Betting Updates: Horse Racing, North Carolina and Golf Betting

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00:00Welcome back to Newswire here on Sports Grid.

00:02It's rare to have Jim Gazzaleon for weeks and weeks

00:04without talking a little horse racing.

00:07I'm glad we brought that back here on the show today.

00:09I don't know if you guys covered anything Tuesday

00:11with me out here, but we do have a couple of stories

00:14surrounding Churchill Downs in Kentucky

00:17and also Saratoga horse racing as well.

00:19So you'll get your fix with that, those of you tuned in.

00:21But again, we have some other stories to touch on as well.

00:23Jim, welcome back to Newswire.

00:24Thanks for making some time for us today.

00:26How are you?

00:27Yeah, I'm doing good, Craig.

00:28Thanks for having me.

00:30And by the way, legalsportsreport.com

00:31is where you can read all of the stories

00:34that we're gonna discuss here on the show.

00:36Let's start off with North Carolina

00:38as we head toward the final quarter of the year.

00:40How has sports betting's outlook been for them in 2024

00:44and what can we expect in the future?

00:47Yeah, I think one of the more interesting things

00:50when North Carolina launched their sports betting market

00:55earlier this year, for me at least,

00:57was golf and NASCAR.

01:00And back in the springtime, Craig,

01:02we talked pretty heavily about both of those outfits.

01:05So I wanted to kind of check in

01:07and see how the golf betting was going in North Carolina.

01:11And for the Tar Heel State, it's been doing pretty well.

01:16I know the tournament there this weekend

01:19was delayed yesterday.

01:20And I know that that first round

01:21just got underway in North Carolina earlier this morning.

01:24But overall, North Carolina accounts

01:27for about 8% of all golf bets nationwide.

01:31So with a top 20 market overall,

01:35North Carolina in terms of sports betting handle widespread,

01:39that 8% of total golf bets coming from North Carolina

01:44puts it as a top five golf market nationwide.

01:48So certainly over-indexing in golf betting.

01:52Now, overall golf betting,

01:54the PGA Tour told me a couple of weeks ago,

01:56overall golf betting nationwide is up 20%,

01:59which is right in line

02:01with the overall sports betting landscape.

02:04We've seen about 20% year-on-year volume increase.

02:09And a lot of that has to do

02:10with a lot of these larger states,

02:12more popular states coming online in the last year or so.

02:17Massachusetts, Ohio, Kentucky comes to mind.

02:21So when I looked into the numbers,

02:23there are a handful of states

02:24that do break out individual sport-specific statistics,

02:30golf being one of them in a handful of states.

02:32And that looked to be more along the lines

02:35of about a 10% increase.

02:38But overall golf betting is up.

02:41Now, when you look at the entire landscape of sports betting,

02:46I think to kind of gauge success for individual sports,

02:50you wanna see how much of that overall piece

02:54of the pie is growing.

02:56Now, while total volume is up, like I said,

03:00that overall market share for golf isn't necessarily up.

03:05And in fact, in 2022,

03:08golf had 1.43% of overall sports betting in 2024.

03:15So far, it's been 1.35%.

03:18Now, it's worth mentioning that we don't have eyes

03:22in every single state

03:24in terms of specific golf betting figures.

03:27There's four or five, maybe six states that break it out.

03:32But in talking to the PGHOR,

03:34they are really banking on the live betting markets.

03:38We've seen the live betting menu for golf grow substantially

03:43over the last six, eight, 12 months.

03:45So they're really banking on that.

03:47And they did tell me they're not declaring

03:49any sort of victories just yet in North Carolina

03:53four or five months in,

03:54but they are rather pleased with the growth in golf betting,

03:58especially from the Tar Heel State, Craig.

04:00All right, good notes there on North Carolina.

04:02Again, you could read about this column

04:03over at legalsportsreport.com.

04:05All right, this one caught me a little bit by surprise.

04:07Kentucky Downs adding a new sports betting operator.

04:11And Jim, it's a sports betting operator

04:14very popular in Las Vegas.

04:16It's Circa Sportsbook.

