Of course, I could only be talking about my buddy and gambling recovery expert, Arnie Wexler.
He knows the in’s and out’s of College Basket Ball and Sports Betting Mania Gambling!
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So here are a few thoughts from Arnie Wexler about March Madness and sports betting on college basketball and more. Arnie is very passionate with advocating about all forms of problem gambling. I don’t know much about this, but that is some of what Arnie’s new book is about, “All Bets Are Off.” Co-written with Steve Jacobson.
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About Arnie & Steve:
Arnie Wexler’s life as a gambler began on the streets of Brooklyn, New York, flipping cards, shooting marbles, and playing pinball machines. At age fourteen he found the race-track, a bookie, and started playing the stock market. His obsession with gambling accelerated until a fateful day in 1968 when it all came crashing down.
Wexler’s gripping narrative leads us through the dungeon of a compulsive gambler’s world—chasing the big win and coming up with empty pockets—and how his addiction drove him and his wife, Sheila, to the edge of life. With help, they managed to escape, and together they have devoted themselves to helping others with the problem they know so well.
Steve Jacobson was a sports reporter and columnist for Newsday for more than forty years with a great interest in all aspects of sports. He co-authored a number of books with notable sports personalities. He was named by Associated Press among the top sports columnists and twice was nominated by Newsday for the Pulitzer Prize.
A Message From Arnie:
HOW many have started their gambling addiction with MARCH MADNESS?
“Who knows how many college students are going to bet on these games? And how many who will place the 1st bet they ever make on one of the games and might become an Addicted Gambler.”
How many athletes will place a bet on a game as well? Maybe even some that are playing actually in the games.!
Arnie Wexler: I over the years, have spoken to many athletes who had a gambling addiction college and pro sports, and “It is easier to gamble than it is to buy cigarettes or a can of beer on college campuses all over the country.”
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How about Pro Sports players who have been in trouble or in “The Media” due to THEIR addiction to gambling and sports betting. Here are just a couple I came across..
Andrew Joseph, azcentral sports
“The gambling escapades of Charles Barkley are not a secret. The former Suns star has been open about his habits and that continued when he joined Campus Insiders’ Seth Davis for an interview.
Davis asked Barkley about his two-year break from gambling, and Barkley shed some light on just how bad it got. Barkley projected that he had lost a million dollars on 30 separate occasions.”
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(Photo: Mark J. Rebilas/USA TODAY Sports) . . .
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“I went to Vegas a bunch of times and won a million dollars. Probably 10 times. But I’ve also went to Vegas and lost a million probably three times as much,” Barkley said.
Barkley did say that he was never worried about gambling addiction, though. Before he took the break from gambling, his goal was to win a million dollars on every trip to Vegas, which often led to big losses. But Barkley said that he has learned to stop gambling when he’s ahead.
He also is fine with stopping when he’s down $200,000 and can still have a good time.
“You know, it’s like anything, if you do it in moderation it’s alright,” Barkley said. “And now with my gambling, ’cause I love it. I love the action, I love the juice. But I just learned to do it in moderation.”
That’s a loose definition of moderation, but it’s definitely an improvement on losing millions.
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(Courtesy of ~ Christopher Hanewinckel/USA TODAY Sports)
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“It’s no secret that John Daly has struggled with addiction over the course of his career, but in a recent interview with Graham Bensinger, Daly revealed just how extreme his gambling addiction was. Daly has earned $10,116,306 in PGA Tour winnings over the course of his 25-year career, and the two-time major champion has made millions more in endorsements — but he’s gambled away $55 million.”
“I thought it might have been $20-$25 but I had no idea it was $55 to $57 million.”
Daly didn’t hide his gambling problem in his 2006 autobiography My Life In and Out of the Rough. He wrote that immediately after earning a 750,000 check in the WGC-American Express Championship, he immediately went to Las Vegas and lost more than $1.5 million playing high-stakes slot machines.
“If I don’t get control of my gambling,” Daly wrote, “it’s going to flat-out ruin me”
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So recovery friends, all I can say is that Gambling Addiction has no boundaries on who it will “touch” and effect. Teens, moms, dads, and even Sports Stars! Currently, we have over 16+ million problem gamblers in just the US and growing with the expansion of sports betting, Indian casinos, and expanding State Lottery offerings. And we wonder why gambling addiction is now the highest addiction of Suicides.
Sports Review:
—Phil Mushnick
Sports Columnist, NY Post
Get the real scoop: Talk to Arnie Wexler who is one of the nation’s leading experts on the subject of compulsive gambling and a recovering compulsive gambler himself, who placed his last bet on April 10, 1968. He has been involved in helping compulsive gamblers for the last 43 years. Through the years, Wexler has spoken to more compulsive gamblers than anyone else in America. Arnie has spoken to students who gamble in college, day and night. They even gamble during class, and it goes on in high school even in the lunch rooms. According to a Harvard study a few years ago, 4.67 percent of young people have a gambling problem.
Experts tell us that the earlier a person starts to gamble, the greater the risk of them becoming a compulsive gambler. In another survey, 96 percent of adult male recovering gamblers stated that they started gambling before the age of 14 .
Some years ago, Arnie was on a TV show with Howard Cossell (ABC Sports Beat). The topic was: Does the media encourage the public to gamble? Bobby Knight, Indiana University basketball coach at the time, said: “A newspaper which published point spreads should also publish names and addresses of services that render to prostitutes.
They practically have the same legality in every one of our states, and I can’t see why one is any better than the other” On the same show, former baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn said: “Anything that encourages gambling on team sports bothers me. We all look hypocritical. But then why are we putting up the odds unless we are trying to encourage it?” David Stern, NBA commissioner said: “We don’t want the week’s grocery money to be bet on the outcome of a particular sporting event”
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