- 7/2/2025
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SportsTranscript
00:00But first, let's get to the very latest in the sports betting space and start off with the NBA player.
00:05It appears to be in a whole heap of trouble, and it just keeps getting worse.
00:08That is Malik Beasley, who's under an NBA investigation with federal authorities in a gambling probe,
00:15also had some financial issues, according to this report,
00:19and failed to pay back a $650,000 advance to his marketing agency.
00:26This is a suit that was filed in April by a New York-based company called Hazen Sports Management Group.
00:32They're seeking $2.25 million in damages and legal fees for Beasley for breach of contract.
00:39Right now, he's still being investigated under the sports wagering issues.
00:43We'll see what this really means in the end.
00:45But right now, Beasley, a free agent, don't expect him to be cashing any checks anytime soon.
00:50Meanwhile, the state of Maryland is considering a change to the promotional credit deduction rules for gaming.
00:55The Maryland State Lottery and Gaming Control Agency proposing an adjustment of the state's promotional credit deduction standards
01:01for licensed online sports betting operators.
01:04Maryland's gaming regulators aiming to reduce the amount of revenue that operators can allocate
01:09toward offering free promotional wagers to eligible players.
01:14We've heard this in the sports betting space before.
01:16Reducing promos, which do entice people to bet on sports.
01:21The agency proposes lowering the amount that operators can offer to 5%.
01:25Also, some breaking news in the sports betting space as well.
01:29A potential new way that you'd be filing taxes if you bet on sports coming next year.
01:35In fact, right now, you can file taxes and say that you lost on sports wagering.
01:39In fact, up to 100% of your gambling losses.
01:42But on this new bill, which is called the Big Beautiful Bill, it's introducing a significant change.
01:49And this is how gambling winnings and losses are taxed.
01:52It would limit the deduction of gambling losses, folks, to 90%.
01:56And the same with your winnings.
01:58So that means essentially that 10% of your gambling losses are not going to be issued.
02:06So 90% of your taxes can be filed if you lose money.
02:10But 10% of them, you're going to have to eat it.
02:12That's the bottom line.
02:13Same goes for winning.
02:14So that's good news for those of you who are winning so much money on sports wagering.
02:18If you are out there, essentially, you're not going to be able to use 10% of your gambling losses
02:23toward your taxes next year.
02:25That's the bottom line.
02:26Now, by the way, this has not gone through yet.
02:28So don't start freaking out.
02:30Because I know a lot of you come next year, January, February, March, you're filing your taxes.
02:33You're like, I lost X amount of money.
02:3510% of it may not be eligible if this goes through.
02:38And again, this will not affect the casual sports better,
02:41which is probably most of you who are watching the show out there.
02:44All right.
02:44Casually speaking, let's go through the National Basketball Association trades and free agency news.
02:49The Detroit Pistons and Duncan Robinson have agreed to a new three-year contract.
02:53It's a $48 million deal.
02:54Miami sent him to Detroit in a sign and trade.
02:58Really good three-point shooter over the last few years.
03:00First, Jakob Pertl has agreed to a four-year, $104 million contract extension with the Toronto Raptors.
03:07He had a career high in points last season, 14.5, 9.6 rebounds, 63% from the field.
03:13Had a really fantastic year.
03:15Also, the Denver Nuggets have signed Tim Hardaway Jr.
03:17He's traveled around the league quite a bit.
03:18He's on a one-year deal.
03:19He started 77 games for the Pistons last season.
03:22Now, no update on LeBron James, but we do have an update in Los Angeles on the Dodgers.
03:28Shohei Otani hit 30 home runs last night.
03:31It was his 30th of the fifth straight season as the Dodgers beat the White Sox by a final of 6-1.
03:36Another side story from the game has been this nice comeback from Yoshinobu Yamamoto,
03:41who seems to be pitching a lot better lately.
03:43Here's Dave Roberts on his effort last night.
03:46I think he just kind of, you know, recalibrated the strike throwing.
03:52The split was really good today.
03:54The fastball, obviously, the command was really good.
03:56He got some early outs, a lot of strikeouts, and was really good tonight.
04:01You talked about just a lot of familiarity between these two teams.
04:04How did you, I guess, kind of like how your offense got to Smith early in this game
04:09and how you were putting that fast together?
04:11Well, I think, you know, it started with the Will at bat,
04:17and obviously the first inning he gets two outs on two pitches,
04:22and then Will earns a walk, Munz gets a walk, and then we get a couple hits right there
04:28and got the pitch count up, which was huge to set the tone for the game
04:33and to get him out after five innings.
