Michigan Sports Betting Guide

History of Michigan Sports Betting

 

Sports betting in Michigan had long been illegal until a 2018 Supreme Court decision in Murphy v. National Collegiate Athletic Association to overturn the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA).  Once the federal government was no longer allowed to control how individual states handled sports betting, many states, including Michigan, legalized sports betting.

 

Within a month of the 2018 decision to allow states to make these decisions for themselves, the Michigan House of Representatives passed the measure with a 68-40 vote.  Although the bill took a while to reach the Michigan Senate, in 2019, it passed by means of a 35-3 vote.  Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer quickly signed the measure, projecting $19 million in revenue.

 

Retail sports betting went into effect in March of 2020, while online sports betting took nearly a year longer, and didn’t begin until January 2021.  Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, sports betting in Michigan got off to a slow start, bringing in just over $100,000 in revenue in March then closing until August.  In total, in 2020, Michigan brought in just over $18 million in revenue from retail sports betting.

 

Online sports betting paid immediate dividends in Michigan, as the state brought in about $17.5 million in just January 2021.  The year of 2021 as a whole was even more successful, as Michigan made over $319 million in revenue.  With information only available for the first quarter of 2022, the state has already brought in over $90 million in revenue.  If that remains steady over the full calendar year, that will represent an over $40 million increase in revenue from 2021.

What does this mean going forward?

As is the case with many other states that have legalized sports betting, don’t expect it to leave Michigan anytime soon.  While the measure passed with an expected $19 million in projections, the state made $300 million more than that in 2021, meaning that it won’t be going anywhere in the future.

 

The expectations versus reality of sports betting revenue in Michigan could lead other states to follow their lead and legalize sports betting.  If Michigan, the tenth most populated state, is bringing in over $300 million annually, larger states such as California, Texas, Ohio, and Georgia have to be wondering how much revenue they can bring in.  In the case of California and Texas, which are four and three times more populated than Michigan, respectively, those annual numbers could reach over $500 million.

How to bet in Michigan

Michigan is one of nineteen states with sports betting operations that allow both in-person retail sports betting and online sports betting.  While Michigan has 26 land casinos, only 20 of them currently have retail sports betting available.  Ten sportsbooks initially launched in January 2021.  Those sportsbooks were FanDuel Sportsbook, DraftKings Sportsbook, BetMGM Sportsbook, Caesars Sportsbook, Barstool Sportsbook, WynnBET Sportsbook, Golden Nugget Sportsbook, BetRivers, TwinSpires Sportsbook and PointsBet.  One week later, Fox Bet launched, with Four Winds Sportsbook launching the following month.

 

Five months later, in July, the 13th sportsbook in Michigan, FireKeepers Sportsbook, launched.  Play Gun Lake became the 14th sportsbook to launch in Michigan, and the final one of 2021.  In April 2022, Eagle Casino and Sports became the final sportsbook overall to launch in Michigan.  The law that passed allowed 15 online sportsbooks so unless there is an amendment to the law then these 15 sportsbooks should be the only ones in the state.

 

Michigan sports bettors are able to bet on sporting events, including, but not limited to, baseball, basketball, football, hockey, soccer, golf, tennis, MMA, boxing, auto racing, and horse racing.  The combination of multiple sportsbooks, as well as, multiple sports residents are able to place bets on gives those in Michigan many options when it comes to betting.