When the Supreme Court overturned PASPA in 2018, most of the media industry treated it as a story about gambling. Seven years in, it has become increasingly clear that it was just as much a story about broadcasting. The legalization of sports betting across more than 35 states has fundamentally changed how sports radio, regional sports networks and digital sports media make money, allocate inventory, and approach audience engagement.
I have spent the past few years watching this play out from the inside and the pace of change has surprised even people who expected it. What started as a few sportsbook ad spots during evening drive has turned into something much more structural.
Sportsbooks are now among the largest advertisers in sports media. The integration of betting content into editorial coverage has become routine and the business models of entire networks have shifted to account for the new revenue stream.
The advertising boom that changed the math
In the first three years after legalization, sportsbook advertising spend in the United States grew from a rounding error to one of the largest ad categories in sports media. DraftKings, FanDuel, BetMGM, Caesars – and a handful of smaller operators – collectively spent more than a billion dollars annually on broadcast and digital ads at the peak. With sports radio capturing a meaningful slice of that.
For station groups like Audacy, iHeart and Bonneville, the timing was a lifeline. Traditional sports radio advertisers, particularly automotive and quick-service restaurants, had been pulling back on terrestrial radio spend for years. Sportsbook money filled that gap and then some, particularly in football markets where the cross-promotional value was obvious.
The market has matured since then. Sportsbook spend has consolidated as DraftKings and FanDuel have pulled away from the chasing pack. And the days of every operator throwing money at every market are over. But the baseline has reset permanently. Sportsbooks are now a structural revenue category in sports media, not a temporary boom.
Editorial integration and the credibility question
The harder question for sports media operators has been how to integrate betting content without compromising editorial credibility. Some have leaned in fully, building dedicated betting podcasts, daily picks segments or betting-focused shoulder programming. Others have kept a more cautious line, treating betting coverage as a separate vertical rather than embedding it across their flagship programming.
When discussing this subject with Ziv Chen, author at Casino.com, he had the viewpoint that the operators succeeding in the long run are the ones who treat betting integration as an editorial discipline rather than a sales channel. His observation matches what I have heard from program directors across multiple markets.
The shows that have built durable audiences around betting content tend to share a few traits: they treat the audience as informed adults, they are transparent about the limits of their predictive power, and they invest in genuine analytical depth rather than empty hype.
The stations that got this wrong early on, treating every segment as a pitch for the latest sportsbook promo, learned quickly that listeners tune out the moment they sense they are being sold to. The ones that found the right balance now have some of the most engaged audiences in the format.
Regulatory risk is the underappreciated story
The other dimension that doesn’t get enough attention is regulatory risk. State-level gambling regulators have been increasingly active in scrutinizing how sports betting is marketed and discussed in the media. Ohio, Massachusetts and New York have all taken action against operators or broadcasters for promotional content that crossed lines that did not exist five years ago.
For sports media companies, this creates a compliance burden that did not exist before. Disclaimers, age-gating, responsible gambling messaging and the line between editorial commentary and promotional content all have to be managed actively. Most of the larger station groups have invested in dedicated compliance staffing for their betting content, which would have been unimaginable a decade ago.
The federal picture remains less clear. There have been periodic discussions about national-level standards for sports betting advertising, similar to the rules that exist for alcohol or pharmaceutical ads, but no concrete legislation has moved. Most operators and media companies I speak with expect that to change at some point in the next few years, though no one is sure exactly when or in what form.
What I am watching for the rest of 2026
A few things are at the top of my list. First, the consolidation question. The sportsbook market has effectively become a two-horse race between DraftKings and FanDuel in most states, which has implications for how much ad spend they need to deploy to maintain share. If that spending drops, sports media revenue planning will need to adjust quickly.
Second, the streaming layer. Amazon Prime Video’s NFL coverage and Netflix’s growing live sports footprint are introducing new venues for integrated betting content – and the rules around that are still being written in real time. Watching how those platforms handle the integration will tell us a lot about where the broader industry is heading.
Third, the responsible gambling pressure. The volume of public concern about problem gambling rates, particularly among young men, has grown significantly over the past two years. Whether that translates into tighter regulation, voluntary industry standards, or a public relations problem that operators eventually take seriously, the issue is not going away.
Sports media has spent the better part of a decade adjusting to the post-PASPA reality. The next phase is going to be about which operators, networks and shows actually built sustainable models on top of the new economics. But also a watchlist on the ones that were just riding the initial wave.
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