Majority Sale Of Mavericks Could Help Texas Sports Betting

• Mark Cuban is selling majority ownership of the Dallas Mavericks.
• The Las Vegas Sands will work to try and bring sports betting to Texas.

DALLAS – After purchasing the Dallas Mavericks for $285 million in 2000, Mark Cuban is selling his majority ownership stake in the team for $3.5 billion to Miriam Adelson and Patrick Dumont, the owners of the Las Vegas Sands corporation.

With the sale, Cuban along with the two families will look to bring legal sports betting to Texas along with adding more casinos as well. Before selling to the Las Vegas Sands group, Cuban had expressed partnering with them to bring a resort style casino to the Dallas area that would have a built in sports arena.

Despite the pieces coming into place in terms of support, on the legal side, Texas sports betting has seen some troubles coming to light. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick expressed earlier in 2023 that there was no interest in expanding gambling.

I’ve said repeatedly there is little to no support for expanding gaming from Senate GOP. I polled members this week. Nothing changed. The senate must focus on issues voters expect us to pass. We don’t waste time on bills without overwhelming GOP support. HB1942 won’t be referred.…

— Office of the Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick (@LtGovTX) May 13, 2023

In the current day in Texas, all gambling options are limited. There are just three tribal casinos and no forms of regulated online or in person sports betting.

There have been recent attempts to male regulated sports betting in Texas in any capacity. In 2023, a group of all major sports betting companies partnered and backed a bill that would regulate an online only sports betting market. It did gain some traction by passing through the House vote but fell through in the Senate. Prior to that, there were three separate attempts in 2021 that all fell short.

While Cuban and the Las Vegas Sands company try and get things situated on the regulated side, it has been estimated that licensed online sportsbooks such as Bovada and BetOnline have been taking in north of $6 billion annually in revenue.

News tags: Dallas Mavericks | Las Vegas Sands | Mark Cuban | Texas