Billy Walters sentenced to 5 years in prison; Bets keeps pouring in on underdog McGregor

Twice weekly, we’ll comb through as many articles, tweets and podcasts as we can find related to the world of sports betting and daily fantasy sports, and publish the good stuff here. 

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Sports bettor Billy Walters was sentenced to five years in prison for his role in an insider-trading scheme.

U.S. District Judge Kevin Castel also ordered Walters to pay a $10 million fine to go along with his prison sentence.

Castel called Walters’ crime “amateurishly simple” and called him “a cheater and a criminal, and not a very clever one.”

“Making millions in the stock market with a deck stacked in your favor leads to time in a federal penitentiary,” Joon H. Kim, acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said in announcing Walters’ sentencing.

Walters, who is 71 years old, is scheduled to surrender to authorities on Oct. 10. He plans to appeal.


The New York Times published an article about the record-breaking early betting action on the Floyd Mayweather-Conor McGregor fight.

“The public is certainly siding with McGregor because they like the value, but we have wiseguys on both sides of this fight,” he said. “There are highly respected players that believe McGregor has a good chance to upset Mayweather. Whether that trend continues over the next month remains to be seen.”

Many bookmakers expect the odds to swing back as the Aug. 26 fight approaches and smart gamblers see an opportunity to bet on Mayweather at a good price. Mason said he thought the true odds on the fight should be more like 20-1. “I think we’re going to see the sharper bettors come in later,” he said.

The one-way nature of the money so far has some books a little worried.

“We’re going to be huge Floyd Mayweather fans,” Mason said. He said it was likely to be the most important moment financially for his site at least since the Super Bowl. (The bookies lost that one. Players bet the Patriots, and they won.)

All the bookmakers say the action is hot and heavy on this fight.

“It’s as big as the big fights get,” Bridge said. “Despite this arguably not being a ‘normal’ boxing match, punters do not care in the slightest and they cannot wait for the fight to get underway.”

Osbourne said, “This will be by far the biggest fight ever bet.” He said it could double the money wagered on the Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao fight of 2015 and perhaps equal the betting on the Super Bowl. “Compared to other big fights, there is no comparison. Mayweather vs. McGregor is the biggest for how much money has been bet this far in advance.”

McGregor’s odds continued to shrink all the way down to +425 where there was finally some resistance.

Minutes after that happened, bettors pounced on the low odds on Mayweather, pushing it up to -600 and McGregor to +450.

Those two bets were the largest the Westgate has taken on McGregor so far; the sportsbook took a “low six-figure” wager on Mayweather at -650 the week of July 3.


Legal Sports Report lists four options the NCAA may consider if sports betting gets legalized on a national scale.

Here’s what we know about the NCAA’s stance on gambling: It doesn’t like it. That goes doubly so for sports betting, which it views as a direct threat to the integrity of its games.

The NCAA uses federal law — the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act — to keep sports betting from expanding outside of Nevada. But if New Jersey beats the NCAA in court in striking down PASPA as unconstitutional, then the NCAA is in a stickier position. (PASPA gives the NCAA and the pro leagues the power to attempt to stop sports betting schemes via the courts. Without PASPA, that power would be gone.)

The pro sports leagues have at least been softening their stance on sports betting, with the NBAeven advocating for a federal framework to regulate it in the US. The NCAA, though, doesn’t have an obvious exit strategy if New Jersey wins and other states start to legalize sports gambling.

The NCAA needs to get ready for that world, as SI’s Andy Staples already pondered. But they have options, some more tenable than others.


Nevada sportsbooks set a record for betting handle on MLB in June this year.

The books set records for both win ($14.9 million) and handle ($207.1 million) on MLB.

The handle is the most for baseball in any month, and just the second time more than $200 million in wagers flowed through the books.

It was just the fourth time that books have generated more than $10 million from MLB betting.

 

An added interest in NBA Summer League in Las Vegas also translated to the sportsbooks.

Sportsbooks contacted by Legal Sports Report did not include dollar amounts on wagering, but did provide insight into year-over-year changes.

According toWilliam Hill US, handle — including straight bets, futures and in-play betting — was up nearly 100 percent over 2016. Similarly, tickets/unique bets were up about the same. William Hill noted that 16 percent of wagers were on the Lakers.

Westgate told LSR it didn’t see as much of an increase of wagering on full games, but said overall handle was up about 40 percent, with the addition of booking bets on the first and second halves, something it didn’t do previously.