole.

“This will definitely have a negative economic impact, but it’s not just the Eastern Band it’s going to impact,” Sneed told the Smoky Mountain News in April. “We employ 4,000 North Carolinians; $179 million goes into the surrounding counties.”

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UFC 249 generated record handle for sportsbooks across the United States, with some operators reporting betting on the level of a full weekend of major sports.

Bettors Flock to Sportsbooks for UFC 249

Several sportsbooks reported that UFC 249 was attracting more action than any other UFC card ever. But that only begins to describe just how much bettors were spending, even on preliminary fights that generally attract very little attention.

“UFC 249 is officially the most-bet MMA event in DraftKings Sportsbook history – and the main card hasn’t even started yet,” DraftKings’ Stephen Miraglia told the Action Network.

After the show ended, it was clear to many oddsmakers that UFC 249 would go down in the record books.

On overall handle, this UFC 249 card ended up slightly outperforming Conor McGregor’s return to the Octagon in UFC 246,” PointsBet director of communications Patrick Eichner told multiple media outlets. “Those two events have blown every other UFC event to date out of the water, with handles comparable to a full weekend’s worth of NBA games.”

Oddsmakers made out well in large part because of an upset in the main event. Justin Gaethje scored a fifth-round knockout of Tony Ferguson in their interim lightweight title fight after coming in as a +160 underdog, according to William Hill. Several sportsbooks reported heavy liability on Ferguson heading into the main event.

Action Continues Saturday with Overeem vs. Harris

While sportsbooks haven’t reported total handle on Wednesday’s UFC Fight Night: Smith vs. Teixeira show, it was clear that there was bigger betting than for a typical non-pay-per-view card.

William Hill reported that one bettor put down $16,500 on Michael Johnson (-110) to beat Thiago Moises. The bookmaker won big on that wager, as Moises submitted Johnson with a heel hook. The sportsbook also noted that 92 percent of the handle on the main event was on Anthony Smith. Glover Teixeira upset Smith by fifth-round TKO after a dominant display.

The UFC action continues on Saturday with the third event in just eight days. While it’s another standard show without any title fights, UFC on ESPN: Overeem vs. Harris features another deep card with several intriguing bouts that feature ranked fighters.

Other main card fights include a featherweight clash between Dan Ige (+108) and Edson Barboza (-135), as well as a middleweight fight featuring Eryk Anders (+132) and Krzysztof Jotko (-165).

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On that day in 2018, only one state – Nevada – hosted sportsbooks and offered single-game sports betting. Now, 18 states have some form of sports wagering up and running, with four more and Washington D.C. having passed laws to legalize the practice.

Sports Betting Rapidly Expands

In total, legal sportsbooks in the United States have taken in $21.8 billion in handle over the past two years, according to the Action Network. While Nevada remains the largest sports betting market in the United States, New Jersey is hot on its heels, and has even beaten the Silver State in total handle in some months.

Today, more than 30 percent of the US population lives in states where regulated sports betting exists, according to the American Gaming Association. It’s a level of expansion few expected when the Supreme Court released its decision two years earlier.

I would have lots a lot of money if I was given a chance to wager on whether non-gaming states, like Tennessee, Virginia, and New Hampshire would legalize mobile sports betting in these first two years,” lobbyist Jeremy Kudon told ESPN.

The biggest successes have come in states that have legalized mobile and online sports betting. Six states now have full mobile betting available, including New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Indiana. In New Jersey, nearly 90 percent of all bets come from mobile devices.

Meanwhile, states which only allow in-person betting have generated only a fraction of the revenue. While New York – which only allows betting at its four upstate casinos – doesn’t release handle figures, its sportsbooks made just under $2 million in revenue in January, compared to the $53.6 million taken in by bookmakers in New Jersey.

State-by-State Regulation, COVID-19 Challenges

Not everything in the sports betting industry has gone smoothly since the PASPA repeal. As the above example shows, state-by-state regulation means every jurisdiction is playing by different rules, confusing the situation for gamblers and operators alike.

Sports leagues have also had a contentious relationship with gambling. While teams and leagues have partnered with casinos and gaming firms, they’ve also lobbied for friendly terms in state sports betting bills, primarily in an attempt to make operators use official league data.

Despite the pandemic, the long-term future looks bright for sportsbooks. Not only are events like UFC 249 generating record handle – showing that there’s still an appetite for betting – but industry insiders believe more states will continue to regulate sports gambling in the months and years to come.

“When legislatures return in earnest, we firmly believe the number of states ready to consider accelerating mobile sports betting and online gaming legislation to drive tax revenue will expand substantially,” FanDuel CEO Matt King told ESPN. “Across the board, it’s a time for pragmatism, and we see that producing a real opportunity for significantly expanding the map.”

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Ferguson enters the fight as a -190 favorite over Gaethje (+160), according to William Hill.

Ferguson, Gaethje in Line for Shot at Nurmagomedov

UFC 249 marks something of a return to normalcy for the sports world, as it will be the first major live sporting event in the United States in nearly two months. That has fans, bettors, and sportsbooks all anticipating Saturday’s card of 12 fights, including two title bouts at the top of the event.

The main event is the clash between Ferguson (25-3) and Gaethje (21-2), with the winner in line for a title shot against undefeated lightweight titlist Khabib Nurmagomedov. Gaethje is a late replacement for Nurmagomedov, who had planned to fight Ferguson but ended up stuck in Russia after attempting to be in the right place at the right time to get around travel restrictions.

That makes this a critical matchup for both men, and one that remains exciting for fans even without Nurmagomedov in the mix. In fact, Gaethje thinks that Ferguson might be a tougher test for him than an eventual title clash with the Russian.

There’s so many unknowns with Tony,” Gaethje said ahead of UFC 249. “You know what Khabib is going to do, and that’s going to be take you down, try to push you against the fence. And if not, he’s going to try and take shots from the space in the middle of the Octagon. I believe that he can’t take me down in the middle of the Octagon, and I can stay off the fence. So that puzzle is written. How do you beat Tony? I don’t know. I’m going to find out.”

Ferguson talked about Nurmagomedov with the media as well, attacking the champion for what he sees as ducking their planned fight.

“Khabib didn’t want the fight, he ran away like a dog with his tail between his legs. It’s the same thing with Conor,” Ferguson said during the virtual media day for UFC 249. “Where are they at? Obviously they’re back home trying to quarantine and we’re here crushing quarantine.”

Bantamweight Title Fight Co-Headlines UFC 249

With both Ferguson and Gaethje known for producing action-packed fights, fans should expect a thrilling main event. And yet, there’s the potential for the co-main event to overshadow the final bout of the night.

That contest will see Henry Cejudo (15-2) take on Dominick Cruz (22-2) for the UFC bantamweight championship. Cejudo has won his last five fights in impressive fashion, including winning and defending the UFC flyweight title before relinquishing that crown to focus on the bantamweight division. Meanwhile, Cruz has been out of action for four years. But while he may be rusty, his name and pedigree were enough to land him an immediate title shot in his return to the ring.

Cejudo enters the co-main event as a -220 favorite over Cruz (+180). Other attractions on the UFC 249 main card include a heavyweight fight between Francis Ngannou (-280) and the undefeated Jairzinho Rozenstruik (+230), as well as a featherweight contest between Calvin Kattar (-240) and Jeremy Stephens (+200).

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