NCAA President Against Criticizes College Player Prop Bets

• NCAA President Charlie Baker spoke out against player prop bets on CBS News
• Baker appeared this week on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” and called for a ban on all prop bets
• The NCAA has been firm in its desire for a nationwide ban on negative player prop bets

NCAA President Charlie Baker again took aim at what he considers to be “negative prop bets” and expressed his desire they be prohibited from NCAA sports betting markets during a recent appearance on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” on CBS.

According to a transcript of the interview posted by CBS News, Baker praised the professional sports leagues for “stepping up” and declaring certain prop bets are bad for their sports, but expressed his desire that college player prop bets be limited or prohibited from all college sports betting markets.

“I also think this is one where I’ve been really pleased to see the pro-leagues start to step up and say this prop betting stuff is bad news, it’s bad news for our players, it’s bad news for their families, and my hope is that we, working together with our colleagues in the professional leagues, can dramatically limit, significantly reduce, and in my mind, at least at the collegiate level, get rid of all of the negative prop bets, and hopefully most of the prop bets,” Baker said during the television interview.

Baker Calls for Prop Betting Limitations

The interview aired on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” on CBS on July 1.

Baker and the NCAA have long decried the availability of negative player props for the NCAA markets. It has encourages state gambling regulatory boards to consider the ban of individual player props in their sports betting markets, citing concerns for harassment and in-game manipulation.

“If you’re a student-athlete on campus in a major program, the likelihood that you have classmates and friends and family members, and friends of family members all over you about prop bets on a pretty regular basis, asking you, you know, ‘don’t take the first pitch, don’t take the first shot, don’t catch the first pass, I don’t want you to lose the game, but here’s all the other things I want you to do, so that I can make money.’ Honestly, it’s disgraceful, it’s demeaning, and it’s incredibly demoralizing for student-athletes,” Baker said during the segment.

According to an NCAA report released in November, 36% of DI men’s basketball student athletes have experienced social media abuse related to sports betting within the last year, but sports betting related harassment overall among all men and women athletes is fairly low.

The NCAA released the findings of a new study that showed 7% of men and just 1% of women in DI athletics reported harassment related to sports betting within the last year.

Several States Have Initiated Bans

Since 2024, Ohio, Louisiana, Vermont, and Maryland have approved bills or rules to prohibit college player props from their sports betting markets.

As it stands, the following states with legalized sports betting do not allow individual college player prop bets in any capacity:

• Arizona
• Colorado
• Louisiana
• Iowa
• Maine
• Maryland
• Massachusetts
• Mississippi
• New York
• Ohio
• Oregon
• Pennsylvania
• South Dakota
• Tennessee
• Vermont
• Virginia
• Washington