Colorado ranked among top sports betting states
DENVER (KDVR) — The NFL playoffs are underway and wild card weekend lived up to its name.
A group called Sportsbook Review analyzes data from states with legal sports betting.
The company started gathering data in 2018 when the United States Supreme Court ruled that states can make their own laws on sports betting.
Data Analyst Ryan Nicklin said the potential cons of legalizing sports betting are that people could become addicted to gambling and would be unable to control it and not set a budget.
However, legalizing sports betting has the potential to put a stop to criminal organizations from conducting bets illegally.
“It’s still quite [early] for like the industry whereas, in a lot of places has been legal for years whereas four years is not that long of a time to see what’s working, what’s not working,” Nicklin said. “Maybe that’s why some states are still hesitant to legalize it because they don’t necessarily know whether it’s going to actually give our state any benefits or is it going to actually provide us with any developmental progression?”
How does Colorado stack up?
Sports Review analysts said it’s not exactly apples to apples because each state has different limits and a different number of sportsbooks. Colorado as a state has the most with 26 different legal sportsbooks.
“The bigger picture is what we’re really looking at here. How influential is sports betting across the entire country? Because when you look at the states individually the numbers can get a little bit skewed with population sizes and the amount of sports books that are available,” Nicklin said.
“The bigger picture is, what are the national trends? What are we looking at is this having, positive or negative impacts in general, or are there areas of the industry that still need progressing or that still need development?”
Colorado legalized sports betting in 2020 and has already risen to the 7th spot as far as money wagered, totaling $9 billion wagered in just two years, according to Sportsbook Review.
Colorado went from $2.9 billion wagered in 2021 to $4.1 billion in 2022.
New Jersey has wagered the most amount of money since 2018, with over $31 billion, followed by Nevada and Pennsylvania.
Sportsbook Review saw an increase this year during the World Cup and will no doubt see the same with the NFL playoffs and Super Bowl.
