Is gambling the reason we have pro sports?

Summary

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Podcast Summary: The Indicator from Planet Money

Episode: Is gambling the reason we have pro sports?
Date: June 17, 2026
Hosts: Waylon Wong, Darian Woods
Guest: David Pacchino (Associate Professor, Elon University; Author of "Over: An Unexpected History of Sports Betting")

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Episode Overview

This episode explores the powerful, and sometimes fraught, relationship between gambling and the rise of professional sports in the United States. The discussion is centered around the provocative thesis from David Pacchino that American sports, as we know them, were fundamentally shaped—and popularized—by gambling. The episode traces this connection from the early days of baseball up through the massive modern sports betting industry, examining anxieties, scandals, and societal impacts along the way.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Historical Roots of Sports Gambling

• Global Context: Gambling on sports traces back to ancient Greece and was a dominant part of European horse racing by the 1600s.
  • “The FIFA Men's World Cup is expected to be the biggest sports betting event ever. Around the world, sports gambling has a long history that goes back millennia.” — Darian Woods [00:09]
• US Legal Framework: Sports gambling was largely illegal in the US until a 2018 Supreme Court ruling allowed states to legalize it.
• Pacchino’s Argument: Rather than gambling springing from sports’ popularity, American sports themselves became significant in large part because of gambling.
  • “If you look back, betting and wagering and the people who place bets were basically at the beginning of nearly every single American sport league and competition that we have.” — David Pacchino [00:59]

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2. Gambling as the Catalyst for Spectatorship

• Recreational to Spectator: Baseball, and by extension other sports, started as recreational activities. Gambling made watching sports compelling to spectators.

  • “You know what's going to create that spark that says let's all get together and go watch people play baseball? … what got those people to go out and watch baseball games was gambling, was betting…. it just gives us a reason to root for one team or the other.” — David Pacchino [04:22]

• In-game Betting: Early forms of betting included pitch-by-pitch wagers, a precursor to modern in-game betting.

  • “There is evidence that people were doing what DraftKings and FanDuel call in-game betting now, right? Pitch by pitch.” — David Pacchino [04:52]

• Memorable Quote:

  • “And it just gives us a reason to root for one team or the other.” — David Pacchino [04:25]

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3. The Ingredients for a National Sport

• Three Essential Ingredients: Gambling, statistics, and publicity.

  • “The official historian of Major League Baseball has said that gambling is one of three essential ingredients for a game to grow into a national professional sport. That’s because betting helps people care about the outcome of a game.” — Waylon Wong [05:17]

• Customer Value: Gamblers became valuable customers—buying more tickets and staying longer at games.

  • “Spectators that placed bets… bought more tickets and stayed for longer.” — Darian Woods [05:39]

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4. The Business of Integrity

• Leagues’ Uneasiness: Owners have always been wary of the association with gambling, fearing it could lead to match fixing and damaged integrity (and value) of the sport.

  • “They thought that gambling would lead to fixed games and fixed games would lead to the damage to the integrity of the game. I've come to believe that the word integrity is really just a stand in for value.” — David Pacchino [06:13]

• Scandals: Several notorious game-fixing scandals have shaped this tension.

• Modern Resilience: Recent scandals haven’t dented sports’ popularity.

  • “Sports have literally never been more popular.” — David Pacchino [06:59]

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5. The Modern Landscape of Sports Betting

• Massive Growth: In 2025, sports betting revenues reached $17 billion—a 23% increase over the prior year.

  • “Sports betting revenues totaled $17 billion in 2025. That's up 23% from the prior year.” — Waylon Wong [07:27]

• Integration: Leagues, teams, networks, and even athletes have partnerships with betting companies.

• Collateral Problems: Addiction, game-fixing, and even athlete harassment have risen.

  • “Around 35% of Division 1 men's basketball players reported experiencing social media abuse related to sports betting.” — Waylon Wong [07:48]

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6. Technology and Accessibility

• New Betting Formats: Prediction markets (like Kalshi) enable peer-to-peer betting.

• Accessibility Shift: The explosion of online/mobile betting is less about social change, more about convenience.

