Chris Boline
The excitement for the 2022 Super Bowl continues to rise for folks all over the country. And while Texas sports betting isn’t legal, people are still finding ways to take advantage of laws elsewhere and we’ve seen that in a big way from a popular person in the Lone Star State. That’s right, a Texas businessman has bet nearly $5 million on the Super Bowl. Who did this? Mattress Mack, of course, was the one to do so.
If you don’t know who Mattress Mack is, he’s Jim McIngvale, the owner of ‘Gallery Furniture’ in Texas. It’s known as a booming company and McIngvale and his family are worth millions of dollars. Because of this, McIngvale revealed that he put down $4.5 million worth of bets for this year’s Super Bowl. With the Los Angeles Rams as the big favorites, he surely bet on them, right? That’s what so many others are doing.
In a stunning turn of events, Mack also admitted that he’s going with the Cincinnati Bengals to record an upset in this one. There’s plenty of hype surrounding Joe Burrow, Ja’Marr Chase, and Co., as plenty of folks think they’ll be able to overcome the odds and take down the Rams. This won’t be easy, as LA indeed holds better NFL Super Bowl odds. People think Matthew Stafford and Co. will get the win.
Despite that, McIngvale had laid millions of dollars on the AFC North team to come out on top. As you might have been able to guess, McIngvale is making headlines across the country for putting so much money on the Super Bowl. He’s known for making some big bets, including on the Houston Astros to win the World Series last year, but this is impressive. So, how did he do it?
Some people drive from Houston to Lake Charles to play a little blackjack. Our guy Mattress Mack crosses the state line, so he can bet $4.5 million on the Bengals to win the #SuperBowl. https://t.co/BePLFFjSdm via @chron
— Matt Young (@Chron_MattYoung) February 4, 2022
McIngvale was forced to leave Texas to make his bets because of state laws
As countless folks know out there, sports betting is not legal in Texas. With this, McIngvale was forced to leave Texas to make his bets because of state laws not changing yet. While there was hope that legal betting would be on the table by now, Texas hasn’t gone through with things. As things stand, it’s looking like 2023 will be the earliest where things will be able to get changed.
That means that McIngvale and the others who love sports betting will need to leave Texas to get things done. In this instance for McIngvale with his Super Bowl bets, he shared the update that he ended up driving to Louisiana to lay down his Super Bowl bets. Can you imagine doing this? Mack lives in Houston. So instead of being able to make bets in a major Texas city, he had to leave town.
Not only that, McIngvale had to leave state lines. That’s just head-turning and it continues to have folks furious that everyone needs to do this if they want to make wagers. Louisiana isn’t the only state where people from Texas travel too, as they’ve consistently been going to Nevada to take advantage of Las Vegas sports betting, while more and more people are going to Arkansas too.
For McIngvale, however, nothing was going to stop him from going with his gut and betting on Cincinnati. While the Rams are the favorites, and big bets continue to be laid on them as well, there’s a load of people who are huge believers in Burrow. He’s one of the best QBs in the league and only in his second year. McIngvale is hopeful he can deliver for him with millions on the line. We’ll see how this one turns out.
Return of the Mack!
Mattress Mack just placed the largest mobile wager in sports betting history 😳
Bengals ML (+170) to win $7.7M at @CaesarsSports pic.twitter.com/KuGqhrmXx9
— br_betting (@br_betting) February 4, 2022
When will sports betting become legal in Texas?
Time and time again, people ask themselves when will sports betting become legal in Texas? We wish we had a clear-cut answer for you, as things are always seemingly up in the air. As mentioned above, people are hopeful that things will be able to get passed in time for 2023 to be a reasonable timeframe, but people might have to wait until either 2024 or 2025 for sports betting to get passed and legalized.
There was a major frustration for 2021, as the deadline was missed by the legislators in Texas to try and get betting on the ballot. Countless folks were ready to try and get their votes in for things to get passed. Now, though, since the deadline was missed, the current window for pushing things through is also closed. That means the earliest we can see a historic change for the state would be early 2023.
With that said, it doesn’t look like people in Texas are in a monster rush to push the envelope here. This is surely disappointing, as guys like Jerry Jones, Mark Cuban, and other influential folks in Texas are waiting for sports betting to get done. It’s a billion-dollar project and it would bring revenue for Texas as a whole. It would also be great for local businesses. Sports betting fans will have to keep waiting for new updates.
