Mike Pesca on the Vig, the Fix, and the John Goodman Thumb

Summary

The Gist – "Mike Pesca on the Vig, the Fix, and the John Goodman Thumb"

Date: December 6, 2025
Host: Mike Pesca (Peach Fish Productions)
Guests: Paula Poundstone and Adam Felber (from "Nobody Listens to Paula Poundstone")

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Episode Overview

This episode features Mike Pesca appearing as a guest on “Nobody Listens to Paula Poundstone” to demystify the world of sports betting. The discussion weaves through the mechanics, the psychology, the perils, and the societal impact of the explosion in legal sports gambling, as well as memorable betting scandals, behind-the-scenes mafia intrigue, and the irresistible marketing machine of betting apps. The tone is inquisitive, irreverent, and heavy with humor, but also manages serious insights about addiction, regulation, and the real winners and losers of this betting boom.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Introduction to Sports Betting and the Over/Under

• Paula describes her consistent bad luck supporting sports teams, jokes that betting would be disastrous, and laments not understanding how badly bettors get “fleeced.”
• Adam introduces Mike Pesca as a unique centrist voice and sports/media veteran.
• Mike teases how by the end Paula will understand "over/under.”
  • Quote [07:33, Mike]: "The over under on Xbox experts is 0.5, and you just hit the over. Do you know what that means?"

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2. What Can You Bet On? More Than You Think

• The group marvels at how bets can now be placed on almost any aspect of a game, not just the outcome.
  • Quote [09:17, Paula]: "How many things do people bet on or can they bet on within a game? It’s not all about the score, right?"
• Mike explains the concept of “prop bets” and gives examples:
  • Next pitch being a ball or strike
  • Specific player points/rebounds/assists
  • Oddities like total points being odd or even
• Explains that extreme granularity is enabled by betting apps and has led to real-life scandals.

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3. Recent Scandals: Cheating in Plain Sight

• Baseball scandal: Two Cleveland Guardians pitchers “helped out” friends by deliberately throwing balls, bets flagged after unusual activity.
  • Quote [10:11, Mike]: "It was as if, cue Yakety Sax, the pitch went right into the dirt."
• NBA scandal: Well-paid player Clifford Rozier fakes an injury to ensure certain stats hit the “under.” Discovery occurs due to “unusual betting activity.”
• Gambling for friends: Surprising even high-income players get involved, often because of poorly managed finances or addiction to “the action” rather than money itself.

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4. The Psychology & Addictiveness of Gambling

• Mike details why people gamble (“the action,” not just the potential win), and that about 2-3% of gamblers become addicted.
  • Legalization and mobile access guarantee more addiction, especially among young men with undeveloped prefrontal cortexes.
  • Quote [14:59, Mike]: "When you increase the number of people who gamble, because now it’s legal in so many states, you’re guaranteeing many, many more addicts."

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5. Organized Crime’s Role: From the Mafia to Player Tip-offs

• Notorious coach (Chauncey Billups, “the Face Card”) allegedly tipped off gamblers about players’ absences and participated in mafia-run, rigged poker games using high-tech cheating like contact lenses.
  • Quote [16:04, Mike]: "They used contact lenses that could see symbols on the backs of cards. And so, yeah, guys got..."
• Adam wonders if Billups knew he was ensconced with the mob; Mike suggests if he didn’t, he should have.

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6. The House Always Wins: Understanding the Vig

• Adam asks, “How do sportsbooks make money if people are betting on both sides?”
  • Mike explains “the vig” (the house’s edge): Typically, you must bet $11 to win $10; on prop bets, sometimes even worse odds apply. Parlays (combined bets) are extra lucrative for sportsbooks because people consistently miscalculate odds.
  • Quote [19:38, Mike]: "There’s something called the vig, which means they take 10% out of every bet. If you want to win $10, you have to bet 11 to win that 10. And the vig is where they get a little edge."
• “Sharp” pro gamblers who beat the house are banned or restricted, which Mike says should be illegal.
  • Quote [22:45, Mike]: "...if you’re very good and have shown that you have an edge over the book, it’s not a fair game. The book will limit you."

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7. Legalization’s Unintended Consequences: Apps & In-Game Betting

• The proliferation of in-game betting (possible with apps) is far more addictive than old-school betting, where payouts were less frequent and required more effort.
  • Quote [27:30, Mike]: "The big problem isn’t just that it’s legal. The big problem is the apps. And the big problem is that kids, young men, people without carefully or fully developed prefrontal cortexes ... just can’t make good decisions. So this is poison to them.”
• The technology, once mind-blowing, is now ubiquitous and a Pandora’s box.

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8. Star Endorsements: Who’s Really Playing?

• Paula rails against celebrity-endorsed gambling apps: “Drew Barrymore, you’re sitting around playing those games. Bullshit.” [30:05]
• Mike mocks the poor production values and speculates about the infamous "John Goodman Thumb" ad, spinning the idea (“He’s the only one who can make the bets. He’s the thumb.” [31:28]).

