American Football and Online Gambling: a Clash of the Titans!
There are plenty of individuals and organizations lobbying against the UIGEA right now. The UIGEA is the law that makes it difficult for US players to gamble online, and from the way things have been going in recent months, there is a good chance that we will see this law overturned sometime during the next year. This would give all US players better access to the hundreds of online casinos and online blackjack games that are available.
The UIGEA, however, has some supporters. One of these is the National Football League (NFL), which believes the law should stay in place. The NFL sees all sports gambling involving American football games as a threat. Wagers placed on games, they say, threaten the integrity of the NFL system. How and why this should be the case is not clear, but the NFL has long opposed sports betting – perhaps they are afraid of sports betting leading fixed games.
Strangely, there is another law in the US that makes sports betting illegal anyway, whether it happens online or offline. So even if the UIGEA is overturned, US players still won’t be allowed to bet on NFL games. Moreover, many other countries in the world allow sports betting, so there are thousands of bets placed outside the US on every NFL game.
In fact, many of these foreign online gambling websites allow US players to join them and place bets. Whether it’s betting on the latest NFL game or playing online blackjack for real money, these sites have it all. Since they are run from other countries where the US government has no jurisdiction, it is hard to apply the UIGEA to them. Until such a time when online gambling in the US is once again freely available, these foreign sites are a good alternative for US players.
