Adam Silver, commissioner of the National Basketball Association, last week reiterated his longstanding support of repealing the federal ban on sports betting, and predicted states will be permitted to decide on whether to authorize sports betting very soon.
“My sense is the law will change in the next few years in the United States,” Silver told the Sports Business Journal. “People want to bet throughout the game. It results in enormous additional engagement with the fans.”
Silver has long favored ending the federal ban on sports betting. In a 2014 op-ed piece in the New York Times, he wrote, “There is an obvious appetite among sports fans for a safe and legal way to wager on professional sporting events. Mainstream media outlets regularly publish sports betting lines and point spreads. Voters in New Jersey overwhelmingly voiced their support for legal sports betting in a 2011 referendum…
“Congress should adopt a federal framework that allows states to authorize betting on professional sports, subject to strict regulatory requirements and technological safeguards.”
In the fall, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear an appeal from the state of New Jersey in a case that challenges the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act of 1992, which bans sports betting in all but four states and bans single-game sports betting in all states except Nevada.