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9. Who's Making Money? (Spoiler: Not Many People)

• Billions are wagered, but because companies spent so much “acquiring users” with big bonuses and states struck poor deals, neither tech companies nor many states have profited as expected.
  • New York secures high tax cut; Kansas gets almost nothing.
  • ESPN tried, failed, and dropped their gambling spinoff.
  • “Follow the money: The money is being wasted by everyone. No one’s really winning.” [33:09, Mike]

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10. Reform and the Future of Sports Betting

• Mike suggests obvious reforms:
  • Ban wild “in-game” bets & prop betting on college sports,
  • Make it fair for talented bettors rather than protecting houses’ profits,
  • Restrict advertising, especially to the young.
• Outrage at college-level scandals: Difficult to distinguish between actual game-fixing and genuine poor performance.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On centrist branding:

  • [08:11, Mike]: "Throw the centrist flag out there, people are on your side automatically, you’d think, right? But it tends to be quite the opposite. Both sides wind up hating you think you’re a big weenie."

• On the “action” in gambling:

  • [13:57, Mike]: "It’s not even the joy of winning. It’s the action. ... They like the uncertainty, they like the action, they like the stimulation."

• On the myth of winning:

  • [32:20, Mike]: “The money is being wasted by everyone. No one’s really winning. This is a very ripe area for reform.”

• Absurd bets and “John Goodman Thumb”:

  • [31:01, Paula]: "Was there one where John Goodman was a thumb?"
  • [31:28, Mike]: "He’s the hand. The other four can swipe the phone, but he’s the only one who can make the bets. He’s the thumb. Yeah, he’s the thumb."

• On manufacturers of odds:

  • [36:26, Mike]: "You could bet on different rebounds, you could bet on the assists, you could bet on player combos ... or in the whole game combined, odd or even. ... It’s not even coin-flip odds but less, and that’s where sportsbooks make money."

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:43–05:18 – Pesca introduced on “Nobody Listens to Paula Poundstone”
• 07:33–09:17 – What is “over/under?” How prop bets work
• 10:10–13:40 – Betting scandals: MLB and NBA “fixes”
• 13:57–15:56 – Gambling addiction explained; athletes’ motivations
• 16:04–18:24 – Organized crime’s role; Chauncey Billups and mafia poker games
• 19:25–23:06 – “The vig”; why the house always wins; “sharp” gamblers get banned
• 23:29–27:30 – Growth of gambling apps; why legalization is double-edged
• 29:12–30:33 – Celebrities endorsing betting; Mike and Paula riff on bad commercials
• 31:45–33:22 – Who profits from the boom? (States, companies, players)
• 33:22–36:02 – Regulations needed, the impact of gambling stats on sports enjoyment
• 36:02–37:49 – The most specific bets you can place; how books make money
• 37:49–39:41 – Personal anecdotes about horse and dog betting; lighter wrap-up

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Conclusion

Mike Pesca unpacks the mechanics and mania of America’s sports gambling explosion, demystifying jargon, recounting both comedic and criminal betting tales, and warning of the real dangers of betting ads and mobile apps. Celebrity campaigns, policy failures, and technological advances blend to create a perfect storm for addictive behavior with few winners. Pesca’s mix of humor and dispassionate logic guides listeners through the maze, leaving Paula and Adam—and the audience—both enlightened and entertained.

Final Takeaway:

• Sports betting is far more accessible—and dangerous—than before.
• The system’s design, not players’ skill, ensures the house wins.
• Calls for regulatory reform are overdue as everyone gets caught in the game, from athletes and mafia figures to everyday sports fans just looking to make the game more interesting.
• Paula: “Guess what? I’m not gonna place any sports bets tonight.” [39:31]
• Pesca: “I think I’ve done my job.” [39:39]

Transcript

[Mike Pesca]

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[Mike Pesca]

Hi, it's Mike. It's Saturday. It's the Saturday show. We sometimes will bring you an appearance I had on another show and the other show this week is the great Paula Poundstone's show with the great Adam Felber, who's not in the title. The name of the show is Nobody Listens to Paula Poundstone. So if Adam's name were in there, maybe it would be an insult to him too. But I was featured on an episode this week where betting on Mike Pesca. And so now I ask you to listen to that, but also in doing so to Abnegate and reject the basic premise and point of Nobody Listens to Paula Penstone.

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[Adam Felber]

We are back. Thank you, house band Nobody. Earl Levine sounded great, Earl.

[Paula Poundstone]

Yeah, thanks.

[Adam Felber]

Hey, Paula, what's up? What's with the pom poms?