04:36And that kid's got good stuff.
04:38So to get him out after five, get in their bullpen a little bit, yeah, you know,
04:45I just think it was good that coming off an off day fed off the momentum from Yoshinobu
04:50and got hits when we needed to, and Tommy had a big hit right there in that first inning.
04:58And obviously Shohei did what Shohei does, and, you know, we'll be ready for tomorrow as well.
05:03One of the big surprises this season in baseball is the Chicago Cubs starting pitching staff.
05:11And one of the bigger surprises is Matthew Boyd, who's been fantastic for them.
05:15Seven strong innings yesterday.
05:17The Cubs beat the Guardians by a final of five to two.
05:20Carson Kelly doubled twice.
05:21Michael Bush went three for three.
05:23Here's Craig Council on the effort after the game.
05:26Yeah, I mean, I thought it was excellent again.
05:30It was efficient.
05:31And it's just more of what we've seen from Matt really the whole season.
05:38You know, I thought he did a great job with Ramirez.
05:40That's obviously the, you know, the one you circle in the lineup.
05:43He did a heck of a job with him.
05:45Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, when there's stuff going on in kind of your area of the team,
05:52the starting rotation, which is where Matt's at,
05:55I think, you know, his steadiness and his just delivering innings every time out, quality innings every time out.
06:05It's stabilizing.
06:07It helps the bullpen.
06:09It helps you win, obviously.
06:11It puts your bullpen in good shape.
06:12And when there's, you know, when we've had guys down, you know, Matt's been super consistent in doing that every single time out.
06:20Seven RBIs last night from a player in Major League Baseball.
06:24This guy is on the Toronto Blue Jays.
06:27George Springer did it against the New York Yankees.
06:3012-5 the final.
06:31And don't look now, but not only the Tampa Bay Rays right behind the Yankees,
06:36but the Blue Jays are now within one game of that American League East.
06:40Toronto scored five runs in the seventh and three runs in the eighth.
06:45Here's Aaron Boone on his team having some misfortune with the bats.
06:50Yeah, got to cash in.
06:52I mean, although I will say the last two nights, I mean, we've stung a number of balls with runners in scoring position.
06:57So, you know, got to create those opportunities.
07:02And, you know, we got to make hay when we have those chances, though.
07:06Aaron, what is your level of concern with the defense recently here?
07:09With the what?
07:10Defense recently.
07:10Yeah.
07:12You know, we obviously got to play a little bit better.
07:14And we have the people capable of doing that.
07:18And we'll continue to work hard at it.
07:20But, yeah, we got to play better overall.
07:22We understand that.
07:23We know that.
07:25And, yeah, hopefully get it going tomorrow.
07:28How about the bullpen as well?
07:29Understanding there were some defensive miscues, but an ERA well over 10 over the last four games.
07:34Yeah, I mean, obviously a tough stretch here.
07:36Some of those guys have been leaned on heavily.
07:38You know, it's on me to I got to do a better job of getting those guys in positions where they can be successful and, you know, and and and making the right decisions for them to make sure they're in the best spot possible.
07:51But obviously been a little bit of a tough stretch for us.
07:54And a good stretch for the Blue Jays, not so much for Tampa Bay, who's fallen behind them.
08:00Believe it or not, it's the A's handing the Rays their third straight loss, four to three, the final there.
08:04Also, the Arizona Diamondbacks on top of the Giants yesterday.
08:09They had four home runs.
08:10They win this game eight to two.
08:11Jacob deGrom continues to pitch well for the Texas Rangers as they beat the Orioles 10 to two.
08:18And don't look now, but the Miami Marlins have won eight straight games, a shutout victory.
08:24Oh, so the twins, one shy of the club record could happen tonight.
08:29Welcome back to Newswire here on Sports Grid.
08:31It looks like we've got our biggest sports betting scandal of the year.
08:35I mean, I don't know if that's a great thing, but it certainly gives Sam McQuillan a lot of material to write about over at LegalSportsReport.com.
08:42So let's bring Sam in.
08:44And I think the biggest, you know, we've had two big sports wagering scandals, maybe three.
08:50The college baseball one feels like number three.
08:53Jonte Porter with his props feels like number two.
08:57And then, I mean, Shohei Otani's interpreter has got to be number one.
09:00I don't think anything's going to touch that with the amount of money that was there.
