LAS VEGAS — “The Mick” outed a Vegas sportsbook that posts 30-cent baseball lines and asked rhetorically, How can a bookie operate here?
“Because I still give out -110 on both sides,” he said of common 10-cent odds, in which $110 wins $100. “I still know, in the long term, I’m going to make money.”
A bookie in Vegas? Coals to Newcastle, yes? No. Not when 30-cent lines, or worse, lie in wait downtown or on the Strip.
It’s a damning indictment of certain licensed operators when a bookie peddles a better price or friendlier odds, sometimes both.
Enter, the Mick. He’s 44, has been in the business nearly 20 years and often clears six figures annually. A Yankees fan from the East Coast, he always has idolized Mickey Mantle.
Thus, the pseudonym.
He has 90 clients, with a top tier that risks a nickel ($500) on a game, maybe a dime ($1,000) or two.
Making a bank deposit isn’t exactly an option.
“I won’t buy a Maserati with cash, either,” he said.
So the Mick gambles, on horses, poker and baccarat, with abandon. The thrill is baccarat; two player cards, two banker cards, closest to nine wins. Over in three seconds. Next coup.
In one casino sitting, he dropped six figures. In another, he won six figures.
“Just spinnin’ those cards, that rush … that feeling. You start to get numb. Baccarat is where I get [most excited]. I blow so much back on my own, like every degenerate.”
EVERYWHERE
The Mick is everywhere, no matter that the American Gaming Association (AGA) tries to spin him as the devil. Regardless, too, that sports betting is legal in two-thirds of the nation.
As corporate pressure keeps pumping theoretical holds in legalized markets, producing suboptimal prices and odds, Todd Fuhrman, a Chicago native, “BetTheBoard” podcast co-founder and CBSSportsHQ analyst, knows the routine.
“Offshore books and corner bookmakers will continue to rejoice,” he tweeted, “knowing their business only grows as a result.”
Said fellow Chicagoan Sam Panayotovich: “Bookies will never die.”
A sports-betting analyst for the New England Sports Network (NESN) and FOX Sports, Panayotovich has no bookie. However, he could find one, in Boston or Chicago.
He added, “Too easy.”
Farther down the Eastern seaboard, a bookie — we’ll call him Joe — details making $2,500 a week during baseball season, $7,500 weekly for football.
Working independently, he said, could net as much as $20,000 a week, “but that comes with headaches … remaining under the radar is key.”
His group serves 2,000 customers in seven states, via a series of “agents” and “sub-agents” who, respectively, receive 3%-10% of clients’ losses.
New customers have $100 ceilings, regulars $5,000.
“No IDs, no driver’s license,” Joe said, “you’ve got to be referred by someone.”
Pete, with extensive Chicagoland knowledge, claimed bookies linked to organized crime have dissipated to fewer than 50 in the area since the U.S. Supreme Court let states pursue sports betting in May 2018.
They use Central and South American websites.
Independent Chicago operators, however, have ballooned to 500, give or take 100. As losses mount at legalized shops, bettors turn to illicit bookies.
“Sportsbooks have crushed them,” Pete said, “so the only thing left is the guy who offers credit, and those bookies will grow substantially.”
UNFAIR MARKETS
In Omaha, Matt Perrault worked in sports-talk radio from 2004 to ’09. Today, the New England native is half of the popular “Bostonian vs. the Bookie” podcast, with former Vegas oddsman Dave Sharapan.
Bookies welcomed, Perrault reported, recent retail-only Nebraska legalization that outlaws in-state college betting.
“The idea that you can’t bet Creighton basketball or Nebraska football home games will leave thousands of dollars on the table for local bookies, who offer those bets, and credit.”
In California, two sports-betting measures failed last fall, outcomes cheered by pals in the San Francisco Bay Area, San Fernando Valley, Orange County and San Diego, all of whom employ bookies.
None want the government, tribal casinos or Euro-model operators to benefit from their betting. All are content with current efficient and trustworthy systems.
“People shop for prescription drugs offshore because the prices domestically are just astronomical,” Gadoon “Spanky” Kyrollos said in New Jersey. “Everyone should have the right to seek the best price on anything.”
Texas handicapper Paul Stone doesn’t require a bookie but appreciates them.
“In this particular industry, the regulated operator should inspire more confidence from the player, not only with a safer product but a better product, and they don’t really do that.
“I was browsing golf numbers this morning and saw 40-cent lines; one golfer at -140, the underdog even. A 40-cent line! The street-corner bookie will continue to exist because, in many cases, they offer the more favorable product.”
NO SUNSET RIDE
A sportsbook limiting a successful bettor to a cartoonish $3.24 or barring him altogether, of which several outlets are guilty, epitomizes that vulturine Euro model.
“[Punters] have no chance,” the late British gambling legend Barney Curley said in “The Sure Thing,” by Nick Townsend. “Bookmakers will not allow them to win … a result of accountants running the show.”
The AGA would best serve the public by educating ignorant politicos who gape at dollar signs when deigning betting licenses to entities that ultimately undermine those constituencies.
Someone intimate with the farce said, “Greed rules. Like Gordon Gecko said, ‘Greed is good.’ They all have it.”
(When the mob controlled Vegas, multiple experts say, a sawdust-floored standalone book could lay off lopsided wagers with bookies. Column fodder for another day.)
While the Mick’s deals appeal, some people get into trouble:
“One said, ‘I’m goin’ on religious hiatus.’ Yeah, good luck. Just make sure you clear your balance with me before you go with Buddha.”
A client stiffed him for $25,000; the Mick believes he’s in Phoenix. Another who owes him $31,000 ghosted him for six weeks; he rang last week, claiming to have been in Canada and vowing to return soon to clear his account.
The Mick retains two toughs, former football players.
“But they’ve never done anything physical. Just by showing their presence, the client understands. ‘All right, give me a week.’ Even just for a thousand bucks, it’s the principle.”
Once, he lost 50 grand to a customer by providing 4-to-1 odds on a boxing match; the underdog won. Another time, he won 50 grand. Briefcase handoffs settled both matters.
He transacts business with clients in Texas and New York via cash in envelopes, slipped inside magazines, sent via the mail. He has sought counsel with major bookies.
A potential run-in with authorities doesn’t faze the Mick:
“I don’t think they’d bat an eye. It isn’t like I’ve got clients betting six figures, or I’m a big-time guy in L.A. or New York. I don’t want to get to that point. I’m happy being a small-time guy.
“If I were a little bit smarter, though, I probably could have retired and ridden off into the sunset.”
