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Bookies in the Cleveland area have been enjoying a successful spring, something they haven’t had in the years since losing Lebron James to Miami.
Well, Lebron is back and the Cavaliers are back in the NBA Finals for only the second time in their history.
Cleveland is a huge sports town with lots of bettors. Traditionally they will wager on their hometown Browns no matter how bad they have been over the years. They will of course wager on the state’s beloved Buckeyes.
This time of year, it’s mostly all about the Indians in Major League Baseball but the Cavs are changing that in a very big way. They’ve also helped boost profits for local bookies since the start of the year.
Sports betting in the Buckeye state is considered a misdemeanor though rarely do prosecutions occur unless bettors are linked to much larger organizations. Bookmaking is considered a felony in the state of Ohio. More and more bookies in the region have shifted their businesses offshore though to Pay Per Head management ventures.
Bookmaking is widely accepted in this blue collar state. Case in point, supposedly the Browns previous owner Art Modell had ties to bookies and the Mob. That’s a claim made in the book “Interference: How Organized Crime Influences Professional Football”.
Meyer Lansky, you’ve probably all heard of him. Lansky was known as the “Mob’s accountant”. He went on to develop a gambling empire which stretched across the world. Modell’s ad agency did work for a Lansky-owned TV company.
Some of his other “mob tied” relationships, according to author Dan E. Moldea, were a bit less subtle.
Named by Kefauver Committee as a leading hoodlum. Linked to Moe Dalitz’ Mayfield Road Gamg, Per Eliot Ness, Morris "Mushy" Wexler’s Empire News out of Youngstown was effectively the router for a network of bookies.
Modell and Wexler became partners in a horse-racing stable after Modell purchased the Browns. Modell was one of his most frequent patrons at The Theatrical.
With Football just around the corner, we already know plenty of bets will come in on the Buckeyes early to win the BCS Championship. It will be interesting to see how excited gamblers will be over a Browns team that teased last season but ultimately let fans down again. The Browns actually made sports bettors proud with a 9-5-2 record.
- Aaron Goldstein, Gambling911.com
