DraftKings’ Vendor Mistake Led to $300K in Voided NY Bets this Past January

• A New York sports bettor said DraftKings voided $300,000 in winning bets due to an error from its third-party same game parlay vendor Sportcast
• Sportcast is the same vendor that recently listed incorrect NBA game totals that saw DraftKings request hundreds of voids across several states
• DraftKings revealed it had plans back in February to replace Sportcast with in-house same game parlay technology, but has yet to make the change

DraftKings voided more than $300,000 in winnings for one New York sports bettor after the operator’s third-party same game parlay vendor, Sportcast, advertised incorrect odds for a Jan. 30 NBA market between the Phoenix Suns and Toronto Raptors.

Sportcast is the same third-party vendor that recently posted incorrect game totals for an Oct. 24 NBA matchup that forced DraftKings to request hundreds of bets be voided across the country after being on the hook for hundreds of thousands of dollars in liability.

In emails provided to Sports Betting Dime, DraftKings initially had plans to replace Sportcast back in February and move to an in-house same game parlay product after the New York sports betting incident, but has yet to replace the vendor.

$318,000 in Winnings Voided Due to Error

Rob, an accountant from New York who asked that his last name not be included in this story, provided Sports Betting Dime with emails sent between himself, the New York State Gaming Commission, and DraftKings following an incident where more than $318,000 in winning bets were voided by the sports betting company.

Rob provided Sports Betting Dime with bet slips and receipts for three separate bets he made on a first-quarter market featuring then Phoenix Suns Mikal Bridges during a Jan. 30, 2023, matchup between the Suns and Toronto Raptors.

He placed three separate bets totaling $9,087.32 on Bridges’ first quarter totals, which were set at 2+ points, 1+ rebounds, and 1+ assist. Sportcast advertised incorrect odds of +3500 for the market, when the correct odds were actually just +100.

The market was not corrected or taken off the board before the game started.

The three bets hit and Rob was due a total of $318,056.20. The bets were marked as “wins” by DraftKings, but when the individual tried to withdraw the maximum allowable amount of $100,000 from his account, the winning bets were flagged and changed to “pending.” After several days, the bets were voided and Rob was refunded his initial stake.

A DraftKings spokesperson told Sports Betting Dime that any time a bet is voided, the original stake of the wager is returned to the bettor. The spokesperson did not go into any greater detail on this incident.

“Disappointment doesn’t begin to describe the emotional rollercoaster I’ve experienced with DraftKings and the agencies that supervise sports betting. They’ve all demonstrated a serious lapse of sportsmanship in honoring the public trust,” Rob told Sports Betting Dime.

His legal counsel submitted a “Freedom of Information Law” request and received emails between DraftKings and the New York State Gaming Commission regarding his client’s bets and the void requests. In New York, sports betting operators must first receive permission from the New York State Gaming Commission before voiding bets.

In a DraftKings’ email to the gaming commission asking to void the bets, a DraftKings employee explained that the “root cause” of the problem was “due to a manual trader error by Sportcast.”

“Due to a manual trader error by Sportcast, odds on Bridges 1st quarter markets were incorrect. Per Sportcast, ‘The game time Q1% of Mikal Bridges was incorrectly set to 2.5% instead of 22.5%, which affected all the 1st quarter markets. That includes 1st point scorer, 1st quarter player points, 1st quarter assists and 1st quarter rebounds’,” the employee wrote to the commission.

According to DraftKings’ house rules, the operator reserves the right to declare a bet void if “offered, placed and/or accepted due to an error.”

Errors are defined in the operator’s house rules as:

• bets accepted during technical problem that would otherwise not have been accepted
• bets placed on events/offers that have already been decided
• bets placed at odds that are materially different from those available in the general market at the time the bet was placed
• bets offered at odds which reflect an incorrect score situation
• odds being clearly incorrect given the chance of the vent occurring at the time the best was placed

A New York State Gaming Commission manager replied to the request in the affirmative with a one-word response:

“Void.”

The New York State Gaming Commission could not be reached for comment on this story.

Earlier in the process, a member of the New York State Gaming Commission said in an email to Rob that based on his betting history it “was obvious to the commission that you were taking advantage of mis-priced markets.”

Prior to his three separate $3,000 bets, Rob had averaged $123.80 per bet and had not wagered over $475 on a single event.

An interesting note included in the “remediation” section of the email from DraftKings to the New York State Gaming Commission is that the sports betting operator apparently had plans to replace Sportcast as its same game parlay vendor as far back as February 2023. The employee wrote in the email that the company was “in the process of building an in-house SGP product to replace Sportcast.”

This email discussion took place on Feb. 1, 2023. Sportcast is still the SGP third-party vendor for DraftKings.

DraftKings had no comment on the email or on its vendor Sportcast.

Sportcast Cause For Hundreds of Recent National Void Requests

Despite plans to replace the vendor, Sportcast is still the current SGP vendor for DraftKings. Recently, the sports betting operator was forced to request hundreds of bets be voided across the country for an Oct. 24, 2023 matchup between the Los Angeles Lakers and Denver Nuggets after the vendor advertised incorrect full-game totals for the matchup. The markets was only open for 13 minutes until DraftKings noticed the error, but hundreds of bets were placed nationwide.

A miscommunication from Sportcast led to the mistake, according to Jake List, Senior Director of Regulatory Operations for DraftKings, at a recent hearing with the Massachusetts Gaming Commission. DraftKings representatives informed Sportcast it could not translate first-quarter SGP markets for the game. Sportcast, however, still sent the first-quarter SGP markets over to the sports betting operator and they were incorrectly identified on the platform as full-game markets.

For example, LeBron James’s full-game over/under totals were listed as 8.5 points, 2.5 rebounds, and 6.5 assists. Those over/under totals should have been listed as first-quarter totals. Incorrect totals were listed for a number of athletes involved in the matchup, not just James.

The Massachusetts Gaming Commission will hold a final hearing on Thursday, Nov. 30, to determine if DraftKings can void 178 bets placed by 137 customers for more than $575,000 in winnings in the state.

The sports betting company also filed an incident report with the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement (NJ DGE) to void the bets. According to an NJ DGE spokesperson, the state typically makes operators pay out bets even if they were accepted with an “obvious error.”

All bets are “suspended” until the DGE finalizes its investigation.

As DraftKings waits for a final ruling from New Jersey and Massachusetts, it has already successfully lobbied New York, Colorado, and Indiana to void bets on the matchup, according to ESPN’s David Payne Purdum.

Connecticut regulators denied DraftKings’ request to void the bets in the state and were forced to pay out more than $151,000 in winning, Purdum reported.

DraftKings asked Massachusetts regulators permission to void 178 bets on the erroneous NBA odds that in total were worth potentially $575,000. First reported by @RLinnehanXl.
Connecticut regulators denied a similar request from DraftKings (~80 bets totaling $151,000).

— David Payne Purdum (@DavidPurdum) November 17, 2023