US sports leagues push 35 states to impose lifetime betting bans for athletes’ harassers

The major U.S. leagues and player unions have sent a 15 September memo to 35 state gaming authorities asking for mandatory lifetime bans on bettors who “abusively harassed or issued threats of violence” against athletes. For sportsbooks and PSPs, the important part is not the memo itself; it is that the leagues are trying to turn harassment into a state-level compliance issue, with direct consequences for player protection, account controls and chargeback-sensitive customer relationships.

1. The memo comes from the majority of the country’s most prominent sports leagues, including the National Basketball Association and the National Football League, and it also includes the MLS. The NCAA did not sign the letter, but the advisory still urges states to pass mandatory bans for people who threaten “amateur athletes” as well as coaches, officials and team personnel.
2. The proposed response is not a soft warning or a discretionary penalty. The leagues want mandatory lifetime bans for anyone found to have abused or threatened violence against professional athletes. They frame it as a safety issue, writing that threatening an athlete or their family members “crosses a bright ethical and criminal line.”
3. The timing is not accidental. The memo lands as Texas Senator Ted Cruz is pushing a federal framework for college athletics, and it arrives just before the annual US Sports Equinox, which falls on 26 October this year. On that day, the NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB all have games, although the MLS will not be in action.
4. The leagues are reacting to a pattern that has become familiar since the Supreme Court’s PASPA decision in 2018 opened the door to broader legal sports betting. One cited example is then-Houston Astros pitcher Lance McCullers, who received menacing threats from a bettor; an investigation later found that the bettor lived overseas.
5. The memo also points to the Benjamin “Parlay” Patz case. About 15 months after the 2018 ruling, Patz sent explicit messages to four MLB Tampa Bay Rays players, threatening to “sever” their necks open. Federal investigators said he targeted more than 300 accounts of pro and college athletes; he pleaded guilty in 2021 to transmitting threats in interstate or foreign commerce, received mental health treatment and a gambling abstention order, and was not sent to prison.

For operators, the practical takeaway is straightforward: leagues are asking regulators to treat bettor harassment as grounds for permanent exclusion, not just a moderation problem for social teams or a law-enforcement matter after the fact. That puts more pressure on gaming authorities to define how such bans are triggered, documented and enforced across states.