09:03So I'm not sure where this Malik Beasley is going to lie here until we get the full story here.
09:08But I also think that if what they're purporting happened here, Sam, that this is going to rise maybe to just below that Otani one, maybe number two, if it ends up because this is a significant player in the NBA.
09:21Yeah, absolutely.
09:23This is a guy, you know, unlike Jonte Porter, who many people hadn't even heard of before his scandal popped.
09:31And obviously, it was found out that he was manipulating prop bets on games and was ended up being banned for life from the NBA.
09:39Faces a lot of federal charges as well.
09:41Malik Beasley, a bigger name.
09:42He started on the Pistons, or I'm sorry, came off the bench for the Pistons this past year, but he was second in the league in three-pointers made.
09:50He was actually in line for a $45 million contract.
09:54It was reported.
09:54And then all of a sudden, the first day of free agency, it comes out that he's embroiled in this possible scandal.
10:00Now, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York is currently investigating it.
10:05I want to be clear, they haven't made any formal charges yet.
10:08So, we did have a case recently where another NBA guard, Terry Rozier, was involved in an investigation, was actually just cleared of it.
10:16So, it could very much still be possible that Beasley is found to have done no wrongdoing.
10:21But the games that they're looking at here are when he was a member of the Milwaukee Bucks.
10:26There's a specific game in general on January 31st when he played against the Portland Trailblazers.
10:32There was all of a sudden a huge amount of money taken on the under for his rebound prop.
10:37I think it was about two and a half boards.
10:39He actually finished the game with six.
10:42But the odds had swung crazy from about plus 120, which is pretty normal for a prop bet, to minus 250.
10:48So, anytime that happens on someone who is not, you know, there's not a lot of news surrounding if he's going to play or not.
10:55That wasn't the case with this.
10:56And there wasn't, you know, it's not a LeBron James.
10:58It's not a Steph Curry.
10:59Like, Beasley's a pretty big name.
11:00But he's not someone where tons of money is going to come in on him.
11:04So, it's interesting that he actually finished with six boards that game, effectively killing this large bet that had been placed on the under.
11:12So, we don't know exactly what has happened here.
11:14We also don't know if that's the only game.
11:17You know, this news came out right before the first day of free agency.
11:21So, that leads us to believe, how long has this been under investigation?
11:24You know, it was about two years ago where this was the case, was the incident.
11:28And then, again, the team, the Detroit Pistons, presumably, had no idea this was going on because, by all reports, they were going to give him a big payday.
11:36They actually pivoted and traded for Duncan Robinson about a day after this news came out and gave him the same contract.
11:42So, you had to think that Malik Beasley was part of their plans and they just found this out.
11:46To me, that makes me think, what else is going on here?
11:49Does this maybe go deeper than we previously thought?
11:51You know, we've only heard about Jonte Porter, we've only heard about Terry Rozier, but how many other players are under, you know, possible investigation by the feds that the teams just, quite frankly, don't know about?
12:02You know, the NBA works with federal prosecutors, but it's not going, federal prosecutors aren't going to notify teams unless there's a reason for them to do so.
12:11So, you know, there's no clear ties to the Porter case yet.
12:14It is being investigated by the same office, which is an interesting kind of nugget here.
12:18But we'll have to see what happens with Beasley.
12:20I imagine now that the news is out there, the NBA will want kind of a swift resolution, want to get ahead of it, especially during the offseason when this is kind of the big talk right now.
12:30Yeah, tough to get a contract for Beasley while you're being investigated, to say the least.
12:34Okay, so let's get to California here.
12:36No sports betting update in the state of California, just to be clear.
12:40Daily Fantasy is now under a little scrutiny here.
12:42Sam, what's the latest?
12:44Yeah, we're expecting an opinion tomorrow from Attorney General Rob Bonta of California.
12:49And it's expected to clarify the law saying that daily fantasy sports contests are illegal in California.
12:56And that would be just have a huge impact on, you know, not just the fantasy sports industry, but sports betting as well.
13:03Fantasy sports has kind of been a murky area in a lot of states for a long time.
13:07We've seen some states like Texas issue opinions, which haven't been enforced.
13:11But by all accounts, it's believed that this opinion will be enforced.
13:15And underdog fantasy in response is filing a lawsuit, actually just filed a lawsuit yesterday in Sacramento Superior Court, asking for a temporary restraining order that would prevent the attorney general from issuing this opinion.
13:27It's a very unprecedented move.
