‘We won almost every game’: Inside Nevada sportsbooks’ best month

• David Purdum, ESPN Staff WriterNov 8, 2024, 07:31 AM ET

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  • Joined ESPN in 2014
  • Journalist covering gambling industry since 2008

Nevada bookmakers have been taking bets since 1949, but they have never experienced anything like this past September.

On September Sundays at Las Vegas sportsbooks, bettors shook their heads in disgust, while behind the scenes in the risk rooms, bookmakers glanced at their computer screens then looked at each other with sheepish grins, asking, “Is this really happening?”

By the end of September, Nevada sportsbooks were up $80.9 million, the most ever in a single month in the state’s sports betting history.

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“Between Weeks 2 and 3, we won almost every single game,” said Jay Kornegay, the longtime chief at the Westgate SuperBook in Las Vegas. “I can’t remember saying that ever.”

Big NFL upsets were behind the record month. Twenty-six NFL favorites lost outright in September, the most in the opening month of the season since 2002. The largest favorite on the board was upset in each of the first three weeks, and teams that were favored by six or more points went 9-13 straight-up and a dismal 3-19 against the spread for the month. Touchdown favorites had never had a losing record straight-up over a month in the Super Bowl era — until September 2024.

“Between Weeks 2 and 3, we won almost every single game. I can’t remember saying that ever.” Jay Kornegay, chief at the Westgate SuperBook in Las Vegas

Football, both NFL and NCAA, accounted for $55.8 million of the record September win. It was the second-most lucrative month for football, behind only November 2020 ($56.0 million). Bookmakers said that, while they had a good start to the college football season, the NFL was the catalyst to the record month.

NFL favorites went 27-37 against the spread during the month, their worst covering performance since September 2022, but the outright upsets did the most damage to the betting public. The Cincinnati Bengals lost to the New England Patriots as 7.5-point favorites in Week 1. The Baltimore Ravens lost to the Las Vegas Raiders as 8.5-point favorites in Week 2. The Bengals lost to the Washington Commanders as 6.5-point favorites in Week 3, and the New York Jets lost to the Denver Broncos as 8-point favorites in Week 4.

Nevada sportsbooks’ most lucrative months

“When you start seeing the favorites losing outright, it compounds the recreational players’ losses,” Kornegay said, “because not only do they love to play the perceived better team, but they also love to tease them and parlay them. And when you knock them out straight-up, it’s beneficial to the bookmaker.”

The upsets also took their toll on survivor contests that require players to pick one straight-up winner each week. Las Vegas casino Circa’s survivor contest attracted 14,266 entries at $1,000 each, producing a $14.2 million grand prize. By the end of September, only 460 entries were still alive.

“I wish everyone was still in it,” Derek Stevens, the owner of Circa, told ESPN. “I want people to get value, feel like they’ve had a lot of enjoyment and satisfaction out of it. When you get knocked out in Week 1 or 2, your emotion is bitterness. That’s not really optimal for us.”

Plenty of cash exchanged hands at Nevada sportsbooks in September, and the books won big. Photo by Ethan Miller/Getty Images

Football was only part of the September story for Nevada sportsbooks, though.

Nevada Gaming Control tracks monthly sports betting revenue on football, basketball, baseball and hockey. Professional and collegiate sports are included in each category. Betting on the remaining sports, including soccer, boxing, MMA, auto racing, golf and tennis, is lumped into a category titled “Other.”

In September, the sportsbooks won $10.4 million on the Other category. It’s the second-most ever in any month for the category, behind only August 2017, when the Conor McGregor-Floyd Mayweather fight on the Las Vegas Strip fueled a record $20 million win in the Other category.

When asked what produced September’s big win in the Other category, bookmakers and Nevada gambling industry analysts pointed to UFC 306, which took place ahead of Mexican Independence Day at the Sphere in Las Vegas and featured an upset in the main event.

“The volume on that day was tremendous,” Stevens said. “That was the biggest weekend of the whole month.”

Nevada sportsbooks’ most lucrative football months

As the big winning weekends continued in September, some bookmakers became concerned that they were winning too much, too early in the season and wondered if the hot start would temper the betting action later in the season.

“Every report that came out on Sunday nights and Mondays, we were saying, ‘Holy smokes, what a big weekend we had.'” Stevens said. “What happened in the first four weeks of the football seasons, that’s not sustainable. No one would be gambling anymore.”

October would quell those concerns, as NFL bettors bounced back. Only 15 NFL favorites lost outright in October. Favorites covered the spread in 61.7% of games during the month.

Nevada sportsbooks have not posted a statewide net loss in a month since April 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the sports world. Reports for October aren’t typically released until after Thanksgiving.

“It’s rare where you’re underwater,” said Kornegay, who’s a 30-plus-year bookmaker in Nevada. “I can probably count on one hand how many times that’s happened to us in the last 30 years that we actually lost for the month. [October] is one of those for the months. It’s been really rough, especially the NFL.”

Through September, Nevada sportsbooks were up $370.7 million, on pace for the state’s most lucrative year ever.

“When you have these big, big wins, if you’re a bookmaker, you can’t take that stuff too seriously and when you take these big losses, you got to continue to run the process,” Stevens said. “I just think that it was disproportional how it fell at the beginning of the year. October’s been a pretty good players’ month. November, I guess we’ll see how things going to play out.”

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