BetMGM Poker recently announced a trio of state championships in Pennsylvania, Michigan, as well as New Jersey. This new poker series will be available on the online poker platform starting from September 15th and will last through September 25th. This is the first poker state championship that BetMGM is organizing for its poker fans in the 3 states.
The poker series is expected to consist of 26 different individual events that will offer a combined guarantee of more than $2 million. This will be the largest guarantee that BetMGM will offer poker players to date. Satellites are scheduled to kick off on September 10th and will allow poker players in New Jersey to buy into the different tournaments for as little as $5.
This inaugural poker tournament is a major milestone for BetMGM, which has been working hard to establish itself as the poker platform of choice for punters in the state. Earlier this year in May, BetMGM launched the BetMGM Poker championship for the first time at the Aria in Vegas. The championship was held concurrently with this year’s Aria Poker Classic.
It was also held at the same time as competitor Caesars Entertainment’s World Series of Poker, which kicked off on May 31st and concluded on July 20th in Las Vegas. During the inaugural poker championship at the Aria, the 4-day poker tournament attracted a total of 343 poker players, which generated a combined guaranteed cash prize of $1.1 million.
A large chunk of the field, 68 poker players to be precise, qualified for the tournament by playing online at BetMGM poker in any of the 3 states. After 4 days of play, Joey Weismann emerged as the winner of the very first BetMGM Poker championship. The Main Event, which required buy-in of $3500 saw Weissman walk away with the first-place cash prize of $224,236.
It should be noted that Weissman is also a WSOP bracelet winner that has so far managed to earn $4.4 million in earnings, as well as the glorious golden cup. During the first iteration of the Poker championship by BetMGM, the brand signed an agreement with PokerGO to host the championship final table. PokerGO in conjunction with BetMGM also organized a freeroll tournament worth $25,000 at the PokerGO studios within the Aria resort.
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BetMGM also debuted its first stadium
Last year, the Arizona Cardinals announced that they had entered into a partnership agreement with BetMGM. As part of the deal, BetMGM agreed to open a physical sportsbook at the three Arizona Gila River properties, as well as the State Farm Stadium, which is also the home of the Cardinals.
The sportsbook was scheduled to debut within State Farm Stadium for this year’s football season. Last year was the first time that an NFL team had partnered up with a sportsbook to debut a new stadium. Soccer fans in the UK and different parts of Europe have become accustomed to placing wagers at stadiums.
However, this is a new step for the NFL, as well as other sports leagues in the country. Before the Supreme Court legalized sports betting, the NFL fought the regulation process and was slow to embrace sports betting even as states started to embrace the burgeoning market. Fast forward today and the league has made a complete about turn.
The new cardinals stadium may be the first but it certainly will not be the last NFL stadium to debut. At the beginning of August, BetMGM and the Cardinals finally opened the NFL stadium at State Farm. The stadium welcomed its first guests on September 11th just in time for this year’s regular season against the Kansas City Chiefs.
The State Farm stadium features a massive 17,000 square foot space capable of accommodating all the best sports betting amenities. The stadium will have a facility for hosting concerts, a restaurant, as well as a sportsbook lounge boasting an array of TV screens for watching live games. Situated on the Great Lawn, the new sportsbook at State Farm Stadium will operate both on game days and non-game days.
All the amenities will be located a stone’s throw away from the trading windows and wagering kiosks, which can be found all over the space. As the first NFL team to offer sports lovers this type of experience, the stadium has helped both BetMGM, as well as the Cardinals, stand out. The sportsbook at State Farm will help to complement BetMGM’s already successful mobile wagering app, which debuted in Arizona last year.
The stadium has more than 25 wagering kiosks for punters to choose from and can accommodate at least 500 fans. As the NFL season kicks off into high gear, the stadium and physical sportsbook will be instrumental in keeping old and new fans engaged. The ongoing NFL season is anticipated to attract wagers from at least 46 million punters, with the majority of sports bettors planning to place bets online.
BetMGM has been at the forefront of sports betting innovation and it doesn’t seem to be slowing down. At the start of the year in January, BetMGM made history yet again when it opened a BetMGM sportsbook at National Park. Last year in June, BetMGM announced that it had teamed up with the Washington Nationals.
As part of the deal, BetMGM became the first mobile app to be made available at Nationals Park. This multi-year deal also saw the construction of the first brick-and-mortar BetMGM sportsbook in a Major League Baseball Park. As you have deduced, BetMGM is one of the only operators to boast massive sportsbooks of this nature.
Final Thoughts
BetMGM is helping professional sports teams offer their fans a chance to wager in and around their stadiums, which improves convenience. For many sports teams and leagues, sports betting has emerged as the perfect tool to boost fan engagement, as well as counteract the decline of in-stadium revenue that has been experienced in the last couple of decades. In the future, expect to see BetMGM enter into more similar partnerships that will see the integration of mobile and retail sports betting into the typical game day experience.