  • “If you had given people in the 1930s phones… they would have been betting on college football just the same way we are.” — David Pacchino [08:41]

• Quote on Gambling’s Role:

  • “I've heard some pundits, you know, call gambling an invasive species. I think the opposite is true. I think gambling is native to American Sports.” — David Pacchino [08:41]

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7. Reflections and Concerns

• Student Sentiment: Despite nearly all sports management students participating in betting, most view it as a net negative.
  • “The vast majority think it's a net negative even though they participate in it.” — David Pacchino [03:07]
• Community vs. Individualism: Modern betting may undermine communal sports fandom, focusing attention on individual wagers instead of team loyalty.
  • “Fans who are more interested in their individual bets than the success of the team.” — David Pacchino [09:27]
• Outlook: David believes the next generation may develop ways to limit betting’s negative effects.
• Lighthearted Close:
  • “Wanna bet?” — Darian Woods [09:51]
  • “I'll bet you a nickel.” — Waylon Wong [09:52]

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On Early Gambling in Baseball:
  • “You take the red team, I'll take the blue team, we'll bet a nickel, we'll bet a dime, we'll bet a dollar, whatever…” — David Pacchino [04:25]
• On Gaming Scandals:
  • “There is immediate fallout, especially for the players involved. I think we’ve gotten to the point though where I’m not sure major game fixing scandals would have that much of an effect on the popularity of amateur and professional sports.” — David Pacchino [06:59]
• Provocative Thesis:
  • “Gambling is native to American sports.” — David Pacchino [08:41]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [00:09] – History of sports gambling
• [02:41] – Introduction of David Pacchino and his background
• [04:22] – How gambling drew crowds to baseball
• [05:17] – The essential ingredients of a professional sport
• [06:13] – Integrity, scandals, and business anxiety
• [07:27] – Modern boom in sports betting
• [08:41] – Gambling as “native,” not “invasive”; accessibility revolution
• [09:19] – Pacchino’s concerns about the social impact and future of sports betting

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Tone and Takeaways

The conversation is lively, candid, and thought-provoking, blending historical insight with cultural analysis and a dash of dry humor. The thesis—that American pro sports owe their prominence to gambling—upends traditional views, inviting listeners to think critically about why people care about sports and the broader economic forces at play.

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Transcript

[NPR Announcer]

Npr.

[Waylon Wong]

This is the Indicator from Planet Money. I'm Waylon Wong.

[Darian Woods]

And I'm Darian Woods. The FIFA Men's World cup is expected to be the biggest sports betting event ever. And around the world, sports gambling has a long history that goes back millennia, all the way back to ancient Olympic games in Greece. Spectators at horse horse races in England and France have been betting since the 17th century, and it's been legal in many countries for decades.

[Waylon Wong]

In the US though, sports gambling was essentially illegal until 2018.

[Darian Woods]

Other than Nevada and a handful of other places.

[Waylon Wong]

Right, always Nevada. Then in 2018, a Supreme Court decision allowed states to legalize this kind of betting. But David Pacchino has his own take about how long gambling has been a part of American sports. He's the author of the new book Over An Unexpected History of Sports Betting.

[David Pacchino]

If you look back, betting and wagering and the people who place bets were basically at the beginning of nearly every single American sport league and competition that we have. They were the first ones to show up.

[Darian Woods]

David argues that gambling is not something that grew out of American sports. It's actually the other way around. Collegiate and professional sports in the US Exist in their current form because of gambling.

[Waylon Wong]

Today on the show, David makes his case that the American love of wagering fueled the rise of professional sports. And he tells us how he views the current boom in gambling.

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[Capella University Announcer]

This message comes from Capella University. You know that feeling when there's a spark building inside you that you were meant for more? That's your own drive pushing you towards what's next. Capella University gets that with their flexpath learning format, you can set the pace and earn your degree without putting life on pause. You've built experience and know what you're capable of. Now this is your time to turn that momentum into more. The only real question is what can't you do? Learn more at capella.

[Darian Woods]

Edu David Pacchino is an associate professor of sport management at Elon University in North Carolina. The students in his program learn the business side of sports, from law to sales and marketing.

[Waylon Wong]

Do you like survey your Students about how many of them, you know, participate in sports gambling or have like DraftKings accounts? And is it like 90%, 100%? Like these sports management students?

[David Pacchino]

I survey them all the time. It's a super high percentage.

[Darian Woods]

Right.

[David Pacchino]

But the two most interesting pieces of information I get from my students, I asked them, do you know somebody who you think has a sports betting problem? And nearly all of them do raise their hands. But then I asked them, and these are kids who want to work in sport management in some capacity. I asked them if sport betting is a net negative or a net positive for American sports. And I leave it vague on purpose. And the vast majority think it's a net negative even though they participate in it.

[Darian Woods]

David's book charts how this uneasiness with gambling in the US Was there from the early days in sports like baseball, football and college basketball. So how did wagering on an outcome of a game even start? Well, David's book describes how sports didn't used to be a professional or semi professional activity.

[Waylon Wong]

You know, early on in your book, you point out something that I had never thought about before, which is this idea that if we take baseball, it used to be a recreational activity that people did for fun and it wasn't necessarily inevitable that Americans would pay money to watch other people play baseball. I mean, that for me was like something I really had to sit and think about.

