With sports betting legal in most states, you see commercials for various websites that offer the chance to bet on your favorite team or athlete almost as offer as political ads during election season. When there’s money to be made from tax and regulation, the politicians find a way to get it through. Ironically, that’s also the only reason the state athletic commissions insist on a flimsy attempt to regulate independent wrestling, but that’s another story for another time. Still, despite how common sports betting is online, I was surprised that there are actually websites that take legitimate betting action on sports entertainment events, such as some of the pay-per-views that make news on social media.
Since sports betting is legal and common now, I guess I can say this without fear of being excluded from any future Hall of Fame inductions. I bet on professional wrestling.
No, I haven’t and wouldn’t place a bet online for the result of a professional wrestling card, but there was a time that young Jim bet on the winners of the squared circle.
In the late-90s, my grandma on my mom’s side of the family lived in Las Vegas for a few years before she eventually moved back to Western, Pennsylvania. Considering that bingo and slot machines are two of her favorite hobbies, she enjoyed her time in the gambling capital of the world. I don’t recall the details, but her cable package at the time, for whatever reason, actually included some of the wrestling pay-per-views, which was more of a perk than it sounds like now. Keep in mind, before an app or a streaming service had thousands of hours of content on demand, pay-per-view was a much bigger deal across the board, whether for sports entertainment, boxing, or even movies. The $35 pay-per-views included in a satellite or cable package were actually a selling point at the time, and if I had to guess, I think it might’ve been an option for her because of the time difference of the west coast not exactly putting the broadcast in a prime time spot.
In western, Pennsylvania, young Jim would patiently wait while someone was on the phone with the cable company to try to get the order through before the actual event started, another aspect those in the streaming era wouldn’t understand, as it was a process to get the broadcast beamed to your television.
Meeting the legendary @SammartinoBruno in 1997 #tbt pic.twitter.com/EjWXxgKtTG
— Jim LaMotta (@jimlamotta) February 10, 2017
My grandma wasn’t necessarily a major fan, but she knew who the key players were because I’ve followed the sport my entire life. In fact, for my sixth birthday, she got a t-shirt made that had Bret Hart’s picture and my name screen printed on it. Hearing of the big wins from slot machines or the bingo jackpots made betting a part of the conversation, even if I wasn’t old enough to actually play the games.
Meeting Brian Knobbs in 1997 #tbt pic.twitter.com/14Z7fCwVoG
— Jim LaMotta (@jimlamotta) March 17, 2016
Instead, I bet on what I knew when I was in elementary school, professional wrestling. Of course, this couldn’t be as simple as picking winners for an amount, the stakes had to be increased for the more important bouts on the card. As mentioned, my grandma would be watching the live broadcast in Las Vegas, while my family ordered the show in Pennsylvania so we could each follow the results. Regular matches on the under card were basic so they were a quarter for each match, title bouts were 50 cents, and the main event was a dollar. Yes, I know the stakes are overwhelming for most sports betters. Anyway, since we didn’t know the specific order of the matches until they hit the screen, we alternated picks for winners, and yes, little Jim was mad when a villain represented my chances to win. Prior to each match, I would either call my grandma or sometimes she would call first, and we would make picks for the upcoming match.
Yes, I literally called Las Vegas to place a “bet” on pro wrestling in the late-90s.
If I was ahead for the pay-per-view, my dad would cover my grandma’s tab of a few dollars, and thankfully, he told me he could “get it for the next WWF show” if the dastardly heels had me in the red for the night. Although, this wager experience wasn’t always without it’s controversy, as nine-year-old Jim protested at the conclusion of the finals of the WWF title tournament when Vince McMahon helped The Rock beat Mankind for the championship with outside interference at Survivor Series 1998. In reality, this was booked as a spin off of Montreal the previous year, but young Jim refused to accept the corporate champion’s tainted victory. Instead the bet was declared a draw or a “push” in gambling terms.
As silly as it might seem in retrospect, it was always fun and a reminder of an era where pay-per-view still had a major atmosphere around it. I’ll probably sound like one of the grizzled vets that have a podcast when I said this, but “back in the day” these pay-per-view shows were one of the most lucrative revenue streams for the national organizations so there was always a major push to sell the show to the audience. This dynamic was even more of a priority when there were three groups on pay-per-view in the late-90s and there was definitely competition for the pay-per-view dollar. For example, in February of 1999 Ted Turner’s WCW offered Super Brawl with Hulk Hogan vs. Ric Flair for the title in the main event, which was countered by the WWF with Steve Austin vs. Vince McMahon in a steel cage for the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre broadcast.
How those decisions affected each organization is another discussion for another time, but the point being, the concept of pay-per-view was a special event. Today, the dynamic of the television business and the technology of streaming services makes it more profitable for at least the WWE to churn out countless hours of programming for a hefty television contract that is designed more to maximize ad revenue for the particular platform than anything else so the priority is often quantity before quality. Still, during the late-90s, it was always fun to watch these pay-per-view shows with a few dollars on the line and if I won an extra two dollars at the conclusion of the main event it was a win-win situation.
What do you think? Comment below with your thoughts, opinions, feedback and anything else that was raised.
Until next week
-Jim LaMotta
E mail [email protected] | You can follow me on Twitter @jimlamotta