[Paula Poundstone]

Adam? The team that I was supporting in all but two of the sporting events that I have attended in my lifetime lost. So betting on my team would be disastrous. Betting against my team, it seems to me, would be the wrong energy. If I bet against Greg Loganis hitting his head on the board on a gold medal winning dive. He would have hit his head on the board twice in the same gold medal dive. Sports betting for me would be like podcasting and selling shirts is for me, just throwing money out the window. And I suspect it is for most people. I'd really like to know, like, how badly the sports bettor gets fleeced. I'd love to understand the phenomenon. I don't, though. I'd love to talk to someone who does know. Experts, I think they're called. I'll never get to, though. Certainly not on this Paid to take a dive of a podcast. Stay down. Stay down.

[Adam Felber]

Well, Paula, if you had bet on being right about that assumption, you'd be wrong and have lost some more money, because we have an expert on who is an expert in the very subject that you were just.

Pensing about.

[Mike Pesca]

That's.

[Adam Felber]

Pensing is not a word, is it?

[Paula Poundstone]

Not really. That's a coincidence. Brushed with melted butter, it is.

[Adam Felber]

He is the host of the Gist, the longest running daily news podcast in history, with his unique pragmatic centrist point of view, giving listeners an alternative to. To the polarizing commentary found almost everywhere else. In addition to guest hosting the NPR program All Things Considered and the News Quiz. Wait, wait, don't tell me. Which I've heard of. His work has been featured on this American Life, Radiolab, and Planet Money. He has frequently appeared on MSNBC, CNN, and the PBS NewsHour, and written for the Washington Post, the Guardian, GQ, Slate, and the Baseball Prospectus. Please welcome Mike Pesca, our pal.

[Paula Poundstone]

Wow.

[Mike Pesca]

Thank you for having me. The over under on Xbox experts is 0.5, and you just hit the over. Do you know what that means?

[Paula Poundstone]

I don't know what over under is.

[Mike Pesca]

By the end, you're gonna know.

[Paula Poundstone]

I'm so excited. Mike, thank you for doing this. You know, it wasn't until I heard Adam read that list of, you know, accolades and things that you've done that I realized. I mean, I thought it was just our buddy Mike Pesca coming to do the podcast, but it turns out it's everybody's buddy Mike Pesca.

[Adam Felber]

It's luminary. Mike Pesca.

[Mike Pesca]

When you heard centrist, we really hook you. That's a great word, right?

[Adam Felber]

People love the centrist.

[Mike Pesca]

Throw the centrist flag out there, people are on your side automatically, you'd think, right? But it tends to be quite the opposite. Both sides wind up hating you think you're a big weenie.

[Paula Poundstone]

It is not. Yeah, I don't Find it a compelling word.

[Mike Pesca]

Ooh, you gotta meet this guy. He's a centrist. He's reasonable.

[Adam Felber]

Yeah, but you're a radically reasonable extreme centrist.

[Paula Poundstone]

Mike, are you. Are you on that app, Hot centrists?

[Mike Pesca]

No. Oh, my God. I aspired to be. The thing about centrists, I always wanted to get a little momentum going behind the sexy centrist label, but most of us aren't. We're very retiring type people.

[Paula Poundstone]

You seem perfectly sexy to me.

[Adam Felber]

Don't retire.

[Mike Pesca]

Well, we retire with IRAs because, you know, we're sensible.

[Adam Felber]

Right.

[Mike Pesca]

We. We invest in our 401ks.

[Paula Poundstone]

Your 401k is being affected badly by what's going on.

[Mike Pesca]

Well, I've liquidated mine to put it into. Toledo is playing Akron. And I got a. I got a. I got an insight on the number of free throws that are going to be sunk.

[Adam Felber]

Yeah. How many.

[Paula Poundstone]

How many things do people bet on or can they bet on within a game? It's not all about the score, right?

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah. Can they. It's way too high. And in fact, this is one of the things that they're thinking of reforming. And as with every reform, it usually comes when do they put up a stop sign after there's been a car crash at that intersection? So there've been a few scandals in betting. I don't know if you've heard of some of them. And one of them, I'll just talk about the baseball scandal because the basketball scandal is even crazier. You could bet on the next pitch in a baseball game. Will it be a ball or will it be a strike? And with this possibility, two pitchers on the Cleveland Guardians wanted to help out their friends. So they started. They each started an inning and they said, bet on a ball, it'll be a ball. And to guarantee that it was a ball, they threw the pitch almost directly into the dirt.

[Paula Poundstone]

Wow.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah. It was as if Q Yakety sacks. The pitch went right into the dirt.

[Adam Felber]

Hey.

[Mike Pesca]

Yes. And those. And the two. Two of the best pitchers on planet Earth thought they got away with it for a couple months until Johnny Law came a call in and Ortiz and Klase now face. This is crazy. 65 years in jail for throwing a pitch into a dirt. Into the dirt. But the fact that you can bet on that is the extreme part.

