Cardinals owner to speak at Global Gaming Expo
Arizona Cardinals owner Michael Bidwill will be the final keynote speaker at next week’s Global Gaming Expo in Las Vegas, the sponsoring American Gaming Association announced today.
In an onstage chat format with AGA President and CEO Bill Miller, Bidwill is expected to discuss the convergence of legalized sports wagering with professional sports.
Bidwill’s appearance is scheduled for Oct. 6 at 1 p.m. on G2E’S main stage at The Venetian Expo.
The Cardinals are new to the sports-betting business with Arizona having opened legalized wagering
Sept. 9.
“Cardinals fans are very passionate, and the launch of legal sports betting in Arizona provides a new and innovative way to interact with them,” Bidwill said in a release.
The National Football League team has announced sports-betting partnerships with the tribal Gila River Hotels & Casino and BETMGM, the sportsbook operations subsidiary of Las Vegas-based MGM Resorts International.
Since 2019, when G2E was last held in Las Vegas — the AGA scrapped the in-person 2020 show because of the COVID-19 outbreak — the number of operational sports wagering markets has doubled, and 13 additional states have legalized it. Sports betting is now legal in 26 states and Washington D.C.
Recent AGA research found that due to expanded sports betting legalization and high fan enthusiasm for the season, a record 45.2 million Americans, 18 percent, will wager on this year’s NFL season, a 36 percent increase from the 2020 NFL season.
“I just thought he would be a really interesting figure to have to talk about how the NFL’S positions have evolved, how individual teams have approached this in different markets and to have a conversation about that,” Miller said in an interview.
“We (the gaming industry) should talk about what we need to do to keep sports betting on the right side of success and not fail,” he said.
Miller said many new business partners, arena, teams and tribes have signed on in Arizona, and he is enthused that the AGA’S responsible gaming program, “Have a Game Plan,” was incorporated into the Arizona legislation establishing sports wagering.