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00:00With this very busy day to start, we know where to begin and we'll sort of work backwards from
00:06where things ended to where they started because we got a College Football National Championship
00:10to mix in here one week from tonight. So let's get started with the biggest upset of the weekend
00:16in the National Football League's wildcard round. Although most would consider this not to be an
00:21upset, the Washington Commanders were a fantastic team during the regular season. They go into
00:26Tampa Bay and they win the game 23 to 20 on a last second field goal by Zane Gonzalez that
00:33hit the upright and went in. Two quarterbacks have engineered an offense on the road in the
00:38playoffs with zero punts and zero turnovers. Those are quarterback Jaden Daniels. The rookie
00:45gets a win and is moving on to the next round in Detroit and of course Peyton Manning did it way
00:51back in 2003. So the question does become how legit is Washington at this point? Can they make
00:58a deeper run into the playoffs? Dan Quinn remembers the first time that Tampa Bay took care of
01:04business against Washington and said getting even in this one was a must. Just finishing up with the
01:10guys and heading into this week this was 100 percent the battle we expected. Coming back here
01:1718 weeks ago they beat us man and it wasn't even as close as the score indicated and so
01:25for us to show the improvement that we've made in that time was significant for us.
01:31This is a really good team in Tampa and we knew it would go down all the way to the wire. We had
01:35talked about overtime. We talked about all the winning time moments all week. At the end you
01:41know like for us to be in the turnover margin the plus that's big for us and we can get that thing
01:46into that space we're good. I was certainly pleased defensively much improved in the first
01:50half. This is a good running team, good screen gain and I thought early in the week you may have
01:55heard me say complimentary football is what we would need here. I thought the best indicator of
02:00that was the long drive in the second quarter. Might have been 16 or 17 plays going back getting
02:07a punt and then the four minute at the end to get a stop and then have a chance to you know with you
02:12know four and a half minutes or so to go but yeah we really expected a tough fight tonight and
02:19that's it's exactly what we did. We really expected it to go down all the way to the end
02:22and it did. Washington will now take on Detroit on a Saturday night. Meanwhile the Packers-Eagles
02:29game was one of the duds of the weekend unfortunately. 22 to 10 the final score as the
02:35Eagles take care of business and they did cover the four or five or five and a half whatever the
02:40spread was they ended up covering. Not the best game for the Packers offense. Jordan Love picked
02:45off a few times. Josh Jacobs had a nice game on the ground but they really couldn't do much else
02:50and as far as Jalen Hurts and the offense is concerned for the Eagles they kind of also left
02:55a little bit to be desired. Not really much happening for them on offense although they
02:58were able to consistently stop the Packers offense. So defense showed up and Nick Suriani
03:04the head coach of the Eagles said still more work to be done to work out some kinks before next week.
03:10Again do we want plays back that happened today? Yeah but one thing I loved about what happened
03:15in the on the offense is that it wasn't going great and we like in there this was the case for
03:21our entire team like Q gives up a P.I. on third down and then Q comes back and has a big third
03:27down stop on a four point play on third and nine from the nine. That's dog mentality. Jake
03:33misses an extra point and then Jake puts the game away with two huge field goals after that.
03:40That's dog mentality. The offense isn't going the way we want it to go but somehow some way when
03:46they cut the lead to six we find a way to put it back to two scores and then they and then I think
03:51it came back to another possession again and we found a way to put it up actually thereupon
03:57whatever it was but we found a way to score again. That's just you know the ebbs and flows
04:02of a game. We're going to go back to work tomorrow and you know no victory Monday for us
04:09you know we could play Saturday too we don't we don't know but no victory Monday for us we're
04:13going to go back to work because we do have a lot of things to clean up. And the Eagles will
04:17await the winner of tonight's game between Minnesota and the Los Angeles Rams. Meanwhile
04:22the Denver Broncos traveled to Buffalo and took an early seven to nothing lead that did not last
04:27long. The Bills scored 31 points unanswered and they end up taking the victory. Not much more to
04:32say just dominated on the ground James Cook, Josh Allen. Denver had a nice season a very surprising
04:39season but they ran into a buzzsaw in Buffalo and Josh Allen who hit Ty Johnson on a fourth down
04:46and one in the back of the end zone which really put this game away. Allen said it wasn't really
04:51one thing in particular for the Bills just a team effort that got the win. Well we I don't think
04:56there was one certain thing over another we just wanted to come out and execute well we ran the ball
05:01well our offensive line did a heck of a job all day Jimbo ran the ball hard Ty and Ray I hate
05:08what happened to Ray you know I feel like that doesn't happen too often in in in this offense
05:13and hate that feeling that I have for him right now but got to see him he's doing okay but at the
05:19end of the day we just wanted to come out and play play our best football and I feel like we did that
05:22today obviously everything gets heightened and maybe you watch another couple games of what the
05:30defense is doing but we're not trying to do anything drastically different we're just trying
05:34to go out there and and play our best football we had a really good week of practice we had a great
05:38great week of game planning I thought our offensive staff again put in some great plays as you saw
05:42today but ultimately it's not the the x's and o's it's the jimmies and joes and guys are ready to go