[Paula Poundstone]

I think so. All right, so how did they figure out that they were trying to cheat? And why were they trying to cheat? Like when is enough enough with those two guys?

[Mike Pesca]

I think they were trying to. Friends there are you want to help.

[Paula Poundstone]

Your friends give them 50 bucks if.

[Mike Pesca]

You are paid $6.5 million. And then we'll get to the basketball scandal where the guy in the middle of it had just signed a three year, $60 million contract and was tipping off his friends that he was going to fake an injury. I think that there are some theories, we don't know. Maybe they get in deep with the gamblers. Also, I covered sports for a while, and even though these are the titles of the contracts, sure, they have to pay taxes and they have to pay agents, but athletes are notoriously bad with their money. So what happens is their loved ones pretty much put them on an allowance and their agents put them or managers put them on an allowance. So anytime you could have an extra $10,000, that's not part of your allowance, athletes go nuts for it. And gambling is a big way they, you know, acquire this money. And the answer to how they found out is, as I said, the pitches went directly into the ground. There was actually a little more sophisticated. There are people who monitor this. And one of the reasons that gambling, or legal gambling was sold to the public. Oh, it won't destroy the integrity of the game because we have these advanced ways of seeing unusual betting patterns. So usually on a bet like will the next pitch be a ball in the United States of America, there might be a thousand dollars waged on it, total. But when there's 15,000 waged on and it's all from Cleveland, it does raise some red flags.

[Adam Felber]

Yeah, that's.

[Mike Pesca]

Yep. And this is like, this is also how to get to the NBA scandal. The NBA part of this scandal. There was unusual betting activity with this one guy, Rosier. Clifford Rosier is a pretty good player and a well paid player taking himself out of the game in the first quarter. And how that would affect a bet is you could bet, it's called a prop bet, on the individual stats of almost every player. So if you said Clifford Rozier was not only going to have less than 14 points, but less than five rebounds, less than three assists, you know, you take yourself out of the game, five minutes in, you guarantee that you're going to hit the under, which is the under the under, which is sports betting term for less than. But it also raises. It raises flags. If a lot of people are betting on that, how would they know? And so cut to Clifford Rosier getting caught and a few other guys too.

[Paula Poundstone]

And when you say he took himself out of the game, how did he do that? He just took his duffel bag, put his towel in it and slipped away.

[Mike Pesca]

Well, now that you mention it, I think in the moment he clutched his hamstring and kind of faked an injury, but really, in terms of like the broad scope of Clifford Rosier's career, he actually did take himself out of the game. He will not be invited back to the NBA from this point forward.

[Adam Felber]

Yeah, he's done.

[Paula Poundstone]

I mean, that's what I mean. Like, why do you think that there's some level, at least on the part of the players and maybe on the part of the viewers, you know, the fans that bet. That is just their stimulation. Junkies.

[Mike Pesca]

Oh, yeah, addicted gamblers. And I'll admit I'm a very small time gambler. I enjoy it. In the beginning of the season, I might put literally $20 down on the Knicks to win the championship, and they never have. But when they do, not only will I be happy as a Knicks fan, I'll have made $130 or whatever. But yes, the real addicted gamblers, what they will tell you is it's not even the joy of winning. It's the action. It's the uncertainty of if you're going to win or lose. And then it's weird because, like, you would think a substance abuser who would chase a high really wants the high, doesn't want the uncertainty if whether you're going to be able to score your drugs or possibly get your next shot of whiskey. Not so with the sports gambler. They like the uncertainty, they like the action, they like the stimulation. And it's why throughout history, something like 2 to 3% of all people who gamble do become addicted. And when you increase the number of people who gamble, because now it's legal in so many states, you're guaranteeing many, many more addicts.

[Paula Poundstone]

Yeah. I don't know if you ever saw that Flintstones episode when Barney and Fred were off to the bowling alley and Fred was just. They gambled on the game and Fred was just kind of jonesing the whole time, just agitated and, you know, he was. Yeah, he's a good bowler.

[Adam Felber]

He was a portrait of a man with a problem.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah, yeah, he has, he has the, the high notes on the piano underscoring his approach, which all the great bowlers do. And I think. Mr. Am I right? Mr. Slate bankrolls him to some degree?

[Paula Poundstone]

Yes, yes, I think he does.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah.

[Paula Poundstone]

Yeah. Mr. Slate got caught up in it and it was ugly. That's the thing. Like, so if somebody's doing this for their friend, then, then it's, it's really, you know, then Right. Then they are. They were already making that kind of money. They could have just given their friends some money. So it's clearly right. That sort of agitated state that they crave.

