NCAA president urges states to ban prop bets on college athletes
Gambling chatter increases the stress on athletes, Baker has said
In the midst of March Madness, the NCAA is pushing for states with legal wagering on sporting events to ban prop bets on college athletes.
“Sports betting issues are on the rise across the country with prop bets continuing to threaten the integrity of competition and leading to student-athletes getting harassed,” NCAA President Charlie Baker said Wednesday in statement posted on social media. “The NCAA has been working with states to deal with these threats and many are responding by banning college prop bets.”
Prop bets — short for proposition bets — allow gamblers to wager on statistics a player will accumulate during a game rather than the final score.
Baker’s statement came two days after the NBA confirmed it opened an investigation into unusual betting patterns surrounding props involving Toronto Raptors forward Jontay Porter. The Raptors said Porter would miss his third consecutive game Wednesday for personal reasons.
Earlier this month, U.S. Integrity, a company used by many professional sports leagues and college conferences to monitor betting activity, flagged a Temple regular-season men’s basketball game for wagering irregularities.
The NCAA men’s and women’s basketball tournaments are a huge draw for gamblers. The American Gaming Association estimates $2.7 billion will be bet this year on March Madness through legal sportsbooks.
Several states including Colorado, Arizona, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania and Oregon have rules prohibiting prop betting on college athletes that predate the NCAA’s recent push. Others such as Illinois, Connecticut and Iowa do not allow college athlete prop bets involving in-state teams.
Kansas, Michigan, Louisiana and Wyoming allow bettors to place prop bets on college athletes regardless of where they play.
The NCAA already has made some progress this year toward eliminating prop bets on college athletes.
Gambling regulators in Ohio, Vermont and Maryland have removed prop betting on college athletes online and in sportsbooks. Baker and his staff are reaching out to regulators in other states to encourage similar bans.
Baker has said the proliferation of legal sports gambling has increased stress on college athletes.
“All that chatter about who’s playing, who’s not playing. Who’s sore, who’s not sore. What’s going on with the team you’re playing? What do you think your chances are? Which is just classic chatter, where — in a world where people are betting — takes on a whole new consequence,” Baker said in January before his address to membership at the NCAA convention.
San Diego State men’s basketball coach Brian Dutcher said he is concerned about how all the negative feedback impacts athletes’ mental health.
“People complaining about how they’re playing, missing shots, and they just get beat up constantly,” said Dutcher, whose team is playing in Boston in the Sweet 16 this week.