Sportsbook operators in Nevada and offshore knew the Floyd Mayweather-Conor McGregor fight was going to be big. But Super Bowl big?
In at least one way, yes, Super Bowl big.
“It’s drawing really well,” Jay Rood, vice president of race and sports for MGM Resorts here in Las Vegas, tells Covers. “It’s gonna be right there with the Super Bowl on the pointspread alone. I think we might draw as much money on this fight as we do (on the Super Bowl pointspread), if things materialize the way they look like they’re gonna materialize.”
Mayweather-McGregor won’t approach overall Super Bowl handle – which includes the total, proposition bets, futures, etc. – but for MGM Resorts, it’s a major money attractor. Rood said the first four days of March Madness rank No. 1 for total handle, followed by the Super Bowl, a one-day event.
“As a single one-betting market, this could be No. 1 or No. 2,” Rood said Monday afternoon from his home base at The Mirage on the Las Vegas Strip, adding handle will most assuredly be better than last January’s college football national championship showdown. “Absolutely. We had a really good handle on the game last year, Alabama and Clemson. We’re probably a little ways away from eclipsing that, and on our way toward what we handle for the Super Bowl (pointspread).”
Nick Bogdanovich, director of trading for William Hill US, said Mayweather-McGregor handle is dwarfing that of many sizable, annual single-day events.
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“As just one individual betting pool, one game, I would assume the only thing that would outdo it is the Super Bowl. It’s way more than anything except the Super Bowl,” Bogdanovich said. “It’s way more than any NCAA football or basketball championship game, or NFL playoff games. Originally, I expected big handle. Mayweather is popular, McGregor is popular, you’ve got the crossover spectacle. But it’s definitely exceeded what I thought it would do.”
The current state record for total handle on a fight is believed to be the Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao bout in May 2015. The exact handle on boxing matches isn’t tracked by the Nevada Gaming Control Board. However, for the month of May dating to 2008 – not including 2015 – the average handle was $23 million on “other wagers,” which is all wagers on sports other than football, basketball and baseball. In May 2015, the “other wagers” handle was $80 million.
The $57 million difference generated in May 2015 can mostly be credited to the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight, according to Michael Lawton, senior research analyst for the Gaming Control Board. And while that’s a whopping amount, Lawton believes this fight will go beyond that.
“From the limited sample (of books) I have heard back from, it would appear that the write associated with this fight will be larger,” Lawton told Covers Monday afternoon.
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It’s a little different story at offshore shop Sportsbook.ag, though handle is by no means small. Peter Childs, risk management supervisor for Sportsbook.ag, wouldn’t go so far as to compare the bout with the Super Bowl, but it’s making boxing history.
“It’s going to be the biggest fight we’ve booked, volume-wise,” Childs said. “I would compare it to a college hoops Final Four or National Championship Game.”
With a few days to go until Saturday night’s fight at T-Mobile Arena, and with loads of bettors rolling into town between now and then, there’s one handle-related aspect of this spectacle that could surely beat out all other records. And it’s one Rood and pretty much every other sportsbook operator is rooting against.
“It could rank No. 1 as far as the biggest loss we ever have as a corporation, if McGregor pulls this off and we don’t see a lot of Mayweather money show up as we get closer to fight. But I think we will,” Rood said. “We’re getting a lot of inquiries (in the) last week, and we’ve gotten a couple calls today (asking) if they can get a sizable bet on Mayweather.”
MGM books would certainly like to see some of those. The tally on Monday showed The Mirage and its partner books had written approximately 6,300 McGregor tickets and 280 Mayweather tickets – a nearly 23/1 advantage for McGregor. Rood noted a similar ratio favoring Mayweather in terms of the average amount of each bet. But with so many tickets on the still sizable underdog, the big Mayweather bets aren’t nearly enough to cover potential losses.
“Ticket count is still in the ridiculous territory,” Rood said. “The levels of handle and the levels of transactions – the transactions are the ones that are really surprising.”
By Monday afternoon, Mayweather was -550 at MGM Resorts books, with McGregor +325 on the buyback. At William Hill, which operates dozens of sportsbooks in the Vegas area and more than 100 total around the state of Nevada, Mayweather was at -500 and McGregor +400.
“Tickets are running 16/1 on McGregor, and we’ve got more money on him as well,” Bogdanovich said. “We’re buried on McGregor.”
Patrick Everson is a Las Vegas-based senior writer for Covers. Follow him on Twitter: @Covers_Vegas.