[Mike Pesca]

I thought you were gonna come in and say, if they're doing it for the friend, then they're not a real friend. But also there's this other aspect. Part of the NBA scandal is this very well regarded coach who's actually in the NBA hall of Fame, Chauncey Billups. And as a reporter, he'd. Guy who is so lovely to talk to, he'd always give you your time. But maybe he was too nice to the wrong people because not only did he tip off gamblers as the coach, certain players who weren't going to play, who would greatly affect the outcome of games. He was involved in poker games where he, as this NBA hall of Famer, was the law, was the attraction. And the poker games were run by the Gambinos, the Genoveses, the Lucchese. Yes, a few of the five families. Angelo Ruggiero, he was running the games. Now, I know, Paula, you're saying. Wait a minute. Angelo. Quack, quack. Ruggerio Capo crime family. Actually, his son, it was Angelo Jr. But yeah, the Mafia was literally running the games. They were all rigged. They used 3D scanners, they used 3D tables, they used contact lenses that could see symbols on the backs of cards. And so, yeah, guys got.

[Paula Poundstone]

So they were contact lenses that. That they had bought from the back pages of comic books.

[Mike Pesca]

That's right. That. It was either that or the sea monkeys. Right. Their cousins, the guys in the other crime family who went with the sea monkeys did not make almost any money, but the contact lens guys made a million. Until they got caught. Till it got. Until it caught up with them. Yeah.

[Paula Poundstone]

Wow.

[Adam Felber]

Chauncey is arguably just the, you know, the big fish that they have there to attract other people to the table. Right. He's not reading cards.

[Mike Pesca]

You know what they called him? They called him the face card.

[Adam Felber]

Oh, yeah.

[Mike Pesca]

Why was he doing it? It's not even known if Chauncey knew that. By the way, when we say Chauncey, don't we just dust it with a patina of legitimacy? But when Chauncey is there at the table and people come to play around Chauncey, we're not sure that Chauncey Billups even knew that the game wasn't on the up and up, but he certainly knew or should have known who he was in league with. And also he was doing these clearly illegal Things by tell fellow confederates. These are words from some of the indictments in which he is literally called player number eight. Yeah. He shouldn't have told them that star players were out and therefore they got an edge. Or. An edge.

[Adam Felber]

Oh, yeah, that's a. No. No.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah.

[Paula Poundstone]

Did Chauncey ever notice that he was sitting beside Mafia people? Did the Mafia people, I mean, were they wearing like shirts that said I'm, you know, team Mafia or.

[Adam Felber]

Or my dad ask me about quack quack. My dad.

[Mike Pesca]

Well, my dad. Do you mean quack quack, quack quack? Used to say, by the way, he got the nickname because he talked a lot.

[Adam Felber]

Oh, that's so Mafia. Mike, let me ask you an ignorant question, because I have only briefly dabbled with the sports gaming thing. Cause we had an advertiser at one point, and so they spotted me $100. I'm proud to say three years later, I haven't lost that full $100. But basically. Cause I don't play a lot, how are they making all that money? To my ignorant point of view, one team's gonna win, one team's gonna lose, one guy's. A guy's gonna score more than 15 points or less than 15 points. People are betting on both sides. How are these companies earning such big buckets of money?

[Mike Pesca]

Right? So. And it is, you know, $100 billion are wagered and they win about 7% of it. So it's definitely a billion dollar industry.

[Adam Felber]

So where are they getting that 7%? Are they just better at math?

[Mike Pesca]

No, sometimes these guys are very. The betters are very bad at math. So there's something called the vig, which means that take 10% out of every bet. If you want to win $10, you have to bet 11 to win that 10. And the vig is where they get a little edge. But on these prop bets, on these crazy prop bets, the edge is even greater. So to let us say a ball and a strike are equally likely. They'll pay you $80 for your $100 bet if it's a ball, and then they'll pay you $80 if it's a strike. And what's that extra $20 that goes in their pockets? And then there are things called parlays. Now we as humans, we give in to this illogical heuristic where we think multiple things happening that are correlated are more likely to happen than the individual things. So let me give you an example that's not in sports. If you. There's this very famous logic test where if you Ask most people, oh, that woman who works in the bank and is wearing a dress, what are the chances that she's married and has children and someone will give you the odds? And then if you ask them, what are just the chances that she has children, they'll give you lower odds. Now, as an estimate, now, that makes no sense, right? It would be more unlikely to have two requirements than one requirement. But this is just how we think. We think married and children, those are correlated. So it's more likely to happen, happen. So with parlays or parlays, they offer bets that say, will the 40 Niners win? Will they have more than 48 points? Will Brock Purdy score more than two touchdowns? You layer on bet after bet after bet. It's very exciting to the bettors. They give you some odds that are terrible odds. And through parlays and inducements to have some special bonus dollars to bet the parlays. These sportsbooks make a lot of money and they take advantage of human illogic. And I'll tell you one last thing. There are really good professional gamblers out there. Usually they're very good at computers. Some friends of mine, I have a friend who's one of the world's only professional tennis gamblers. And the problem for a guy like that, the problem for a guy like that is not, oh, how do I beat the book, how do I beat these apps? It's, will they let me continue betting after I show that I'm good and the answer is no. So it's against, it's against the law to flat out kick anyone out for being good. But it's not against the law to limit them, to limit their maximum bet at a dollar a cent. And so that's what they do. And so the game becomes, if you're very good and you have shown that you have an edge over the book, it's not a fair game. The book will limit you. And you essentially can't make bets that cut into their profits. So then for these guys, the game becomes finding go betweens, finding straw betters, finding guys who have lost so much money because they're terrible gamblers, trying to gain their confidence. No, I'm not here to rip you off. You are useful to me. We're going to start betting through your account. You're going to take a small slice of it because I can't even get my own bets placed. And this is, I think this is unfair, by the way. I don't think that the states that allow these gambling sites to exist should Also allow them to limit someone who's very good at gambling.

