If you’re in Louisiana and hoping to place a bet on how many touchdowns LSU’s running back will score in the first week of the 2024 football season, you’re out of luck.
Let’s go a little further on the reasons behind this and how it will impact the online sportsbooks industry.
Game Changer
The Louisiana Gaming Control Board put a stop to all proposition bets on college athletes. This means they’ve essentially put a hold on all individual player prop bets across Louisiana. These are bets that rely solely on the performances and statistics of college athletes within games. This suspension applies to all college sports events and will start from August 1, 2024.
The Board issued this statement:
Any wager based on the following is NOT approved and is NOT permitted:
- Any proposition or “prop” bet on an individual athlete’s performance or statistics participating in a college sporting event. Only proposition bets based on full team statistical results are permitted.
This bulletin’s directive is effective at 8:00 AM, August 1, 2024. All reasonable efforts shall be made to comply. Sports Betting Operators may honor any outstanding bets. While the Division understands that identifying players included in this notification may present challenges, Sports Betting Operators shall use their best efforts to comply with the intent of this notification.
The college football season officially kicks off on August 24th, so the August 1st start date ensures the new rule will be in place when the season begins.
Why Is Louisiana Banning Prop Bets on College Athletes?
The National Collegiate Athletic Association president, Charlie Baker, has already made a public plea, asking states with legalized sports gambling to ban prop betting on all collegiate athletics. He says individual prop bets pose a risk to the integrity of the games.
The chairman of the Gaming Control Board in Louisiana, Ronnie Johns, agrees. “We have an obligation to protect the integrity of sports betting, but we also have an obligation to protect the safety and the integrity of college athletes and college athletics as a whole,” he told the Louisiana News.
Johns points out that Kayshon Boutte, who used to play football for Louisiana State, played a role in the ban. The Louisiana State Police arrested Boutte in late January. People have accused him of participating in illegal sports betting while he was with the Tigers.
Ban To Cost Sportsbook Operators Big Bucks
According to Citizens JMP Securities, college player props constitute approximately nearly 2% of total betting revenue.
That means, based on the numbers, that Louisiana sportsbooks may have generated close to $7 million in revenue from college props in the past year. If college player props were to be banned nationwide, sportsbooks could potentially lose an estimated $200 million in annual revenue nationwide.
Louisiana Not the First State To Implement Such a Ban
States such as Maryland, Ohio and Vermont have recently enacted prohibitions on college player prop betting. Regulators of sports betting in other states seem open to the idea of considering similar bans.
The nine legal sports betting states that do not restrict college player props are:
However, the North Carolina State Lottery Commission is already considering a ban similar to Louisiana. States can change their rules about sports betting. However, these changes might face resistance when lawmakers discuss them.
We’ll have to wait and see what happens.
Calculators
