After a protracted debate exploring all angles of why or why not to allow sports betting on a series of Super Bowl coin toss prop bets, the Massachusetts Gaming Commission Wednesday afternoon voted not to allow the bets. The decision came after a vote during which commissioners unanimously agreed that such wagers are not already part of the state’s betting catalogue and would have to be added.
The possible bets discussed included betting on the coin toss result (heads or tails), the winner of the Super Bowl coin toss (Chiefs or 49ers), and a prop bet of the coin toss winner to also win the game.
According to commissioners, FanDuel requested clarification about a group of prop bets related to Sunday’s Super Bowl, but never made a formal request for a decision. Some commissioners were clear in saying that a discussion so close to this year’s game was “disappointing” and that operators have long known when the game was scheduled for and that the wager is not part of the current bet menu.
Commissioner Eileen O’Brien, one of three who opposed allowing the wagers, said that she didn’t think that the commission should “change process” in order to allow the bets so close to the game. Because no formal request to add bets was made, the decision to do so would have been the commission’s doing, and in the first year of legal online sports betting, it has not once added wagering markets unless there was a formal request.