Regulators in Nevada reject payouts to golf wagerers on miscalculated odds bets
Loose Cannon: A Tale of Betting Mishaps in Sin City
Nevada, the land of casinos and gaming, once again found itself at the heart of a betting controversy. This time, it's about two unwitting sports enthusiasts, Bret Tison and Melvin Fowler, who took a gamble on an outsider in a golf tournament in far-off Australia. The result? A hefty payout loss, all thanks to a glitch in the system.
In the hustle and bustle of November 2023, these two sports bettors plunked down their cash on the William Hill mobile betting app, part of Caesars Entertainment's empire. Their bet? On Joel Nachshon, a long-shot player ranked a lowly 1,162 in the world, to win the first round of the Fortinet Australian PGA Championship 2023 golf tournament.
The oddsmakers weren't kind to Nachshon. Though Tison made his bet at 200-1 odds, the tournament began, and Nachshon teed off at 2:40 p.m. By the time Tison placed his bet at 5:52 p.m., the odds had shortened to a more realistic 4-1.
The question is, why was Tison's bet paid out at the original, inflated odds of 200-1? It all comes down to a minor but crucial technical glitch: the golf-feed supplier had updated Nachshon's name from Joel MOSCATEL NACHSHON to Joel Moscatel Nachshon, causing the William Hill system to interpret this as a new golfer in the event with initial odds of 200-1.
The investigation revealed that both lines for Nachshon were active and available for wagering at 200-1, but only one line correctly updated the prices. The non-capitalized golfer Joel Moscatel Nachshon remained active on the board, but the 200-1 odds did not update as the round progressed.
Luckily for Tison, William Hill didn't ask for a rescission of the erroneous wager, considering it an "obvious error" according to its house rules. The house rules also allowed the resettlement of wagers. But when Tison was paid out $1,000 instead of the expected $40,200, he rightly protested. A dispute of $39,200 ensued.
During the hearing, Tison testified that it was his first time betting on a golf tournament, betting on Nachshon out of 150 players without doing any research. He relied on an "announcer's comment" and didn't notice that the odds were 200-1.
In Fowler's case, the situation was similar. He placed two in-game wagers on Nachshon, with his second wager at the inflated odds of 200-1. When the sportsbook discovered the error, it resettled the wager at the correct odds of 60-1, paying Fowler $12,200 instead of the expected $40,200. Fowler accepted the payment, leaving $28,000 in dispute.
The Nevada Gaming Control Board, after considering the case, ruled in favor of the sportsbook, citing the "obvious error" in the odds as justification for voiding the bets or adjusting the payouts to reflect correct odds. The decision has left these two sports fans with a bitter taste in their mouths, questioning the fairness of betting in the land of Sin City.
In the ensuing days, Bret Tison and Melvin Fowler, the sports enthusiasts, discovered that their shared love for sports-betting had led them into the world of sport-betting controversies. Despite their win in the Fortinet Australian PGA Championship 2023 golf tournament, they ended up losing out on substantial profits due to an erroneous glitch in the sports-betting platform they used, leading to debates about the fairness of sports-betting in Nevada.
