Major League Baseball commissioner Rob Manfred raised some eyebrows with comments made regarding gambling regulation on Monday morning.
Appearing on ESPN’s Mike and Mike, Manfred said MLB is in the educational stages talking to the owners about getting ready to join the conversation about changing sports gambling regulation in the United States.
MLB commissioner Rob Manfred tells @MikeAndMike that baseball wants to be ready to join dialogue to change sports betting regulation in U.S. pic.twitter.com/0bQWO6UP62
— David Payne Purdum (@DavidPurdum) April 3, 2017
These comments come at an interesting time in American sports. Las Vegas, one of the gambling capitals of the world, has just welcomed an NHL team, the Vegas Golden Knights. It also is set to soon receive the Oakland Raiders after NFL owners voted 31-1 in favor of relocating the franchise during the Annual League Meeting in Phoenix, Ariz.
Not long after that, a couple different reports indicated the NFL itself might be angling to get into gambling in the future, rather than letting outside sources control the action (more on that here).
Just one week later we have Manfred indicating MLB needs to change its stance on the sore subject — one which Charlie Hustle would be very interested to see change, to be sure.
Obviously, change won’t swiftly come. But based on the recent comments made by commissioners of the three major sports in America, change, she is a coming.