Same thing happening in Nola, except it's the Russians. Albanians and Russians slowly taking over OC, and the Italians aren't gonna be able to fight back because of the lack of a gene pool to recruit from and the unwillingness to make non-Italians...the Roman Empire is a fallin' gentlemen..
The New Orleans family faded away due to attrition before the Russians or Albanians arrived. The Philadelphia family is still there and it doesn't appear these Albanians operated in the same area or were serving the same clientele.
If you've been paying attention, these predictions about these new groups "taking over" haven't really come true. If you go back far enough, you saw the same predictions regarding the blacks in the 1960's. The Colombians in the 1970's. The Chinese in the 1980's. The Russians in the 1990's. And the Albanians over the past decade. Each group stakes it's own claim but no one group has or will become the sole dominant group the way the Mafia was for at least half a century. If for no other reason than American law enforcement is much more on the ball now.
Also, while attrition is certainly the single biggest factor to the demise of the Mafia, I don't think making non-Italians would be beneficial. What trust and solidarity there is remaining in the mob is helped, in part, by members sharing the same ethnic background. It's why most virtually all OC groups work with their own. Besides, the Mafia can benefit just as much from non-Italian associates.
I don't see how they're taking over, they're simply operating in their own communities.
Exactly. It's not so much a matter of Russians, Albanians, or other groups taking a piece of the pie but, rather, the pie simply becoming bigger.
Football/soccer and tennis are btw by far the most popular with European bettors. As far as I know Albanians are more recent immigrants and probably still rather follow European sports than American. Albanians were always big football/soccer fans.
I was always wondering, do Italian-American bookies even offer you to bet on European soccer leagues? I guess they don't know that much about this sport because it's not so popular in America. They would have to copy the odds from someone else or something. Would an American bookie accept some bets on let's say some German 2nd division games even though he knows nothing about those teams and soccer in general?
In America the biggest sport for betting, by far, is football. At least 50% of money wagered, I believe. Basketball is second and baseball third. Other things (hockey, boxing, soccer, etc.) would be after that.
Why would you go on an off shore betting site connected to American LCN when you have much better offer on Asian betting websites and legal betting sites aren't that bad either (plus with them you at least know that you're going to get your money and that it isn't some kind of scam)? Why would you need a mob to run such site anyway? I don't see how LCN or any mob group in America profits from this. If anything, it makes life much harder for them because there's so much competition. Off shore and illegal online betting sites are good only for OC groups involved in match fixing and similar stuff
It would only make sense to me that these guys copy the odds they see on the internet sites and offer you a bit higher odds on the street.
First, betting online is illegal in America and some so called "legal" online sites have already been prosecuted.
Second, with the mob bookies, the only thing done online is placing a bet at a website that both the bookie and player can log into and see. No money is exchanged online but is exchanged in person between the bookie and player. Players don't have to worry about depositing their money in some online account and the bookie doesn't need to worry about running a nearby wire room the cops can kick down. And even if the offshore-based internet site does get taken down by law enforcement, a new one is up (with new user names and passwords) in a matter of days.