[Paula Poundstone]

Yeah, it's like not letting Rain man play blackjack.

[Mike Pesca]

That's right. And by the way, Charlie was Charlie's last name in that Charlie knew. Yeah. Tom Cruise's character knew that he would be kicked out if he was counting cards. So he was.

[Paula Poundstone]

I mean, that doesn't seem right to me at all. All right, all right. Does sports betting increase during difficult economic times?

[Mike Pesca]

It does, because people need small entertainments. So it does. But we were going through pretty boon economic times and sports gambling was crazy. Sports gambling has always existed. It's been a constant. I am sympathetic to some of the arguments to legalize it. Like why let the Lucchesis and Gambinos get all the money when those mafia organizations called the state of Kansas and the state of New York? We should get enough to wet our beaks. But the big problem isn't just that it's legal. The big problem is the apps. And the big problem is that kids, young men, people without carefully or fully developed prefrontal cortexes, or cortices, I guess is the plural. And that's, you know, up until you're 25 and you're a guy especially, just can't make good decisions. So this, this is poison to them.

[Adam Felber]

I'm living proof.

[Mike Pesca]

What did, what did 22 year old Adam Felber miss decide on?

[Adam Felber]

Oh, it's just good that I couldn't have bet on sports. But no, I made every bad decision you could make, whether it was relationships, career, or anything in between.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah. And now all those decisions are in your pocket every second of every day, every invading your leisure activity. If you ever said, I've made such bad mistakes with girls and my job, at least I'll watch a basketball game. No, now it's quicksand.

[Adam Felber]

Now you can make. Make mistakes there.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah, that's it. That's what our society is trending towards. We're not going to give you any moment where you can't make a mistake sleeping. Don't worry, we have an app for that. Your Apple Watch is tracking you.

[Paula Poundstone]

Oh, yeah, right, yeah. Okay, the apps. One of the problems, of course, is. And tell me if this is different from how the betting used to be, but now that you have this app and the thing is in your pocket and you're watching the game, do people change their bets, increase their bets, bet more while they're. While they're watching? And they wouldn't have done that the old way.

[Mike Pesca]

They couldn't have done it this this innovation called In Game Wagering. And I did a story. I was the first NPR reporter to have a podcast and it was called On Gambling with Mike Pesca. I don't know, NPR and gambling really went together, but damn it, I tried. And I remember I did a story all those years ago where it was one of the casinos was debuting in Game wagering and it blew my mind that this is probably 2012, something like that. Cut to today and this amazing technology I thought would redefine sports gambling is everywhere in everyone's pocket. It in game gambling. It's just one of the many, many temptations that when they, I think plausibly made the case that we should offer legal gambling, and it's in a long tradition of things that we've always done as entertainment, they didn't really take enough care to examine the Pandora's box that they were sitting on top of. And we'll be back with a little more me talking to Paula right after this Foreign.

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[Adam Felber]

And we are back with Mike Pesca. We're talking the over under on sports betting.

[Paula Poundstone]

Mike. So now that it's on an app, it's in your pocket and you can bet throughout the game from your home or wherever you are. You couldn't do that before, cuz how did you have to do it before?

[Mike Pesca]

Well, you'd have to make a bet. You'd have to go up to the counter at a Las Vegas only place in America where it was legal and you'd bet on the game and then they'd give you a ticket, a physical ticket, and you'd wait and watch the game. And in this way, sports gambling, though very attractive, the longer you can space out the payments of any form of gambling, the less addictive it is. So when horse gambling, you know, betting on the races, when that was our dominant form of gambling, there were certainly people addicted to it, but it was much less pernicious than when slot machines came in and you kept getting rewards every few minutes. Now with the apps and with sports gambling and a lot of the apps also have regular casino games on the apps, it is just, it is just a dopamine minefield.

[Paula Poundstone]

Yeah. I keep seeing these celebrities do ads for these things and they are more than well paid, these celebrities, they are not hurting for anything. And I can't help feeling that they are wounding others by promoting this thing. Right. Like really Drew Barrymore, you're sitting around playing those games. Bullshit. You're not playing those games. And you know, I'm so excited about. Oh my gosh, I hate that.

