The Patriots’ QB, Cam Newton, is also COVID-positive. Now, Sunday’s game at the Kansas City Chiefs is postponed initially, but no one else in the team tested positive, so it pushed through. Kansas City won 26-10. New England Patriots cornerback Stephon Gilmore tested positive for the Coronavirus on October 7. But on Monday, just two days before, Gilmore played every snap at Kansas City. One might think this is an isolated incident, but when it comes to bookies and football, this can turn serious very quickly. Let’s take a look at what connects COVID and the NFL season, and the concerns bookies have.
COVID and the NFL Season
Bookies are now somewhat feeling uncertain about getting people to wager high stakes in football. If early in the week, someone comes in with a pretty high wager, a question arises: “what if the game gets postponed?”. Of course, your sportsbook pay per head provider will take care of any adjustments to the schedule.
Line management is also not a problem. Especially if you are using white label sports betting services. But since football is the biggest sport people bet on, its also the most lucrative sport for many bookies. And if games keep getting postponed, profits will also take longer to materialize, if it even does.
NFL Calendar
Of course, even before the season started, everyone was wondering how the NFL can pull of a covid-free season. But now that we are actually seeing cancellations, bookies are starting to worry. Its not just about game schedules being rearranged. With your bookie software, these things are taken care of even without you prompting it.
As a bookie, your concern would be your cash flow. Will the changing schedules affect your cash flow? Your liquidity? If rosters and lineups keep changing, will you have enough time to keep track and adjust your lines accordingly? Football season is exciting enough as it is, and keeps a lot of bookies busy. But with the added complication of the pandemic, bookies will need to out more effort into making sure that their sportsbooks are able to cope with the changes, and still turn a profit in the long run.
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