There's still a lot of illegal gambling going on. High stakes private poker games and other action that's covered by credit an online bookie like Fanduel isn't gonna give you. But you'll have a vig to pay every week or you're going to have a big problem.
Hi CNote,
I partially agree with you. But I also disagree with what you said here. If you're saying that, pretty much, only poker games are going in NYC now, then I completely agree with you. But if you're saying that bookmaking and other gambling is still strong here, then I strongly disagree with you.
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I agree with you that there are still knockaround guys involved in illegal gambling, but, nowadays in NYC, most of the fellas who do that sort of thing are trying to operate private social clubs with card games which they cut 5% out of each pot for the "house." And at some of these locations, (some of them, not all,) they'll also have a few joker-poker video slot machines available for customers who wanna play those....but thats about it. Period!
And yes, there are still local bookmakers taking sports bets....but they are quickly getting out of the game because, as I stated above in my earlier post, NY's legalization of sports betting over the last year or two has literally -- not figuratively, but literally -- gutted them!
A huge majority of their wagering customers, little by little, have flocked over to the litany of legal online sports-wagering companies now available to them.
NY's bookies are quickly finding out that about the only bettors still coming into them as the older bettors, the diehards, who they've had as customers for decades and are not inclined to switch because they're dinosaurs, and many of these bettors are not even familiar with the internet, understand?
By the way, what I'm telling you here is NOT conjecture, hyperbole or a wild guesstimate....its cold hard facts!
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NOTE: I think by now, most of you are aware of the fact that I come out of NYC, where I was born and bred my entire life. In the neighborhood where I grew up, if we didn't have at least 200 bookmakers, probably more, then we didn't have 1 (lol)... I knew most of em, and to this day many are still friends who keep in touch....So I am more than just a little familiar with the subject at hand.
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To prove my point even further, consider this:
Back before the legalization of the NYS Lottery (LOTTO), there were literally thousands and thousands of policy-numbers runners, who fed hundreds of policy "banks" throughout all the Five Boros. The numbers business was one of the Mob's biggest moneymakers, generating hundreds of millions of dollars a year, in NYC alone.
But, within a few years of NYState implementing their own "numbers" business, 95% of the Mob's policy banks went Kaput...Finito! And today? Lol. Good luck even finding a street guy who takes numbers bets anymore...Its become a bullshit business.
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NEXT:
Horse-race bookmaking. Years back, before the advent of legalized horse betting in NYC, many bookies actually preferred to only take bets on horses, for the simple reason that they liked the odds better. I don't know if you're aware of that? But lots of bookies wouldn't even bother taking sports bets.
But by the early 1970s, NYS started up the OTB Corporation, (Off Track Betting) and within a few years time, the entire horse business went out the window for mob guys...It became another bullshit business. Nearly all their customers started betting with the State of New York. So all the bookmakers had to shift their business solely over to sports bookmaking. Accepting a "horse bet" from a customer soon became a "courtesy" bookies would extend as an accommodation for a good bettor.
These are cold hard facts, fellas...Not conjecture!
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Whatya wanna talk about next, fellas, floating dice games?
"Floating dice games" -- which was previously another multimillion-dollar-a-year business for the Mob, hasn't been a thing in NYC for years already!
Are there still one or two small, bullshit games that guys operate every "blue moon" somewhere within the Five Boros? Yeah, maybe! (but thats a real BIG maybe!)
Right after legalized casinos came to Atlantic City, NJ -- in 1977 -- within a few years times 90% of ALL table games; dice, craps, roulette, blackjack, etc., etc., etc., went out the window!
Today? Nearly 50 years later? LOL....Pleeez!
Good luck finding any of that -- a roulette table, etc -- around the city. It ain't happening fellas....because thats all over!
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In closing this, let me state -- once again -- that these are not my personal opinions, or guesses, or bullshit hyperbole. These are cold hard facts that you can either choose to believe, or not. But regardless or what you decide -- to believe me or not -- these facts will remain facts!