- Bally’s Corporation has announced a partnership with the National Hockey League (NHL) Nashville Predators as an ‘Official Sports Betting Partner’ and ‘Official Free-to-Play-Partner’ of the team and the Bridgestone Arena.
- This is Bally’s first partnership with a NHL team and with a professional sports team in the state of Tennessee.
- Tennessee’s ‘mobile only’ sports betting ecosystem is among the worst in the US thanks to a ridiculous ‘mandatory 10% hold’ and questionable regulatory oversight.
The less said about Tennessee sports betting the better. Simply put, Tennessee has among the worst regulatory frameworks of any US state. High taxes, ridiculous licensing fees and dubious regulatory expertise–that among other things has granted a sports betting license to a company that operates a chain of high interest payday loan stores with no relevant gaming experience–has made Tennessee into a joke throughout the industry. The icing on top of this putrid cake is their ‘mandatory 10% hold’. Sportsbooks are *required* to hold at least 10% or be subject to fines. Never mind that this number is downright impossible in any sort of legitimate sports betting environment. To wit–the Nevada bookmaking industry has never come close to a 10% hold percentage. This means that sportsbooks are required to deal absurdly bad odds to players lest they run afoul of the state’s utterly insane hold percentage requirement.
Technically speaking, Tennessee has sports betting. Since the state had no interest in creating an industry that would benefit the betting public–or anyone else in Tennessee–companies have the opportunity to make a profit in an ecosystem where they’ve been given carte blanche to offer odds and markets that wouldn’t see the light of day in a legitimate jurisdiction. For that reason, it’s hard to blame any company for wanting to set up shop in Tennessee. If anyone in Tennessee is stupid enough–or has such a poor grasp of mathematical concepts–that they’re actually willing to play at a state regulated sportsbook instead of one of the many top flight offshore books hey deserve what they get. It’s no different from the claw games at the carnival or other borderline crooked games like state lotteries.
Bally’s is in the process of entering the Tennessee market and they’ve just announced a partnership deal with the NHL Nashville Predators. The deal has Bally’s designated as an ‘Official Sports Betting Partner’ and an ‘Official Free-to-Play Partner’ of the team and their home ice, Bridgestone Arena. A press release announcing the deal indicates that this is Bally’s first partnership with a NHL franchise and its first with a professional sports team in the state of Tennessee. Here’s what the press release describes as the first co-promotional endeavor between the team and Bally’s:
As the first offering in this partnership, Bally’s will soon launch Smashville Selector, an engaging, free-to-play game that offers fans the chance to compete for unique prizes. Available as an app on Android and iOS, Smashville Selector challenges fans to correctly answer five predictive questions ahead of select Predators games. Prizes will be awarded to the top competitor after each game, with a grand prize distributed to the highest-scoring Predators fan at the end of the season.
Smashville Selector is the latest offering in Bally’s product line of dynamic mobile sports apps, following this summer’s release of the free-to-play Bally Sports Trivia and real-money sports betting app Bally Bet in Colorado and Iowa. The Bally Bet sportsbook app is expected to launch in Tennessee in 2022.
Predators Executive Vice President and Chief Revenue Officer Chris Junghans, had this to say about the partnership between his team and Bally’s:
“From the moment sports betting launched in Tennessee, we’ve wanted to align with dynamic companies that will help us bring the best fans in sports even closer to the game we all love. We’ve found just that with Bally’s Corporation and Bally Bet, who we’re thrilled to welcome to the pro sports landscape in our state for the first time. Bally’s unique approach to content integration and brand alignment through their broadcast partnerships is going to be a game changer. We are excited to be one of the first teams to partner with Bally on this unique and exciting endeavor.”
Adi Dhandhania, Chief Operating Officer of Bally Interactive, the company’s digital division, is happy to be partnering with the Predators:
“The Nashville Predators occupy a special place in sports fans’ hearts across Tennessee and their Bridgestone Arena provides a unique and electric atmosphere. It will be a great venue in which to market our brand, especially when combined with Predators game broadcasts on Bally Sports South.”
The Bally Bet mobile sports betting app is currently live in Colorado and Iowa. They expect to go live in Tennessee at some point during 2022.
