After three years of debate, the Ohio legislature passed legal sports gambling last December. The deadline for state regulators to launch sports betting is January 1, 2023. Before then, rules and licensing must be finalized; then Ohioans will be able to bet at retail sportsbooks, online or on apps and at kiosks at bars with specific liquor licenses.
Jessica Franks, spokeswoman for the Ohio Casino Control Commission, which will oversee sports betting, said creating the rules could take up to six months. “We’re going to need the rest of this year to get everything done,” Franks said. Applications for sports betting operator licenses will not be available until the summer or fall, she said.
The commission released proposed rules in two stages. The first batch focused on provisional licensing and testing standards. The second set covered licensing for mobile and retail sportsbooks, general wagering provisions and equipment. The comment period ended January 28 for the first set and will close February 4 for the second group.
Ohio, which hosts 11 casinos and racinos, will allow 25 Class A licenses for mobile and online betting, and 40 Class B licenses for retail sportsbooks; the state’s eight sports teams would get preference for those licenses. The Professional Golf Association locations in Akron and Dublin and NASCAR at the Mid-Ohio Speedway near Mansfield also are eligible to open sportsbooks.
Meanwhile, at JACK Entertainment, Vice President of Sports and Digital Gaming Adam Suliman said, “We’re as eager as our customers are to get it live.” He said sportsbooks are planned for JACK Cleveland Casino and JACK Thistledown Racino in North Randall. He called the venues “Vegas lite” because they won’t be as large as sportsbooks found in Las Vegas. Suliman pointed out while sportsbooks used to be the hub of betting action, but technology has changed the industry.
“What we’re learning very quickly in this space is that customers just expect to be able to bet on their mobile devices and in every state where mobile and online wagering has been allowed, it is the preference of customers to use that medium. In fact, I was just looking at some numbers out of Arizona and upwards of like 94 percent of the bets are taken mobile versus in a retail environment,” Suliman said.
But not everyone automatically knows how to place a mobile bet. That’s why JACK’s website BetJack.com and app features a “training camp” to explain sports betting and its lingo to newcomers. Suliman said, “This is a new business and it’s a new gambling opportunity and it can be confusing. Anybody who has walked up to a blackjack table who has never played before can tell that can be a bit intimidating so the way we view our job now is to help educate and sort of train customers, provide a training camp, if you will, to help people understand how this type of gambling works and so we’re offering that on BetJack.com right now.”
To further help educate the public, Suliman said a free-to-play option will launch on the website soon. “Primarily that goal is just to help customers get their feet wet a little bit and get some reps in before real money starts flying around and hopefully, we get them comfortable with not only our product but just the industry in general. I just think it’s kind of our responsibility as an operator to help educate the customers here in Ohio.”
