Chris Boline
When will people be able to bet on sports in Florida without any issues? That’s the question that everyone is hoping will get answered sooner than later. However, with things still up in the air, a new court finding could further push back Florida sports betting and that’s the last thing that anyone wants to hear about right now. This has been an incredibly frustrating project for a while now.
According to a local report, a new case trying to call out the legality of the Seminole Tribe’s pact with Florida has been presented by a plaintiff. Seriously? Just when people thought that maybe Florida could keep working to try and get things off the ground, this news has arrived and it could prevent things from moving forward even more. Again, that’s not what anyone wanted to hear about.
Florida remains in its appeal process after a U.S. District Judge sided against the teams claiming that the current operations of the Seminole Tribe with Florida was illegal. The Hard Rock Cafe had even silently launched its online betting app, but that had to be shut down shortly after the U.S. judge had made their decision. Floridians got a small taste of what legal betting would be like.
In the end, it’s now a wait and see for what might happen with things down the road. There had been hope that a new sports betting initiative would be placed on the November 2022 ballot for citizens to vote on, but there’s not much optimism around that right now either. The hope is that Florida sports betting will be finalized by 2023, but people feel disheartened with all the latest updates.
If you are waiting for regulated sports betting in Florida….looks like it's going to be a while. Via @sports_handle. https://t.co/CcOhpeei8J
— Dan Back (@dan_back) April 12, 2022
Florida losing out on its plans is costing major revenue numbers
We don’t have to tell you that Florida losing out on its plans is costing major revenue numbers from coming in. Across the United States, different locations are recording huge financial gains thanks to betting going down consistently. This is always going to be the case for Las Vegas sports betting, as Sin City never disappoints when it comes to fans checking out different odds and placing wagers.
For people in Florida, they raced to make bets through the Hard Rock Cafe app when things were made available only for a short amount of time. This of course included NFL star Calvin Ridley, who has since been suspended for betting on NFL games. While Ridley is in hot water, that doesn’t mean that people weren’t loving checking out the Super Bowl odds and making bets.
With that said, things were only live for a little bit. Since then, people have had to wait and the state is losing its chance to make money. That money could go towards different resources in Florida to help the community. NFL action will also be popular, but MLB and NBA betting is massive as well. Think about how much revenue could be coming in right now at this particular time.
Starting with the NBA, the postseason is here and there’s plenty of intrigue leading up to things. Can the Miami Heat win it all? Speaking of Miami, the Marlins would have received plenty of attention for MLB betting as well. The same goes for the Tampa Bay Rays. Instead, neither of those teams can be bet on from people in Florida in state. They’ll have to make wagers in neighboring locations. That’s rough.
Calvin Ridley got caught because he placed a legal mobile bet in Florida with Hard Rock. They notified Genius Sports, who oversees betting integrity for the NFL. Ridley placed 3, 5 and 8 game parlay bets that did include the Falcons, per source.
— Jonathan Jones (@jjones9) March 7, 2022
Will sports betting arrive in 2023?
Waiting for things to keep an eye on, people want to know will sports betting arrive in 2023? For everyone in Florida, this really is a hot topic and that’s not going to change. At this point last year, it felt like everything was going to be finalized without a hitch when Governor Ron DeSantis and the Seminole Tribe reached their historic agreement. It was a 30-year pact, which would bring in billions.
“The breakdown of the 2010 compact has denied the state of Florida any revenue derived from the Seminole Tribe’s ongoing gaming operations — including what is the most profitable casino in the United States, located in Hillsborough County. This changes today,” DeSantis said in a statement. “With this new compact, the state will now see a large stream of reoccurring revenue to the tune of billions of dollars.”
As you can see from that DeSantis quote, he was through the roof with excitement when the agreement was announced. It was going to bring an enormous amount of revenue for the state and countless people shared his feeling of joy. However, there were also local casino owners who didn’t want to see this go down, which led to multiple different lawsuits being presented.
While Florida and the Seminole Tribe were able to dodge some of them, that wasn’t the case with one of the main ones. Now, it has no one knowing what exactly what will happen with Florida sports betting and more confusion has just arrived as well. There’s sure to be more updates on this latest case coming in the near future.
