With all of the scandals and criminal activity resulting from athletes and coaches working with criminals to cheat, there has been discussion around the future of sports betting. But one thing will never be on the table: a return to the days when betting on sports was illegal.
The reason sports betting will never be illegal again is quite simple: it makes lots of people lots of money. The federal government, state governments, sports leagues, and even athletes are making a lot more money now that sports betting is an accepted and encouraged form of entertainment. With all of the money being made, there is no chance sports betting will go away.
That being said, I do believe and strongly hope so-called prop bets are someday illegal. They are way too easy to fix. Betting on most of them is a really stupid thing to do.
In their simplest form, prop bets allow people to bet on things within the game; for example, someone could bet on the outcome of a particular pitch. If the pitcher will throw a ball or a strike. They can even bet on the velocity of a particular pitch. Unless you are really dumb you can see how easy it is to fix this kind of bet. All you need to do is have the pitcher agree to throw a certain pitch at a certain time and you can win the bet. Even if you eliminate outright cheating (something that would be impossible to do) there is the reality that there is really no skill or strategy to these kinds of bets. This means making them is a recipe for losing most of the time.
While sports betting isn’t going anywhere, prop bets must be illegal to protect what is left of the integrity of the games and to protect people from themselves.