05:47we got our rest getting able to kind of not play everybody that last game guys were refreshed and
05:54again we're gonna need to get our rest this week and we got a really really good Baltimore Ravens
05:58team coming here they put the thumping on us or during the year and we know that we understand
06:02that so again it's the most important game because it's the next one expectation is that
06:07Sunday night football game between Baltimore and Buffalo could be the highest rated game of the
06:12season because the Ravens very easily took care of business against the Pittsburgh Steelers on
06:16Saturday 28 to 14 Derrick Henry rushed for over 100 yards and two touchdowns the Steelers
06:21lost five games in a row to end the season also another upset on Saturday the Houston Texans took
06:27care of the Los Angeles Chargers fairly easily final score 32 to 12 Justin Herbert threw four
06:33interceptions the Texans took care of advantage of those mistakes and did the rest the Texans are
06:38moving on to play Kansas City on Saturday the New England Patriots are naming a new head coach in
06:44about 15 minutes from now Mike Vrabel will be named as the next Patriots head coach he'll
06:48replace Gerard Mayo Khalil Mack says he's unsure of his football future he'll be a free agent he
06:53said that post game he's on the Chargers by the way the Vikings also as we mentioned two and a
06:57half point favorites tonight the game is in Glendale Arizona they moved it because of the
07:01fires in Southern California Ohio State took care of Texas 28 to 14 the Cotton Bowl in case you missed
07:07that one over the weekend they'll take on the no-train fighting Irish on Monday night they are
07:11eight and a half point favorites that's the current line over on the Fansville Sportsbook
07:14also Anthony Knapp Notre Dame's left tackle was injured in the Capital One Orange Bowl and he
07:19will not play in the national championship and former Michigan quarterback Alex Orji
07:24announced that he is in the transfer portal no longer he is transferring to UNLV so he'll become
07:30a running rebel naturally our thoughts and prayers are with everyone in Southern California with all
07:34these fires going on and certainly it has affected the sports world as well the Los Angeles Lakers
07:39and Los Angeles Clippers are expected to resume their home games tonight the Clippers six-point
07:44favorites side against the Heat Lakers three-point favorites against Wembley and the San Antonio
07:48Spurs also Philadelphia 76ers were talking about building a new arena in South Philly they're not
07:55going to build this new arena and that comes after basically they got approval to build this
07:59controversial new project from the city council also in the NBA last night the Cleveland Cavaliers
08:05hottest team in the league after winning 12 games in a row that now comes to an end as the Indiana
08:10Pacers won this one by a final of 108 to 93. Welcome back to Newswire Pat Evans is with us
08:17from legalsportsreport.com you can catch him of course on social media on X and over at the
08:22website as well Pat great to have you back here on this Monday on Newswire and let's get started we
08:27you know certainly always are paying attention to rules and legalese in these different states and
08:32you know every it's it's really the wild wild west when you think about sports betting every
08:36state has their own restrictions and laws it's not you know it's over sought by the government but
08:42you know state by state they make their own decisions so we're going to start today with
08:46Nebraska which like other states in the United States don't have college sports betting on their
08:53own team such as Cornhuskers but wait but wait there seems to be a possibility that we could
09:01see a change there as I read on legalsportsreport.com yeah I mean to your point every state is different
09:06and each state has their own little nooks and crannies of crazy regulations uh Nebraska is
09:12certainly no different I it's a state we don't talk about a lot Craig I don't even know if we
09:16have since I've been coming on this show in the last three years um Nebraska legalized sports
09:22betting at the ballot in 2020 the legislator put it through in 2021 making you know their
09:27regulations and one of the stipulations to ensure it had enough votes to pass the legislator
09:32was to ban in-state college betting um and and I think that's a huge aspect in in Nebraska because
09:39they don't have any professional sports teams and Nebraska football and Nebraska basketball now and
09:44volleyball I mean it's huge uh there's estimates that you know banning in-state college football
09:50might make the handle drop I think it was like 15 percent or something like that uh but you one
09:55could imagine in Nebraska that could be pretty significant um increase because of how you know
10:01the sports ecosystem is there and so this year oh and of no other another note was when they
10:07legalized sports betting it was part of a bigger casino referendum which would legalize casino
10:12betting and there was no sports betting allowed until I think it was 2023 when the first casino
10:18started opening up so and it's only in person so it's it's pretty interesting landscape there but
10:24now we have a bill to to kind of lift that ban on in-state college betting so Nebraskans might
10:29be able to bet on Cornhusker football soon again that's only in person last year there was a late
10:35bill in a special session to help reduce property taxes I think that's probably the last time we
10:40talked about Nebraska here um and they included online sports betting expansion um it didn't make
10:46any moves really during the special session but Governor Jim Pillen came out and said he wants a
10:51priority bill filed this month or back then he said in January uh for the session a priority bill
10:57kind of gets action no matter what um and that hasn't been filed yet but I think that we will
11:04see a bill soon with priority kind of designation to expand into online sports betting in Nebraska
11:10so Nebraska might be a kind of a fun state to watch this session that maybe a lot of people
11:15weren't paying attention to but certainly some rules that are potentially going to change and
11:19then potentially a fairly significant expansion there uh to go online from their four in-person
