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The NCAA has had to deal with plenty of headaches over the past few years thanks to the widespread legalization of sports betting. Now, its president is pushing back against the prediction market giant Kalshi over its apparent plan to start offering action on the transfer portal.
There were inevitably going to be some issues linked to the Supreme Court ruling that opened the door for legal sports betting across the United States, and many of those fears have been realized since the floodgates started to open in 2018.
The NBA and MLB have both been forced to grapple with some high-profile scandals concerning players and coaches who’ve been accused and convicted of peddling inside information, and the NCAA has also had its hands full on that front.
The governing body has also had to deal with a spike in the harassment of student-athletes who’ve been forced to deal with unhinged gamblers who seem to think sliding into their DMs to attack them over a lost bet is acceptable behavior, and it’s made a concerted effort to get states to ban individual props at the college level.
Virtually every wager you can make at sanctioned sportsbooks is directly linked to the outcome of a game, but that would not be the case with a new “prediction market” concerning the transfer portal that has drawn the NCAA’s ire.
The NCAA is not happy with Kalshi’s plans to launch a transfer portal prediction market
The line between bets and the contracts offered on the “prediction markets” that have become all the rage over the past couple of years is blurred to the point of being indistinguishable, as major players like Polymarket and Kalshi have taken full advantage of a grey area that allows them to operate without being subjected to the rules traditional casinos and sportsbooks have to abide by.
Those companies have managed to argue that the action they offer falls under the purview of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission due to how the de facto bets they offer are structured, but that position has come under increased scrutiny as they have slowly but surely encroached into the world of sports.
According to ESPN, Kalshi seems to be preparing to expand its horizons with a new filing that was recently submitted to the CFTC concerning a plan to begin offering a transfer portal prediction market that would give fans the opportunity to earn (or lose) money by wagering on whether or not athletes (specifically DI football and basketball players) will opt to take their talents to a new school.
That development earned a stern rebuke from NCAA president Charlie Baker, who pushed back against the proposal in a statement that reads:
“The NCAA vehemently opposes college sports prediction markets.
It is already bad enough that student-athletes face harassment and abuse for lost bets on game performance, and now Kalshi wants to offer bets on their transfer decisions and status. This is absolutely unacceptable and would place even greater pressure on student-athletes while threatening competition integrity and recruiting processes.
Their decisions and future should not be gambled with, especially in an unregulated marketplace that does not follow any rules of legitimate sports betting operators.”
The filing said Kalshi planned to launch the transfer portal market on December 17th, but it has not gone live as of this writing.
The portal will officially open up on January 2nd, and the company says “statements on social media from players or announcements from agents or athletic departments” will serve as “valid” proclamations when it comes to certifying predictions.