But, of course, if you live in Texas, taking part in such illicit activity isn’t as straightforward. It’s a little like getting high in Texas. Simple weed isn’t legal, but a bunch of other things like weed are. You just have to know how to navigate the market, you see. It’s also like trying to watch some free porn online in Texas since Attorney General Ken Paxton began waging war against PornHub. You can still do it, and do it rather easily, as long as you follow an additional step or two.
The federal ban on sports gambling was lifted a few years ago, but that hasn’t made it legal in Texas. Sports gambling here is a Class C misdemeanor that can result in a $500 fine. To be clear, we’re not suggesting you should bet on the NBA Finals; no, that’s not something we would do.
We’re simply letting you know that if you are the type of person who enjoys learning about how to do such things, then you can keep reading about how other people might do such things, like the rapper Drake.
Offshore Online Sportsbooks
They may sound hard to reach from landlocked North Texas, but the most popular online offshore sportsbooks are remarkably easy to access (again, if that’s something you were only wondering about). If you enjoy watching European soccer, it's very likely you already know the names of some popular online sportsbooks. According to Book Makers Review, Bovada, BetOnline and BetAnySports are three of the top offshore sites you can use right now.
BetOnline takes the overall top spot in their list “thanks to its generous bonuses,” the report stated.
“Players will also find that BetOnline’s limits are designed to cater to everyone from novices to seasoned high-rollers,” the BookMakersReview article reported. “Regardless of your betting budget, you’ll find exciting opportunities to get in on the action and profit from your sports knowledge.”
As a favorite for mobile wagering, Bovada got high marks for “an expansive range of betting markets.”
For research purposes only, we might have set up accounts with both BetOnline and Bovada. As we potentially made our way through the signup and depositing requirements for both sites, we noticed the process was more or less identical to signing up for a DraftKings or FanDuel daily fantasy sports account, which is legal in Texas.
Our debit card might’ve successfully made a small deposit into a new BetOnline account while Bovada might’ve just told us to try depositing some various forms of crypto instead.
If that was something we would actually do, we surely would have put a few bucks on the Mavs to win Game 1, since the real money is in betting on the underdog, after all.
Daily Fantasy Sports Apps
Similar to how delta-8 and delta-9 products bought legally across Texas can get you just as high as the illegal stuff, certain daily fantasy apps can satisfy your need to wager on the game almost as much as a popular gambling app can in a state that allows mobile sports betting. PrizePicks and Sleeper are two examples we tested out recently during the NCAA March Madness tournament and the first couple months of the Major League Baseball season. Both apps are completely legal in Texas, too.
It’s pretty silly just how close placing a prop bet in Sleeper is to placing one with a standard gambling app is. There is a more limited range of possible bets with Sleeper and PrizePicks, with player-specific prop parlays being the primary options available, as opposed to wagering on team results. Perhaps the primary differentiating element is that you cannot go into a negative balance with Sleeper or Prize Picks, the way you might be able to do with a bookie.
