Sportsbook Pays Out NBA Rookie of Year Winner Early
Scott Morris | February 12, 2019
We have seen sportsbooks in the past payout heavy favorites before the actual event. It is a strategy that garners press and notoriety. The idea is that regardless of if the heavy favorite wins or not, the sportsbook will receive that much (or more) worth of media/press from the campaign. They would prefer the heavy favorite wins but the last two times these moves made the news, the heavy favorite actually lost.
In December, before the NCAA football championship, the sportsbook FanDuel, operating in New Jersey, paid out all Alabama bets early. Alabama was a heavy favorite to win. The sportsbook only had $40,000 worth of bets on Alabama, so they were not very exposed at all. The total bets on Alabama were that low for four reasons: 1) Small betting area 2) Not near Alabama region 3) sportsbook just opened doors months before 4) Bama was heavy favorite (expensive odds)
Anyway, Clemson went on to beat Alabama and the sportsbook had to cough up about $300,000 worth of payments (paying both sides). In the end, many experts believe FanDuel still profited from the exposure. Their parent company, Paddy Power Betfair did a similar campaign with the U.S. presidency back in 2016. They paid out the heavy favorite Hillary Clinton bets and ended up having to pay both sides when Trump won. This was much more costly for the book.
Online sportsbook MyBookie.ag is paying out the NBA Rookie of the Year early in similar fashion.
“With Luka Doncic a lock to win the 2019 Rookie of the Year, we saw no reason to make people wait until the end of the season to receive their winnings, so we are paying out $150,000 in winning tickets for those who bet Doncic during the season.” the company posted in a press release. “For the unlucky ones who did not, should Luka not win the 2019 Rookie of the Year, we will double the payout on the player who does.”
The rookie is currently averaging 20.8 PPG, 7.1 RPG, 5.5 APG for the Dallas Mavericks.
MyBookie.ag is also offering last-minute action to anyone who wants to bet college basketball player of the odds on Zion Williams to win. The Duke freshman has posted ridiculous numbers this year and is the heavy odds on favorite to win, so much so that many sportsbooks have taken the bet off the board. Williamson is averaging 21.8 points per game, 9.2 rebounds per game and 2.4 assists. They are offering 3/1 payout. Duke is currently #2 ranked team in the land and odds on favorites to win it all. This promotion starts on Thursday, February 14th and runs until Monday, February 17th.
