Missouri launches sports betting as recent scandals shine a spotlight on the growing industry

Missouri launched legal sports betting Monday, allowing residents to place wagers on professional athletes’ individual performances—except when it comes to players from Missouri colleges and universities. This restriction on “proposition bets” highlights growing concerns as legal sports betting expands to its 39th state since the Supreme Court’s landmark 2018 ruling.

The timing of Missouri’s launch coincides with a series of gambling-related scandals that have rocked the sports world. Two Cleveland Guardians pitchers were recently charged with accepting bribes to throw specific pitches, an NBA player was arrested for allegedly providing inside information to gamblers, and six men’s college basketball players lost their eligibility over accusations of manipulating their performance. Each case centered around proposition bets—wagers focused on individual player statistics rather than game outcomes.

Prop bets have become particularly vulnerable to manipulation because they concentrate significant financial stakes on a single player’s performance, creating opportunities for threats or bribes. For example, bettors might wager on a pitcher throwing a certain number of strikeouts, a basketball player scoring a specific point total, or a quarterback exceeding a particular passing yardage.

“This creates a situation where athletes can become targets,” said an industry expert familiar with the growing concerns around prop betting integrity.

Sports betting has seen remarkable growth, with operators collecting over $11 billion through the first three quarters of this year—a 13% increase from 2022, according to American Gaming Association data. While national statistics specifically tracking prop bets are limited, industry analysts confirm their growing popularity.

Research from West Virginia University’s Center for Gaming Research and Development revealed that during a one-month period this summer, proposition bets comprised more than half of all wagers on one major betting platform. Brad Humphreys, an economics professor directing the research, noted that almost all these wagers involved parlays, where multiple bets are combined into one larger wager requiring all components to win.

“Prop bets speed up the ability to make multiple bets,” explained Rachel Volberg, a gambling research professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. This acceleration carries “a higher risk of developing addictive behavior for some bettors,” she warned. Missouri’s new program allocates at least $5 million annually for problem gambling services—a standard practice in states with legalized betting.

Regulatory approaches to proposition betting vary widely across the country. While all states with legal sports betting currently allow prop bets on professional athletes, New Jersey has proposed legislation to ban them. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine recently told The Associated Press he regrets signing his state’s sports gambling law and has urged regulators to end player-specific micro betting.

College athlete prop bets face even more varied restrictions. More than a dozen states place no limits on collegiate prop bets, while an equal number prohibit them entirely. Missouri joins approximately seven other states with prohibitions only applying to in-state college teams.

The restriction was included in Missouri’s constitutional amendment authorizing sports betting, which voters narrowly approved last year following a state-record $43 million campaign funded primarily by industry giants DraftKings and FanDuel.

“We thought this was a good middle ground that had worked in other states and that would uphold the integrity of the games here,” said Jack Cardetti, spokesperson for the Sports Betting Alliance, an industry group supporting the amendment.

Critics question the effectiveness of Missouri’s narrowly tailored restrictions. “That’s going to be a Band-Aid on a dam that’s breaking here,” said Nathan Novemsky, a professor of marketing and psychology at Yale University, “because folks will just make those bets on other teams.”

The Missouri Gaming Commission has assigned three employees to regulate sports betting and is seeking to hire a fourth, according to commission chair Jan Zimmerman. However, detecting fraudulent betting activity largely falls to the betting operators themselves, working in coordination with sports leagues and law enforcement.

Recent scandals have prompted industry responses. After the indictment of two Cleveland Guardians pitchers, Major League Baseball announced an agreement with leading sportsbooks to cap bets on individual pitches at $200 and exclude them from parlays.

Despite the scandals, Missouri residents like Brett Koenig are eager to place legal bets. Koenig, who previously crossed the Mississippi River into Illinois to wager legally, plans to bet on Monday night’s NFL game from home. “It’s something I’ve been looking forward to for a long time,” said Koenig, who advocated for legalized sports betting on social media. “I’m ecstatic to have the opportunity to do it, and to not have to drive 45 minutes across the river.”