November 03, 2015
Although the biggest story in the NFL over the past year involved some deflated footballs, by the end of this season the biggest story might be the deflated pocketbooks of people who are getting fat off of fantasy football.
It is a story that has been bubbling under the surface for the past few months, but it will not be long before the NFL and all professional sports leagues are going to have to confront the issue of fantasy football and gambling.
Full disclosure at this point: The person banging on this keyboard gets paid to endorse Draft Kings, and there are many others in the media who endorse a variety of fantasy sports companies, most notably Draft Kings and Fan Duel. In fact, media companies – and some owners of NFL teams -- have connections with the biggest fantasy sites and professional sports leagues make no secret of their associations with these companies.
Heck, you can even watch a Flyers game from a Draft Kings sports lounge. And the Detroit Red Wings have a direct link with the company to play fantasy games through their website. By no means are these examples unusual, as many pro teams overtly promote and drive traffic to the sites through their various advertising streams.
And why not?
In terms that the NFL and all other professional leagues understand, these fantasy sports sites are cash cows. They advertise heavily on both national and local levels, and as a bottom-line entity, they drive new customers to the games.
You can argue all you want that you have to study the players to win in these leagues, but common sense tells you that this is some form of gambling. That is why the NCAA has cut ties. Of course, if you want to follow the lead of the NCAA you are headed down a path of hypocrisy that will land you nowhere.
Fantasy football is a major reason why many fans watch out-of-market football games. Just last weekend the Philadelphia Eagles were out of sight and out of mind because of their bye week, but for many Eagles fans it was business as usual across the NFL because their fantasy teams were up and running.
The real beauty of the week-to-week leagues gets even bigger later in the season, because there is no such thing as being out of the running. Unlike the first, second and third generation fantasy sports leagues, these latest generation leagues go week to week, so no matter how badly you were beaten in the previous week, you are back to square one the following week.
It is not difficult to figure out the appeal of these games. Even the best high school football, basketball, baseball or hockey player knows in their heart that they could never compete on a professional level. There is no way they could ever go head to head with a pro athlete -- and it would be silly to think they could do a better job than those already out on the field.
But the general manager?
Really, is there a baseball fan in Philadelphia who does not think he or she could have done a better job as the Phillies GM than Ruben Amaro? And what about Chip Kelly?
It doesn’t take any athletic skill to run a team, just an idea of what it takes to seek out talent, put it together, and then watch the process take place on the field. Even more to that point, these leagues also work on the basis of salary caps of some sort, so what used to be a boring aspect of being a fan can now become strength, because you also have to manage a salary structure.
But is this gambling?
Well, the technicality that the professional and fantasy leagues hide behind is that this is a skill. In other words, unlike a dice or card game where you just throw your money down and hope, you must use your “skill” to mold a team. If you win, it is by virtue of your knowledge of the game.
But there’s a pretty thin line between skill and gambling and everybody would be better served if the pretense were dropped.
You can argue all you want that you have to study the players to win in these leagues, but common sense tells you that this is some form of gambling. That is why the NCAA has cut ties. Of course, if you want to follow the lead of the NCAA you are headed down a path of hypocrisy that will land you nowhere.
Fantasy sports has become too big to shut down on the basis of gambling, and the best that could come of this is that the veil of morality is pulled away from professional sports in America, and everybody owns up to the fact that Americans – like people all over the world -- like to gamble on the outcome of games.
Ironically, one of the nation’s most popular former athletes is Charles Barkley, who is a self-described “degenerate gambler.” However, Barkley recently said that he did not approve of the fantasy leagues because they encourage people who can not afford to gamble to take the plunge.
His reasoning is that because he can afford to gamble he should be allowed to gamble as long as he only loses what he can afford.
Sounds good, but Leonard Tose, a man much wealthier than Barkley who once owned the Eagles, eventually lost the team due to gambling debts.
This is not a matter of rich and poor. This is a matter of common sense. We have become a country of lottery games and Bingo nights, and to shut down fantasy sports would be shutting the barn doors well after the horses were not only out of the barn, but also out of the county.
