DraftKings Sportsbook: Coming Soon To A State Near You?

If you're in New Jersey, you have access to the new DraftKings Sportsbook. Here's a rundown of where you can find DraftKings for sports betting now and in the future.

DraftKings Sportsbook online

The well-dressed DraftKings NJ sports betting platform operates under the license of Resorts Atlantic City, but it's available across web and mobile channels statewide. As long as you're in the state, you can wager.

The product is perhaps more polished and market-ready than we expected from DraftKings. The company was, after all, solely a daily fantasy sports outfit until May of 2018.

It was the first online sportsbook in the state and currently the biggest in terms of revenue.

Land-based DraftKings Sportsbooks

There are currently two land-based DraftKings Sportsbooks in the US:

• DraftKings Sportsbook at Resorts, in New Jersey
• DraftKings Sportsbook at Scarlet Pearl Resort in Mississippi.

States that may have DraftKings Sportsbooks in the future

Potential for growth is capped in the short term, however. While FanDuel has racked up market-access partnerships throughout the country, DraftKings is still pretty lean on that front.

Here's the list of states in which you might see the next DraftKings Sportsbook pop up, and it's not a very long one:

New York

Apart from NJ, New York is the only other state in which DraftKings has a confirmed point of entry. It announced a partnership with Del Lago in July 2018 that covers both retail and online/mobile operations. If that materializes, Del Lago could end up christening the first on-property, DraftKings-branded sportsbook in the country.

That's all well and good, except NY sports betting is not yet in place. Voters approved the activity for four commercial casinos in 2013, but regulators have lagged on implementation. What's more: that existing law excludes online/mobile wagering, so a new one likely will be required before the DraftKings Sportsbook app launches in NY.

Recent rumblings create some cause for optimism on the retail side, but the timeline for NY sports betting is still very much up in the air.

Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania is a little closer to becoming an online sports betting state than its neighbor.

Full legalization came late last year, and regulators have just started to put the wheels into motion for launch. Temporary regulations are being tweaked, and the window is now open for applications. They cost $10 million apiece. The first sportsbooks have started to open.

DraftKings figures to be a candidate to partner with one of the PA casinos, but it would have limited ability to fully leverage its brand. State regulations permit each casino to deploy just a single online/mobile platform displaying its own logo. Each may only use one sports betting partner.

About half of the 13 prospective licensees are off the board, it appears:

• SugarHouse/Rivers: Owned by Rush Street, which has a partnership with Kambi. That’s DraftKings’ supplier, too, but there’s no indication it is part of the deal.
• Parx: Recently announced that it will use GAN to power its operations.
• Presque Isle/Lady Luck: Both will soon be operated by Churchill Downs, which has established a partnership with SBTech.
• Harrah's: Parent company Caesars has an NJ partnership with Scientific Games that figures to carry across the border.

It’s also impossible to pin down a timeline for the launch of online PA sports betting, but it’s coming sometime in 2019.

West Virginia

The launch of WV sports betting happened in 2018. The West Virginia Lottery has posted temporary regulations for public comment and issued the first interim permits over the last couple weeks. Several sportsbooks have already opened as of the fall of 2018.

Regulators in WV have crafted a framework that's more hospitable to DraftKings and other mobile-first operators.

Each of the state's five casinos is permitted to offer up to three online/mobile platforms, making room for as many as 15 individual brands in the marketplace. DraftKings doesn’t have a confirmed WV alliance, but it likely will pursue opportunities.

FanDuel has the opposite problem. It was ahead of the game, announcing a partnership with The Greenbrier way back in June. FanDuel Sportsbook is eventually going to offer both retail and online/mobile wagering, but it doesn't have an app ready to go yet. DraftKings has the app, but it's lacking the dance partner.

Nevada

This one could be interesting, since Nevada is one of the few states in which daily fantasy sports is explicitly prohibited as a skill game. DraftKings is a sports betting company now, though, an activity that is very much legal and thriving in the Silver State.

It has generally seemed unlikely that DraftKings would pursue Nevada sports betting, but nothing is a given anymore. The company recently announced plans to open an office in Las Vegas, which at least draws a raise of the eyebrow. DraftKings wouldn't pay for a license to offer DFS as a “gambling” game, but might it do so in the world of widespread sports betting?

It’s also worth noting that CG Technologies is being pushed out of the Nevada market amid a string of gaming violations. Either it or the many sportsbooks it serves will need to find a replacement supplier, and a shiny new option has just become available courtesy of DraftKings.

File that last bit of evidence in the circumstantial folder.

Other candidates

Any state with legal sports betting should be considered a candidate for a DraftKings Sportsbook, really. In this post-PASPA world, company executives have made no secrets about their ambitions.

Rhode Island and Delaware have both legalized sports betting, too. Neither allows mobile betting, however, and neither even has provisions for additional partnerships. The industries in both are administered by state-chosen suppliers under the lottery's direction.

It looks like the states broken down above represent the complete list of candidates for DraftKings Sportsbook in the short term, then. Despite its early lead, it's even possible that it could still be stuck in only NJ and Mississippi when the calendar ticks over.

At least they have Barkley.

The post DraftKings Sportsbook: Coming Soon To A State Near You? appeared first on Legal Sports Report.

Original source: https://www.legalsportsreport.com/22985/draftkings-sportsbook-states/

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