[Mike Pesca]

The production quality of those commercials are the worst things on tv. Local car dealerships are much better than those commercials. If you look at the background, there's one with two of the cast members of Friends and I looked at the background, there were just things on the floor. They obviously just drew a curtain behind them when they were, they had 12 minutes when they were getting together. For fondue. I can't believe the slap dash nature. They must have gotten so many millions of dollars to do this.

[Paula Poundstone]

Was there one where John Goodman was a thumb?

[Mike Pesca]

I hope so now. Okay, pitch me.

[Adam Felber]

Wow.

[Mike Pesca]

Bring it to life. I think he got it. Cause I saw it.

[Paula Poundstone]

I'm like, boy, that looks familiar. Wait, I think that's John Goodman, But I don't want to accuse John Goodman.

[Adam Felber]

Well, there's four slender actors playing fingers, talking, and then John Goodman walks in as the thumb.

[Mike Pesca]

This is something I like this. I don't know how.

[Paula Poundstone]

John Goodman's lost a lot of weight.

[Adam Felber]

Stick with me. I'm spitballing you.

[Paula Poundstone]

He could be a fingernail now.

[Mike Pesca]

He's the hand. The other four can swipe the phone, but he's the only one who can make the bats. He's the thumb. Yeah, he's the thumb.

[Paula Poundstone]

You guys are really fleshing this out. Do we have a figure? Do we know how much money sort of collectively people lose, say, per game or in a year?

[Mike Pesca]

Well, no, we don't know per game, but we do know it's. I mean, this has got to be rough. Very, very rough. Because the statistics say it's about $100 billion a year industry. And. And that's way too round a number. But, yeah, the casino companies are making billions, but in a way, no one's really making that much money because the inducement that you got, Adam, for doing an ad, everyone in the public was offered 100 or $50 to try to hook you into the apps. So the apps and, you know, FanDuel and DraftKings, they were losing a lot of money in player acquisition on the theory that once we addict them, it'll be excellent market for us. Us. But so far, that hasn't quite come to pass. ESPN was in the gambling business. They just announced, we're out of it. It's not really making any money for us. There was a.

[Adam Felber]

Just got in, though, didn't they?

[Mike Pesca]

They did. They bought a company called Pen Gaming and they rebranded it from a different company. So the companies aren't doing as well because they had to pay a lot for customer acquisition. The states aren't doing so well. Not because people aren't gambling, but a lot of them, I'm proud to say, not New York. We drove an extremely hard bargain. But the New York Times has done great with just a few steak dinners and a cigar. Certain states will sign away their rights for online gambling in the states. You know, New York could get something like 20% of every dollar wagered and Kansas gets four. It's really sad. I feel bad for Kansas in that state. And then, like I said, if you're good at this, they don't even let you gamble. They limit you. So it's an odd thing where follow the money. The money is being wasted by everyone. No one's really winning. Winning. This is.

[Paula Poundstone]

Wow.

[Mike Pesca]

This is a very ripe area for reform. I think some of the reforms, I think the sports leagues have made a bit more money. Some of the reforms are pretty obvious. You got to ban all these crazy in game bets. Is the next pitch going to be a ball or a strike? And I also think you have to ban prop betting with college sports. I know college athletes are essentially professional athletes now, but there was just a scandal where a half dozen players from different colleges last year were cited as gambling. And if I went and looked at some of the scores of Mississippi Valley State, they were losing every game by 30. And the allegation was they were starting to throw their games. How would you know they were so bad? Like, how do you say, okay, this game I'm throwing, I kind of have this little theory that, like, when you're that bad, just try to get the rumor out that you've been throwing the games for gambling. But yeah, it's a problem with colleges. It's a problem with the pros, It's a problem with teenagers. It's a problem with just enjoying sports at all or in a different way. A lot of people who don't gamble really resent that. You can't even see a statistic anymore without the odds attached to it.

[Adam Felber]

I hate that because I love sports and I don't like gambling. But then again, I'm a guy who, like, for a couple of years I played those, you know, in those fantasy leagues for various sports. And I hated those because I found myself rooting against my team so that, you know, quote my unquote player could do well. It's just, I'm much happier with just enjoying the game.

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah, but Adam, here's the secret. The Dodgers don't care about you. So even if you root for them, I mean, I get, in some abstract way, they, I'm sure appreciate it, but.

[Adam Felber]

I play a lot of Yankee fan anyway. Mike.

[Mike Pesca]

Oh, yes, that's, that's, that's what I mean. That's why they don't care about you. I would say Aaron Judge, if you ever met Aaron Judge, he would care. That guy would bend down from his gigantic guy and pick you up and rock you like a small baby.

