What’s In And What’s Out

September 9, 2024 1:51 PM

Tennis is making bets on its future — one driven by data, sports betting, and foreign investment. But how big of a swing is it willing to take? [via]
posted by ellieBOA (14 comments total)

Money and betting will ruin tennis too. Lots of money here. Need I say more.
posted by DJZouke at 2:35 PM on September 9 [3 favorites]

I don’t have as much emotional investment in tennis selling itself to Saudi Arabia as I do golf, but my feelings about it are the same—it seems like it would be hard to grip your club or racquet properly with Jamal Khashoggi‘s blood on your hands.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 3:06 PM on September 9 [5 favorites]

Love the illustrations
posted by rossmeissl at 3:16 PM on September 9

I find it worrisome how much sport is caught up with gambling at every level, from the National Lottery supporting British athletes to Canadian sports broadcasts being wall to wall betting ads to the ATP selling out to micro-betting. I'm not as worried about the idea of the sports being corrupted as I am about the fact that gambling is a worryingly addictive way of extracting money from people in a manner that creates no actual value. Sure, some of it gets diverted to things that are valuable as in the National Lottery but on the whole, institutionalized gambling does what?
posted by jacquilynne at 6:14 PM on September 9 [2 favorites]

The only sports I regularly watch is soccer via illegal streams. Last summer I signed up for a local sports channel because my father-in-law was visiting and he loves watching sports, and I was surprised by the amount of betting content was being shown during games. Not just ads during commercial breaks but as part of the actual broadcast. I'd be more than OK with rolling the laws back 30-something years and making gambling illegal again here in Ontario.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 7:23 PM on September 9 [1 favorite]

Oooh, data, sports betting AND foreign investment? Sign me right the fuck up.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 4:30 AM on September 10 [1 favorite]

We aren’t huge sports fans, but we do like to watch a bit of baseball, and the gambling ads have become intolerable. It seems like every other commercial is for one betting app or another, or a casino. Add to that the in-studio breaks where a couple bros declare whatever bet/parlay they’d go with on the game you’re watching. It’s insane.
posted by Thorzdad at 4:53 AM on September 10 [1 favorite]

Money and betting will ruin tennis too

Tennis lost when the likes of gentlemen sportsmen like Arthur Ashe gave way to mouthy bratty adolescents like - well, you know who.
posted by BWA at 7:09 AM on September 10

Who? I don’t know who.
posted by cashman at 7:27 AM on September 10

I'm guessing that would be John McEnroe.

Or maybe Boris Becker.
posted by Windopaene at 7:58 AM on September 10 [1 favorite]

The future of racquet sports is pickle and padel. Easier to pick up and uses less space.

Gambling will be the death of most pro sports. When the first big rigging/corruption scandal breaks (my guess is with umpires) the bottom will fall out.
posted by leotrotsky at 10:45 AM on September 10

Tennis has had a match fixing and gambling problem for a long time.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=tennis+betting+scandal
posted by pthomas745 at 11:56 AM on September 10

I find it worrisome how much sport is caught up with gambling at every level

But surely sport has often mainly been about formalising something so people can place a bet on it.
posted by plonkee at 1:31 PM on September 10

Sports leagues cannot currently be directly involved in sports gambling for the obvious reasons of integrity — if the business incentives of an organization like the ATP are suddenly in line with that of a sportsbook, how are we to trust that matches wouldn’t be fixed to maximize profits? So, instead, the relationships are separated by contracts.

thank fucking gawd for integrity and contracts, nothing to see here folks
posted by ginger.beef at 2:03 PM on September 10 [1 favorite]