Sports Betting
Vermont
Last month, Max Spradlin, a junior at the University of Vermont, was watching a basketball game with his friend Marc Mastrangelo, also a student.
The Boston Celtics were playing the Oklahoma City Thunder, and the Celtics were up by more than 30 points. Mastrangelo needed one more 3-pointer from Celtics guard Payton Pritchard for his bet to succeed.
With only two minutes left in the game, Pritchard caught a pass right above the 3-point line and lofted a high arching shot over his defender. Mastrangelo’s first bet ever had cashed out.
“We hit, we hit, we hit,” Mastrangelo said, jumping off the couch.
Spradlin wasn’t as lucky. He’d placed two bets on the game and ended up losing 15 cents, but he didn’t mind.
“I had a fun time rooting for a meaningless, random regular season NBA game that the Celtics were clearly going to win the whole time,” Spradlin said. “I had a good time with it even though I lost, technically.”
Spradlin turned 21 in January, just before Vermont legalized online sports betting. Now, he bets on basketball and hockey games a lot.
“I usually bet a few times a week,” he said. But he tries to limit the habit — if he notices he’s bet several days in a row, he takes a couple of days off.
“I know gambling can be dangerous and it’s a very downward spiral,” he said.
Spradlin is one of about 30,000 people in Vermont who placed bets on sports games last month. The average bet was close to $18.
Many were drawn in by ads from sports betting apps like FanDuel and DraftKings. The companies promise $200 in “bonus bets” when you sign up for $5.
“It was a brilliant marketing strategy to get people involved,” said Gary Mitchell, a drug and gambling addiction counselor in Hardwick, who’s also a big sports fan.
“We’re just giving people the perfect marriage — the perfect storm — between screen time addictions and gambling,” Mitchell said. “From an addiction counselor standpoint, it terrifies me.”