[Adam Felber]

Love me like I've never been loved. Like a mother's love.

[Paula Poundstone]

But Aaron, tell me like the most specific thing that people can bet on right now. I like the idea of like when, when a player is at the foul line and they bounce the ball like a couple of times, can they bet on that? Can they say how many times LeBron James is going to bounce the ball at the foul line?

[Mike Pesca]

They can't. I will tell you. Part of this gambling scandal was one of LeBron James pals, a guy in his entourage, a friend who he kept around from the old days. Cuz you gotta keep your old friends close and loyal.

[Adam Felber]

He was absolutely.

[Mike Pesca]

He was tipping off the gamblers. So let's see. They don't have anything. Let's see what a quick bet is first.

[Adam Felber]

When the super bowl rolls around, there are the craziest bets in the world.

[Mike Pesca]

There's a lot of stupid bets. So at tonight's Clippers Orlando Magic game, which as we speak is. I might be destroying the recency or the immediacy of the podcast.

[Adam Felber]

It's okay.

[Mike Pesca]

Someone listening will be saying, wait a minute, the Magic played the Clippers weeks ago.

[Adam Felber]

I would have taken the Magic on this game.

[Mike Pesca]

The Clippers are down by 23 points and yeah, it's in the fourth and no one should care, but damn it it. Don't you want to know if Desmond Bain, who is currently sitting at three three pointers, will make five three pointers for $100 bet? You could make $1200 on that. You could bet on different rebounds, you could bet on the assists, you could bet on player combos like first to record 40 points plus rebounds, plus assists. Yeah, so a lot. Oh, total number of points. But in the whole game combined, odd or even. And this gets to how do they make money? The odds should be 50, 50. But no, if you want to bet. Yeah, if you want to bet a total, the total number of points in 7 minutes 57 seconds. And the only reason that there is no one who has any insight on this, it's just, I'm not going to say degenerate gambling, but it's just. Let's just take an odd and do a coin flip with worse odds than a coin flip. If you want to bet odds, it's minus 116, which means you have to bet $11 and 60 cents to win 10. And if you want to bet even, it's minus 1 10, which means you have to bet eleven dollars to win ten. So either way, and if there is an even amount of money on that bet the sports book is going to make. Yeah, that money.

[Adam Felber]

That totally makes sense. That's the vig. That's the old fashioned vig, isn't it?

[Mike Pesca]

Yeah.

[Paula Poundstone]

I used to like to go to the track. I don't know anything about horses.

But I always like to make a bet that was, you know, not likely to happen, in my opinion, so that I, you know, so that the return would be great if it did happen.

[Mike Pesca]

Yes.

[Paula Poundstone]

And, you know, one of my bets was that the horse I picked would go place the bet for me because, you know, I didn't always like to get up out of my chair and, you know, I never did come in.

[Adam Felber]

But that never came in.

[Paula Poundstone]

If it did, man, I would. I'll tell you what, I would not be doing it a fucking podcast. I would be. You know what? I would still be doing the podcast.

[Mike Pesca]

You'd be show. You'd be showing off that trained horse who has one trick, which is placing the bet. Now, did you. Growing up in the Boston area, did you ever go to Wonderland racetrack and watch the dogs? The dogs?

[Paula Poundstone]

No. I remember, but no, I didn't go to anything like that until I didn't live there anymore.

[Mike Pesca]

I will tell you. So the name of the rabbit, the electronic. The electric rabbit who raises. That's it. Here comes Swifty.

[Paula Poundstone]

Swifty.

[Mike Pesca]

And a greyhound owner once told me that every once in a while, Swifty and the different tracks have different names. They break down and then the dogs do catch them and what happens? It ruins the dogs. They never run hard again. Yeah. They're like, that was it. That was it.

[Adam Felber]

It's just made of metal and stuffing and what the hell was I chasing?

[Mike Pesca]

Crisis. And they go on a three week and they take up smoking.

[Adam Felber]

It's really terrible when you see a dog go that way.

[Paula Poundstone]

Yeah, that was us, Jason, podcasting. We finally caught it.

[Adam Felber]

Yep. And look how disappointed we all are.

[Paula Poundstone]

Now we just throw money out the window. Well, wow, this was really informative. And guess what? I'm not gonna place any sports bets tonight.

[Mike Pesca]

I think I've done my job.

[Adam Felber]

Yeah, well done, Mike. He's the host of the Gist podcast and. And he's a sports betting expert. And our pal, Mike. It was great to have you on our show. Mike Pesca, everybody.

[Paula Poundstone]

Thanks, Mike.

[Mike Pesca]

Thanks so much.

[Adam Felber]

All across America, people are in their cars applauding for you, Mike.

[Mike Pesca]

And also trying to get that last wager down on Ivan Zubak to have over 12 rebounds.

And that's it for the show, not his show. He had more of a it. But for our Saturday show, I will talk to you on Monday.