Weidner's Words: Stopping a bad beat

March Madness has drawn to a close and left in its wake countless busted brackets. Across the country this week, bracket pool winners will collect their money from reluctant coworkers and get ready for when the biggest gambling month of the year comes around again. It is estimated that wagers this year totaled almost $10 billion on the entire tournament. Frequent sports bettors just intensify in March, and those who usually never bet might at least enter one friendly wager.

Sports betting (besides online betting that uses offshore accounts) became illegal in nearly all states when Congress passed the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act of 1992, which banned state-sanctioned sports gambling. But that might change when the Supreme Court rules on overturning the ban in a case that should be decided in the next few months.The current ban affects every state except for Delaware, Montana, Nevada and Oregon.

If the Supreme Court rules in favor of New Jersey and legalizes all sports gambling across the United States, there is potential for a massively profitable industry. It is estimated that Americans annually bet at least $150 billion on sports through bookies, online sites and March Madness pools.The estimated $250 million that is bet legally each year seems insignificant in comparison. Legalizing sports betting could help facilitate a massively profitable industry around an activity that many Americans already participate in.

However, whichever way the Supreme Court rules, it is important that legislation regulating sports gambling places strict limits on the role of professional sports leagues. While many leagues have been opposed to legal sports gambling in the past, some have begun to change their tune. The NBA recently offered to place its support behind the movement, making it clear that it would support any effort to legalize sports gambling if it were granted one percent of revenue from any bets placed on its games.

Allowing professional sports leagues in the United States to impose these conditions would be a large mistake. There is something that seems fundamentally wrong about the NBA, which facilitates all of its games, also having a stake in all betting that happens with regard to its games.

Not only can you argue that this creates a large conflict of interest, it’s inevitable that this would lead to the NBA advertising for and encouraging fans to place more and greater bets on all different aspects of its games. If fans choose to bet, that is fine, but they should not be encouraged to bet on entertainment by the same organization that both creates the entertainment and profits off bets placed on it. The NBA should focus on bettering the quality of the league and games, not on expanding a betting industry for self-benefit.