Reality has set in at Bally’s Chicago. The $1.7 billion megaresort has long looked as though it would miss its projected September 2026 opening date. Construction hiccups have ensured as much, plus this is terra incognita for Bally’s Corp., which has never built a megaresort nor operated one. Gaming & Leisure Properties Inc. execs were under no illusions that the project would stretch into 2027 and have budgeted accordingly. Anyway, Bally’s made it official by appealing to the Lege for a year-long extension of its Medinah Temple temporary casino.
Bally’s might still try to generate some quick bucks by going for a soft opening, but we’d advise against it. A squishy first impression could be fatal in Chicago. The location isn’t the greatest, downtown has struggled as a gambling destination and anything less than a maximal initial impact would almost surely hurt the cachet of Bally’s Chicago. To be clear, ANY operator would find the site and its access a challenge. That’s not a knock on Bally’s. But the latter does need to get this right, with the company’s future arguably riding on it.
That spring kickoff of Bally’s Las Vegas has been swiftly forgotten and, in Chicagoland, Bally’s Chairman Soo Kim needs to shut the hell up about “eating a lot of people’s lunches.” While some other Windy City casino projects have been moderately successful, only Wind Creek Southland has been consuming anyone else’s meals so far. If Chicagoans are to be convinced to battle traffic and drive past sundry other casinos (especially Rivers Des Plaines), then Bally’s Chicago needs to debut with all its ducks in a row. So far, Bally’s has not done anything to warrant the bellicose talk spewing from its chairman.
Speaking of belligerent, do you think the umbrageous Donald Trump (above left, with friends) has anything against Las Vegas? He’s never succeeded in business here, certainly not at truncated Trump International. Even so, he might spare a thought for partner and George donor Phil Ruffin, still bravely trying to make a go of that gilded condo-cum-hotel tower—never mind Treasure Island and Circus Circus. Ruffin is among the casino owners sure to be getting agita from the latest cuckoo-crazy White House policy on tourism. As part of its wacked-out jihad against international travelers, the Trump administration is imposing an onerous and intrusive new visa policy.
In furtherance of its Orwellian agenda, the Department of Homeland Security wants incoming travelers to submit “social media identifiers … telephone numbers used over the previous five years; email addresses used over the previous ten years; detailed personal information about immediate family members–including names, dates and places of birth, residences, and contact information; and expanded biometric identifiers.” Who can remember, let alone document all of that—and to what end? Those requests should be filed under None Of Your Damn Business and we wouldn’t blame anyone boycotting the United States on those grounds. It’s angry-making.
Confronted with these authoritarian tourism dicta, Silver State congressional Rep. Mark Amodei (R, above) crawled away and hid. Fortunately, the rest of the Nevada delegation remembered who they work for and is demanding redress. “In Nevada, where the economy is deeply reliant on domestic and international visitors, even modest changes to travel policies can have outsized economic consequences,” they wrote. Unfortunately, their intended audience is border tsarina Kristi Noem, so their plaints are likely to fall on deaf ears. But we appreciate the effort at sanity.
In the upper house, a few senators have noticed the baneful side effects of online sports betting—certain to be made worse by the uncontrolled spread of prediction markets. Sen. Katie Britt (R) is taking point on the issue and even Sen. Dick Durbin (D) has shaken off his customary torpor. They and three of their colleagues are demanding that the Centers for Disease Control show interest in a growing epidemic of disordered gambling amongst America’s youth. Now, getting the CDC to manifest interest in mental health may be an awfully big ask, especially at a time when Charlatan-in-Chief Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is trying to sabotage that very thing.
However, hardly a day goes by that we don’t see headlines about underage and sometimes degenerate sports betting, particularly on college campuses. You would think this would be a federal-level concern. You’d think wrong. Britt is to be commended to shining a senatorial flashlight on the issue. Somebody needs to start the ball rolling. We also wish Britt luck with getting Attorney General Pam Bondi to take notice of rampant, illegal, offshore gambling sites. So far, Bondi has shown no more inclination to do so than did Merrick Garland, her somnolent predecessor. When it comes to gambling-related issues, the Trump administration gets a big, fat F grade.
Britt’s concerns were obliquely validated today, when the NCAA was blindsided with another whopping sports-corruption scandal. 26 conspirators (OK, alleged conspirators) were indicted for a point-shaving scheme involving college basketball. 39 players from 17 schools were entangled. At the heart of the ring is Las Vegas‘ own—Sin City must be so very proud—gambler Shane “Sugar” Hennen, already under indictment for having corrupted NBA play. His involvement extended, the feds say, to manipulating basketball games in China. Hennen was nabbed at Reid International Airport a year ago, about to take a one-way trip to Colombia … supposedly to see a dentist. Because, yeah, dentistry is an unknown science in Vegas.
NCAA President Charlie Baker comes out of this looking foolish. Only weeks earlier, he had tried to rescind a ban on betting by collegiate athletes. That tone-deaf and foolhardly move was narrowly voted down. Now, Baker is trying to shift blame for ongoing scandals onto sports books, since they are continuing to take prop bets onto student athletes. But he’s trying to have it both way. We liked Baker plenty when he was governor of Massachusetts but his tenure atop the NCAA has been rather maladroit.
However, the laugh line goes to Buffalo University Athletic Director Mark Alnutt, who straightfacedly proclaimed, “We believe these to be isolated incidents.” 39 players spread over 17 schools? What the fuck is “isolated” about that? We’re dealing with the systemic corruption of sports and have to hope that it’s been nipped before it could spread further. At least the perpetrators were afflicted with convenient stupidity, placing the sort of high-profile bets that tend to get flagged. As the Westgate Las Vegas‘ wagering supremo, John Murray, told ace reporter David Danzis, “$30,000 on a first-half wager on St. Bonaventure over La Salle? … We wouldn’t want to take wagers like that if we didn’t know who the customer was.”
NCAA, heal thyself … especially before some genuinely intelligent fixers get in on the act.
I’ll take Trump’s policies over what a nightmare Harris and Waltz would have been for this country.
Thanks for the information, I was unaware that Bally’s Chicago had any cachet.