Exchange wagering this Summer in NJ?
 

All of the nonsense about how it might lead to more allegations of race fixing...that was once the main battle cry of those who opposed "exotic wagers" like the trifecta.

Relatively speaking, horse racing has a good public image, and it should have a great one.

Look at the 1920's. Horses were commonly drugged with very hard stuff, like Heroin, for performance enhancing purposes.

Race fixing actually existed in those days. There were scandals involving "Midnight Riders" -- the Night Riders would take a horse in-tomorrow out of their stall and ride them to exhaustion, so they could bet against said horse the next day.

A horse like Old Rosebud (2-year-old champion, runaway Kentucky Derby winner, Horse of the Year as an older horse, a horse in some ways more popular than Man O' War, and he breaks down in a claiming race at age 11 and is euthanized at Aqueduct)

Technology sucked. You had to lug Chart Books around with you and buy a DRF to get decent past performances. The poor tracks, they had no simulcasting and slots revenue.

Adjusted for inflation, it cost $75 just for general admission at a New York track. Want to go to Aqueduct on a Thursday? Pay $75 just to get in.

The poor tracks, and poor horse racing. However did they manage to dominate the Sports Pages and offer fantastic purses? They even made celebrities out of dozens of their betting customers.

Betting exchanges are a step in the right direction. However, every entity in racing is out for themselves and their piece of the pie, and the long term best interest of the game always suffers because of it.

"Midnight Riders" I've never heard of that...that's some interesting stuff. Were there any other not so well known fixes back in those days?

I'm sure making an exchange only open to one state will be a huge success. Who wants to take my action on 10 maiden claimers at Monmouth. I will give you 5-1 on the first Cibelli runner you see in there...On second thought, let me talk to her vet first.

They aren't legal in any other states yet.

Yes Chuck. Reread my first sentence.

Fixes weren't infrequent, relatively speaking. Pittsburgh Phil is credited in a Beyer book for bribing a jockey to be honest and paying him for wins. However, that was actually a method first used by Plunger Walton decades before him. In fact, The Albany Law site has a few pages on Plunger Walton doing exactly that. Pittsburgh Phil merely used the same method at a smaller track known for larceny.

I don't believe fixed races ever really happen anymore. Certainly not at the big tracks, or even the mid level tracks. If they happen, it's at a lesser track.

If you know how to play the offshore game, you can get good action offshore on some pretty cheap tracks.

Here's the famous bookmaker, horse bettor, and horse owner (he owned Roseben) Davy Johnson making a joke about one of the Night Riding incidents in New York that got a conviction...

That's awesome. Some real colorful characters back then. Someone should make an HBO type show from back in that day along the lines of Boardwalk Empire.

So why complain about it?

I think his point was that the market will be very thin being only NJ. Involved.

Actually, it would seem utilizing New Jersey as a highly controlled test tube for Exchanges is an ideal introduction to the concept here. The rest of the jurisdictions and industry can see what works and what might need to be adjusted for a successful application sport-wide. The biggest issue was and is how much the exchange will contribute toward 'bricks and mortar' and if it's enough to offset what might come out of the part-mutual pools. Dennis Drazin on ATR later today to discuss it.

Regardless of the validity of your interpretation of his intent it just gets tiresome when seemingly there is negativity attached to every racing topic, even the likely positive developments.

Ridiculous. I want things to succeed. I live in NJ. I will participate if the numbers are right. That being said, Betfair own TVG and I can tell you with first hand knowledge that they are awful. And that is our only option in this state, legally. So having confidence in them running this thing is going to be wait and see.

Betfair has nothing to do with it being available in just one state.

I want this so badly to succeed. My fear is that politicians from other jurisdictions will deem it a failure based upon revenue generated within NJ without considering for a second that it is because only players from within one state are participating.

How are they awful? I've had nothing but positive experiences with them.

Exactly....Look at the numbers from online gambling that started in Nov. Already behind projections though much of that is probably the Obamacare like sites that don't even have many banks participating.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-0...4-million.html

You mean the .1% rebate is to die for? The interface when it was just 4njbets was far better. I've also found their withdrawal process to be far less smooth than the deposit process which is quite annoying. Their on air talent is not talented...should I go on.

I agree with Randall, funny how Cristy in his State of the State was all over "Choice", but makes a deal that limits ADW's to TVG only, = no choice.

