Muhammad Ali was 38 when he stepped into the ring in 1980 for “The Last Hurrah” versus 30-year-old Larry Holmes.
Ali, the former champ and living legend, was beaten badly. His former ring doctor reportedly said afterward that “[a]ll the people involved in this fight should’ve been arrested.”
Well, Mike Tyson was 58 when he stepped into the ring last Friday with 27-year-old Jake Paul.
And while Tyson took a lesser beating than Ali did four decades ago, there were likely still a few people who thought the whole thing a bit criminal – namely, those who struggled to stream it and the large number of bettors who backed Tyson to win.
Hi Noel, we would not look to void bets on Mike Tyson as they were settled on the official result of the match.
— bet365 Help (@bet365help) November 16, 2024
There was indeed huge action on the fight. For example, according to ESPN BET, Tyson-Paul was its “most bet combat sports event ever,” drawing more than three times the bets and four times the handle of the next biggest boxing match for the one-year-old sportsbook.
And, as is common these days, there were a few folks on social media lobbying for bookmakers to void bets on the fight due to its lackluster-ness. Some might have wondered why they were allowed to wager on a 58-year-old Tyson at all.
The reasons why they were show the bind that sports betting regulators were in, and why many decided to allow betting on the bout to happen.
However, given the result, the next “megafight” may not sail as smoothly past gaming watchdogs who continue to refine their approach and rules for legal sports wagering in the U.S.
TLDR: TDLR said yes
The Massachusetts Gaming Commission (MGC) arguably had the most transparent and thoughtful take on Tyson-Paul, which is sort of their thing due to the state’s open-meeting law and the regulator's generally thorough approach to overseeing sports betting in the commonwealth.
Members of the MGC met on Nov. 7 and discussed wagering on Tyson-Paul in a public meeting. There, it was noted that the state’s sports-betting catalog allows wagering on boxing matches overseen by the Association of Boxing Commissions and Combative Sports, to which the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation (TDLR) belongs. It was the TDLR that sanctioned the Tyson-Paul fight and its two noticeable rule changes: bigger, 14-ounce gloves and two-minute rounds.
These changes meant the fight could be considered “safer,” which played well with the MGC commissioners. Other regulators didn’t like those changes, including gaming commissions in New York and Pennsylvania, which banned betting on the fight. The Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board even noted the three-decade age gap between the fighters.
“With respect to Pennsylvania they explained that they did not believe that wagering on this event should be permitted from both a rules perspective and integrity perspective, citing the age difference between the fighters,” a memo to the MGC commissioners stated.
So Pennsylvania and a few others said no to wagering on Tyson-Paul at licensed sportsbooks. But Massachusetts, North Carolina, Ohio, Illinois, and others said yes, including for a reason that underpins a lot of what goes on with legal sports betting in the U.S.
If we don't, they will
The Nebraska Racing and Gaming Commission actually reached out to the MGC’s sports wagering division to ask about Massachusetts’ stance on the Tyson-Paul fight.
“Interestingly,” the MGC memo said, “Nebraska explained that while this event would not be approved under their existing event wagering catalog because they have deemed it to be an exhibition match and wagering on exhibition matches is not permitted, they created an exception to allow wagering on this event to combat driving patrons to the illegal market.”
This argument carried weight with the MGC as well.
“We talk about the illegal market and what drives folks to the illegal market,” MGC chair Jordan Maynard said during the public meeting. “I think if we did ban this, especially as it falls currently under our rules today as approved … we would only be potentially moving people in Massachusetts to the illegal market on this fight.”
MGC representatives also contacted two monitoring services before the Tyson-Paul fight, IC360 and the International Betting Integrity Association. Those watchdogs told the commission “that it would be unlikely there would be any betting-related corruption due to the significant public popularity and fight purses in the multiple-millions for both fighters.”
While that likely helped the MGC in its determination to allow wagering on Tyson-Paul, it’s probably not something that was known by your average bettor. And what they saw was a once formidable fighter standing mostly idle while a younger man circled and occasionally swatted at him.
Fool me once ...
So there’s the rub for sports betting regulators. This was an event sanctioned by an athletic regulator that was going to be watched and scrutinized by millions of people. Interest in wagering on the fight was high, so much so the fears of leakage from the legal market were likely well-founded.
But what happens when the event everyone’s interested in turns out to be a letdown that prompts bettors to squawk for refunds and social media pundits to make wild accusations about its integrity?
Even if these complaints are misguided – nobody forced anybody to bet on this fight, wherein the significant age difference between the two combatants was well-known – they could at least be heard and considered. Regulators have to regulate both for the sharps and the squares. The smart and the, uh, not-so-smart.
Interestingly, MGC commissioner Eileen O’Brien suggested, and Maynard suggested similarly, that the regulator’s approach to Tyson-Paul-like events could be tweaked. The chair said he would be supportive of a “broader view of changes that could come to these types of events in the future.”
Tyson-Paul was huge. The amount of interest in and gambling on the fight was huge as well. But the next Tyson-Paul may not get as easy a ride with some gaming regulators – and burned bettors may steer clear altogether.