11:24casinos yeah definitely a state to watch you're right we haven't really talked Nebraska much all
11:29right so since sports betting was legalized we have talked about this state quite a bit because
11:33they were really one of the first ones to get sports betting going back in 2018 that of course
11:38is Mississippi but something is as I want to say I'm not a conspiracy theorist must be in the water
11:45there because how they can get in-person betting and six years later still not have online sports
11:53betting tells me there's something going on in a back room somewhere Pat with these casinos the
11:58Beau Ravage I mean no offense Beau Ravage I know you guys have a sports bet but what are they
12:03blocking this like what exactly is going on here are they afraid that they're going to lose money
12:08here now and I understand that notion but I mean this has gone on way too long Pat without an
12:12explanation I know it is kind of crazy to think about because when we look at the landscape and
12:17so much of what we're talking about now is other states in the southeast expanding I mean Alabama
12:22doesn't even have a lottery they're talking about building a lottery or passing a lottery this year
12:27uh potentially with sports betting but again I think we've talked about in the past that
12:31Alabama's gonna maybe skirt that for a little bit and just get lottery done Georgia again South
12:36Carolina those all these states have this little fundamentalist side of them that that is pushing
12:42back on gambling and sports betting and I don't think that's any different in Mississippi
12:46Mississippi of course does have that just vibrant casino culture which I think helped that 2018
12:52passage of in-person sports betting and since then they've tried a lot to get mobile sports
12:59betting passed and it just hasn't moved and I think to your point it is a lot of cannibalization
13:05concerns by a lot of the locally owned operators of course they've got big casino companies
13:11national and regional casino companies that are for expansion online but I don't think you can
13:16discount the effect that local ownership has politically at state level governments and I
13:23think that's kind of what's been holding it back is those cannibalization concerns from the local
13:27casinos that don't have the weight of these giant casino conglomerates behind them and then so then
13:33we get to this year and I mean we've talked about it quite a bit over the last couple of weeks as
13:37we head into this new legislative session the sales of sports betting and even online gambling
13:44as a whole kind of momentum is the sales are kind of getting slack you know there's not a lot of
13:52the headwinds are growing as we've talked about the U.S. congressional hearings the big media
13:57articles talking about problem gambling just kind of the backlash of all the ads and frequent stuff
14:03you know I was just reading an article about how the DraftKings partnership with Delta Airlines
14:08is just another kind of step of how annoyingly prevalent sports betting now is to people who
14:13don't sports bet and that's where this kind of backlash is coming from and I think that might
14:20be why we might not see a bill the senator who leads the gambling committee in the in Mississippi
14:26said he doesn't plan to file a bill unless the gambling commission tells him to and the gambling
14:30commission has come out and said you know what we don't you know weigh in on any bills or laws
14:36that's to them we'll just regulate it so he's not going to file it he said you know there's certainly
14:41other people who could file it and so I wouldn't be surprised if we see a bill in Mississippi but
14:46you know it doesn't seem like it's going to have a ton of momentum but again anything can happen
14:50in the political world and in these legislative sessions so something could move but again we're
14:55not seeing anything right now in Mississippi all right well we'll get an update of course as we go
15:00throughout the year 2024 marked the year ESPN bet took over their own sports betting you know
15:06entity and looking to make a big impact I know in 2025 and so therefore part of their process
15:12Pat has been opening up a lot of these in-person sports books and we just got word that several
15:17will be opening up across the country what do you make of this news yeah it's interesting I mean
15:22over on the LSR podcast that we we do every week we talk a lot about kind of the race for third
15:28and ESPN is a pretty distant second tier operator and so they definitely have a lot of
15:34room to make up and gain ground and they certainly need to I think a lot of what
15:39they've talked about in the last couple earnings reports of you know fully syncing with the ESPN
15:44app and and the retention they have with customers they get from ESPN is actually pretty pretty
15:50promising in the long run yeah last week they announced they're opening 10 new ESPN branded
15:56sports books at casinos across the country that's pen entertainment that brings their total up to 19
16:02they're also in 19 states mobily and I don't think that's a you know it is a brand it's fun to go to
16:07a in-person sports book if you're a fan of a brand but I don't know that that will move them needle
16:12much in terms of market share because you know I think as we've seen over looking over stats and
16:18and everything it's about 95 percent generally of wagers are made online so you know it's not
16:24going to move the needle a huge amount but it is fun to see branding up and and customers going
16:29into a casino and saying hey maybe I should bet at ESPN bet versus you know draft kings if they're
16:34at you know whatever casino they're at so you know it is a move it doesn't move the needle much
16:41we'll see but ESPN bet certainly trying to to make some ground up on on you know a couple of
16:48leaders in that second tier maybe fanatics bet mgm caesars uh the likes yeah definitely want to
16:54see more from ESPN bet this year to see if they can jump into fourth third place we know first and
17:00second owned by fan duel and drafting as they have been for six years without a doubt all right pat
17:05we'll catch up with you later in the week thanks again for coming on newswire appreciate it thanks
17:09as always correct