04:18And the reason why I guess I find this

04:19a little fascinating, Jim,

04:20is because Superbook, which was exclusive out of Las Vegas,

04:24ended up pulling some of their books,

04:26their sponsorships and partnerships

04:29in different places in the country.

04:30Why has Circa decided to jump into Kentucky?

04:33Yeah, so Circa launched their online sports betting app

04:37in Kentucky about six or so,

04:40a little bit more than that, mid-May.

04:43They started taking bets in Kentucky online.

04:46So this has always really been part of the plan

04:50in opening up a retail bricks-and-mortar sportsbook

04:55in the state.

04:57As you know, Craig, the state allows the online operators

05:01to have agreements with racetracks.

05:04So Circa, they have their online licensing

05:09through Cumberland Run, which is a harness track.

05:12And now they're going to be opening a temporary sportsbook

05:17at Kentucky Downs next week.

05:19And I say it's temporary because I think they're trying

05:23to really capitalize on the start of football season

05:26and just get something up and running.

05:27All the regulatory hurdles have been cleared.

05:30So in speaking with some people there,

05:32they said the timing just worked out

05:34that football season's on the horizon

05:36and they wanna be able to offer this.

05:39What I found interesting is that this is going to be

05:42the closest retail sportsbook to Nashville,

05:46which is a very popular market for Kentucky Downs

05:52and the attached casino there.

05:56So what they're hoping is that they're able to draw

05:59that crowd from Nashville, Tennessee

06:02that is looking for a more traditional style

06:05of watching football and placing a bet on it

06:09and not being tied to their phone for the entire afternoon.

06:14So they do get a lot of business from that Nashville market

06:18and Nashville, Tennessee obviously has mobile sports betting

06:22but there's no casinos in Tennessee.

06:23So this is certainly a draw for them.

06:25And as the horse racing fan that I am,

06:30I wanted to see how this all matched up

06:32with their race dates at Kentucky Downs.

06:34They have a short sort of boutique meet there.

06:38It only lasts seven days, but for them,

06:40two of those days will coincide live racing

06:43with NFL football opening night that Thursday,

06:47September 5th, there's live racing

06:49during the day at Kentucky Downs.

06:50And then all day Sunday, that's September 8th,

06:53week one of NFL, you'll have live racing there

06:58along with that full slate of NFL games.

07:02So that's Circa Sportsbook opening

07:03at Kentucky Downs next week.

07:06And then the more permanent larger build out

07:09is expected sometime next summer.

07:11All right, now let's get a final story from you here, Jim,

07:14before we let you go for the weekend.

07:16Let's hit on Saratoga.

07:18You've got some numbers in from horse racing.

07:20So here we go, Jim, how are things going in upstate New York?

07:24Yeah, I couldn't let you get away

07:25with a couple of weeks in a row

07:26without talking about horse racing.

07:29So we're about halfway through the summer racing season

07:32up here at Saratoga, and it's been raining

07:37seemingly for the last week,

07:39as it has been up and down the entire East Coast really.

07:43And that's really affected the racing up here

07:46in terms of being able to run on the turf,

07:49which usually has larger fields, more handle.

07:53So halfway through the meet, handle last year

07:56compared to this year is relatively flat,

08:00slight increase, really only a couple of thousand dollars

08:04really, and a lot of that has to do with the rain.

08:09It's taken a bunch of races off the turf.

08:12Last weekend was a big weekend, Whitney Day at Saratoga,

08:16and they had two or three marquee turf races.

08:21Two of them got canceled, one got moved to the dirt,

08:23and when that happens, a lot of the horses scratch out

08:25because they don't want to run on the dirt.

08:27So that's affected handle.

08:29Attendance kind of walking around there on the weekends,

08:33like I do, it just seems a lot quieter than in years past,

08:37and speaking with some folks at NARA,

08:39it seems like the Belmont Stakes weekend

08:42up here in early June really kind of took a lot

08:46of the excitement out of the summer.

08:48Perhaps some people coming into town

08:50for their annual trip to Saratoga,

08:53they did that back in June for the Belmont

08:55rather than this summer.

08:57Jim, great stuff.

08:58As always, have a great weekend,

09:00and we'll catch up with you again next week on Newswire.

09:03Thanks, Greg.

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