Like marijuana and gay marriage, Americans’ attitudes towards sports betting have softened to the point where the practice is legal in a lot of states now. Leagues in every sport have official gaming partners they provide with proprietary information. It should be no surprise then that this environment has opened the door to the NFL allowing sportsbooks to advertise during games.
According to Bill King of Sports Business Journal, the league will allow its network partners to sell six ads per game to gambling companies. The rules mandate that they be spaced out in a way that puts one ad in each quarter, one in the pregame show and one at halftime. Joe Lucia of Awful Announcing points out that this will help avoid a situation similar to 2015, when DraftKings was advertising its daily fantasy products every 90 seconds during a game.
The NFL is also limiting who can buy these six spots. Caesars, DraftKings, FanDuel are permitted as official sponsors of the NFL. Four other sports books have been designated as “approved operators” that can purchase in-game advertising as well. They are BetMGM, FoxBet, PointsBet, and WynnBet.
Sportsbooks have spent a lot of money advertising their products in recent years as more states legalize betting on games. The NFL is limiting the available inventory, which likely means the spots will be priced at a premium.
By comparison, the NBA, which allowed in-game advertising for sportsbooks this past season, offered nearly double the amount of spots per game.