[David Pacchino]

Yeah, no, you're absolutely right. And you know what's going to create that spark that says let's all get together and go watch people play baseball? You know what I found in those early years is that what got those people to go out and watch baseball games was gambling, was betting. Is that me and you show up to a game and I say, hey, you take the red team, I'll take the blue team, we'll bet a nickel, we'll bet a dime, we'll bet a dollar, whatever. And it just gives us a reason to root for one team or the other.

[Waylon Wong]

What were the early bets on baseball like?

[David Pacchino]

Like we don't have that much information on what they were specifically betting on because these were just literally random people sitting on bleachers right in, in Manhattan. But there is evidence that people were doing what DraftKings and FanDuel call in game betting now, right? Pitch by pitch. And so a batter comes up and say, I bet he gets a hit, I bet he doesn't. And we bet on that. And so this wasn't just who's going to win the game. People have been doing this sort of in Game betting for years.

[Waylon Wong]

And in fact, the official historian of Major League Baseball has said that gambling is one of three essential ingredients for a game to grow into a national professional sport. That's because betting helps people care about the outcome of a game.

[Darian Woods]

I don't think care for other reasons too. Nah, just the hard cold cash.

[Waylon Wong]

Want that nickel?

[Darian Woods]

David says the spectators that placed bets at games proved to be valuable customers. They bought more tickets and they stayed for longer.

[Waylon Wong]

The other two essential ingredients are statistics and publicity. And David says this combination of gambling stuff, stats and public awareness shows up in other professional sports like boxing and American football.

[Darian Woods]

But the people running these leagues haven't always felt comfortable with the connection to betting. Some of this is tied to cultural ebbs and flows in sentiment around gambling. But David sees a business reason behind the unease.

[David Pacchino]

They thought that gambling would lead to fixed games and fixed games would lead to the damage to the integrity of the game. I've come to believe that the word integrity is really just a stand in for value. And so what they're saying is that hey, more gambling will lead to fixed games. Fixed games will then lead to potential decreased fan interest which will then bring down the fat. The value of our franchises, the value of our leagues. People won't show up anymore.

[Waylon Wong]

It's not an unreasonable anxiety, right? Because you document some of the most famous kind of fixes and scandals in sports and they were incredibly damage damaging, right? Like it's not good to fix the sports game.

[David Pacchino]

No, it, it's not. And there is immediate fallout, especially for the players involved. I think we've gotten to the point though where I'm not sure major game fixing scandals would have that much of an effect on the popularity of amateur and professional sports. And I might be taking a contrarian opinion here. We've had multiple game fixing scandals and suspensions and arrests since 2018. Sports have literally never been more popular.

[Waylon Wong]

And sports gambling in the US is more popular than ever. Leagues, teams, media networks and even individual athletes have official partnerships with gambling companies like sportsbook operators. Data from the American Gaming association show that sports betting revenues totaled $17 billion in 2025. That's up 23% from the prior year.

[Darian Woods]

All of this activity has been accompanied by not just game fixing scandals, but other problems like addiction and the harassment of players. The NCAA recently surveyed athletes and found that around 35% of Division 1 men's basketball players reported experiencing social media abuse related to sports betting.

[Waylon Wong]

Meanwhile, prediction markets like Kalshi offer another way to bet on games. With a typical sports Book customers place a bookmaker. The house, essentially a prediction market, is peer to peer. There is no house.

[Darian Woods]

Despite the different mechanics, the end result is still people wagering on games. That's why some lawmakers have criticized prediction market companies for skirting regulations around sports betting.

[Waylon Wong]

Regardless of the platform, David says gambling has become super accessible to fans. They can place bets through a mobile app.

[David Pacchino]

I've heard some pundits, you know, call gambling an invasive species. I think the complete opposite is true. I think gambling is native to American Sports. The last 20 years, when people have been gambling more, it's an accessibility shift. If you had given people in the 1930s phones and the laws and the Internet, they would have been betting on college football just the same way we are.

[Waylon Wong]

Did reporting this book, you know, reshape your thinking in any way around these things?

[David Pacchino]

It has changed my thinking in some ways. The biggest one is that I don't love that betting is this big a part of American sports. Even if it was inevitable.

[Darian Woods]

David says he doesn't like how modern betting has stripped away the communal aspects of sports fandom. And his students agree.

[David Pacchino]

They do see the pitfalls that are put before us here, the potential drawbacks to fans who are more interested in their individual bets than they are for the success of the team. And I think that's a good thing because I don't think we're getting rid of legal sports betting anytime soon.

[Waylon Wong]

David says he's optimistic that the new generation will come up with ways to limit the negative effects of sports gambling.

[Darian Woods]

Wanna bet?

[Waylon Wong]

I'll bet you a nickel the stakes

[Darian Woods]

are so low, you might get one.

[Waylon Wong]

This episode was produced by Julia Ritchie with engineering by Jimmy Keeley. It was fact checked by Cierra Juarez. Kicking Cannon is our show's editor and the indicator is a production of N.

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