LEts list the case vs TVG in New Jersey

- virtual non existant rebates of $ 5 per $2500 bet.
- withdrawal of $$ is very s l o w, compared to instant deposits, need proof from bank that $ is there.- often bet back $$ i wanted to withdraw, funny how that works
-poorly designed interface where the next race of a track isnot advanced to automatically.
- very slow update of will pay info, and pull down feature to see exacta and DD info - i must use other sources for this info
- wagering pad that floats and changes in size which one must manipulate.
- having list of featured tracks vs ones you want, which must be changed
- very small print size for these old eyes in results scratches etc
-few betting promotions and those few are atrocious
- limit of video to 10 hours per month unless betting level is reached
- betting timing is 2 minutes fast compared others.
- etc. etc etc


That said it is an improvement over the old site, but eons behind other ADW platforms. They are now up from the Model T, to an Edsel !:rolleyes:

They have no incentive to provide more as the clientle has no other option except off shore. Our way or nothing, :wf


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It's really hard to sign up and participate

It will only be as good as the liquidity it gets...and the commissions need to be close to what they are in the UK for it to have a chance.

They just ran a hurdle race at some track called Market Rasen a few minutes ago. The race had a small field, and the purse was only $8,000 ...




Still, there was good liquidity in the market. Almost a million dollars matched on the win end. Fair prices to be found on both sides.

Some 2/1 shot that won at Turf Paradise yesterday, you could have taken over $7,000 US on him, and all at better than 3/1 odds. If you bet 7k in the win pool, that 2/1 shot would go off 1/9 at Turf Paradise.

Betfair gains first exchange-wagering license in U.S.
By Matt Hegarty

http://www.drf.com/news/betfair-gain...ing-license-us

Betfair, the British-based owner of Television Games Network, has been granted a conditional license by New Jersey regulators to launch the first exchange-wagering platform in the U.S., a development that could have a dramatic impact on the racing industry if its supporters' goals are fully realized.

The approval of the license could usher in a new era for Thoroughbred racing in the U.S. if the proposition of exchange wagering survives what is expected to be close scrutiny by state and federal legal authorities and myriad hurdles to its widespread adoption in U.S. states. Exchange wagering, which has been embraced in the United Kingdom but has drawn criticism in many other countries, allows bettors to post prices and accept bets from other customers of the betting platform. The practice is closely akin to bookmaking, which is illegal in nearly every state in the U.S. under strict interpretations of federal law.

The license granted by the New Jersey Racing Commission is subject to the expiration of veto periods granted to both New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and the New Jersey attorney general. Both periods expire in early December. Christie has never shown any interest in preventing the establishment of exchange wagering in the state, but the approval of the license and the eventual launch of the system is likely to draw attention from the federal Department of Justice, which has not yet issued an opinion on the legality of exchange wagering.

Under current rules in New Jersey, only New Jersey residents would be able to open accounts on the platform, though residents of the United Kingdom would be allowed to bet against those New Jersey customers. Bets will only be allowed to be posted and matched on races from tracks that have explicitly granted approval to Betfair to offer the service, according to Frank Zanzuccki, the executive director of the state racing commission.

Technically, Betfair received the license through Darby Development, a horsemen-led group that operates Monmouth Park in Oceanport, N.J., under a lease from the state. Dennis Drazin, the head of Darby, has pushed for approval of the exchange-wagering platform, so if successfully launched it will at the very least offer bettors the opportunity to make and accept bets on races from Monmouth, which is expected to hold live races this year from May until the end of September.

"We're fully on board," Drazin said.

Drazin said that Betfair officials have stated they expect to launch the platform in March. He deferred to Betfair on questions about the availability of signals, but said that he believed some Standardbred tracks have expressed interest in being offered on the site. Handle on Standardbred racing in the U.S. is roughly a tenth of handle on U.S. Thoroughbred racing.

Betfair officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The approval of the license is the culmination of years of effort by Betfair to gain regulatory approval in a U.S. state. Only two states, New Jersey and California, have passed bills approving exchange-wagering since Betfair began lobbying state legislatures to endorse the practice after buying Television Games Network, a U.S. account-wagering provider and horserace broadcasting network, in 2009.

Wow! This could be big!

Wait and see. Who knows.

Let's see if it gets off the ground.

It will be Jersey vs Jersey and UK (why would they play with other options available) so I can't fathom there being the volume necessary to be judged a sucess. I am certain the media will run with that.