13:29You know, we've seen underdog and other sorts of pick-up companies or fantasy sports companies out there respond in states where they've been asked to leave by simply leaving or changing the way that their games work, going from a player versus the house model to a player versus player model.
13:45We've seen, you know, in New York, they paid $17.5 million in fines and agreed to leave the state.
13:51Florida, they agreed to leave the state.
13:52But California, they're now, you know, they have legal action on the table.
13:55So what they're saying here is that this goes beyond kind of the attorney general's duties, and it would be making a policy decision where one is not warranted.
14:05It's also saying that, you know, more than 10% of our business is in the state of California, which is no surprise because, again, California doesn't have sports betting.
14:12So it's a huge market for these fantasy sports companies, really crucial to their business.
14:16Now, we'll have to see what happens when the opinion comes out tomorrow.
14:20But I wouldn't be surprised if other companies like Cryspix get involved as well.
14:24They've been very vocal through their lobbying group, saying that this should be left up to the citizens in the state.
14:30We should give them a vote whether or not they want fantasy sports to be legal.
14:33Now, the background behind all of this is, of course, that sports betting is still illegal.
14:37The tribes pretty much hold the key to allowing that to happen.
14:41They have tremendous influence in the legislature.
14:43They actually just sent a letter to the legislature, which it's believed by many killed a bill that would have legalized fantasy sports.
14:49And reportedly, they're close to a deal with the FanDuel's and the DraftKings of the world to create framework to allow legal sports betting in California.
14:58Those sports betting companies are very much against the fantasy sports companies.
15:01They see them as offering a product that they're not allowed to do.
15:03So it's kind of the enemy of my enemy is my friend sort of thing here.
15:06Right.
15:07But and we're seeing the, you know, the fantasy sports companies respond this way.
15:11So, you know, as we talk about a lot of stuff on this show, I imagine all gets worked out in the courts eventually, but very messy.
15:17We'll have to see what happens tomorrow when the opinion comes out.
15:19Just want to add a disclaimer that if you play fantasy football or any of those kind of leagues with your buddies, those wouldn't be threatened under this kind of law.
15:26It's only for companies that have payment processors effectively acting like, you know, a sports book operator or a fantasy sports operator.
15:34And doesn't matter if they'd be threatened.
15:36People are still going to play fantasy football in California, Sam.
15:39Regardless of that, I have a feeling.
15:41Okay.
15:42Thanks for breaking that.
15:44So, okay.
15:46Let's get to Illinois.
15:48Okay.
15:48So FanDuel DraftKings taking their quarter 50 cents based on Illinois taking more money in taxes.
15:54We thought maybe this would get resolved before July 1 and cooler heads would prevail, but they are pushing forward.
16:00I know another company, I believe Fanatics is involved now taking their little cut too.
16:05And so those fees officially go into effect yesterday.
16:08Correct?
16:10Correct.
16:10Yeah.
16:11Yesterday marked the end of Illinois' legislative session, which is the session that they added this new per-bet fee on sportsbooks.
16:21So 25 cents on the first $20 million worth of wagers that you take as a sportsbook.
16:27And then 50 cents on every bet after that.
16:30There was only two sportsbooks that met that threshold last year, DraftKings and FanDuel.
16:35They came out with this news that they're going to pass this 50-cent fee directly onto the customers, saying that they weren't going to take any of the tax and they wanted it to be absorbed.
16:45They did that as a kind of threatening mechanism.
16:48They said as well, you know, if Illinois gets rid of this sudden change before the legislature is over, we'll get rid of it.
16:54Obviously, the legislative session is over now.
16:57They didn't get rid of it.
16:58The new per-bet fee will go into effect in September.
17:02And already we've seen other sportsbooks, like you mentioned, Fanatics say, oh, we're going to do the same thing.
17:06You know, Fanatics wouldn't be subject to this new fee.
17:09But it's not surprising that, you know, they're kind of thinking, you know, if maybe other people can get away with it, so can we under just kind of the guise that, you know, it does apply to every sportsbook.
17:18But I don't think Fanatics will reach that $20 million threshold.
17:21So for me, this will be a really interesting case study to see if sportsbooks can simply just charge more and get away with it and people will be fine.
17:28I have to think they are.
17:29Most people don't price shop.
17:30So it'll be really interesting to see what happens in Illinois when this goes into effect.
17:34You know, if people do, in fact, go to the offshore illegal market, like has been threatened, or if they're simply fine with just staying with their favorite apps and paying more.
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