Rules and Regulations

The Sports Gambling Hall of Fame

The Mission of the Sports Gambling Hall of Fame is to recognize and honor those individuals who have notably transformed the sports gambling industry.


Advisory Board

The initial Advisory Board for the Sports Gambling Hall of Fame (SGHOF) will be assembled from a group of respected individuals with experience, history, and respect within the sports gambling community. The Advisory Board will serve four important functions. These are:

  • ·  To act as the governance body for the SGHOF establishing rules and procedures.

  • ·  To annually develop a list of nominees for admittance into the SGHOF.

  • ·  To determine those nominees who will be admitted into the SGHOF.

  • ·  To determine those candidates to be invited to join the Advisory Board.

    Advisory Board Growth

    Any newly inducted living hall of famer will be voted on to join the Advisory Board1. Furthermore, each Advisory Board member who has served on the board for at least one year may nominate one person annually to join the advisory board. A vote on Advisory Board membership will require a 75% approval rating to pass.

    Criteria for Membership to the SGHOF

    -Membership to the SGHOF is available to bettors, bookmakers, oddsmakers, and other individuals who have had a material impact on the development of the betting and bookmaking industries.

    -Nominee must have a minimum 15 years experience in the Sports Betting Industry.

    -Nominee must have primarily specialized in North American Sports; however, rare exceptions are possible.

1 Board vote 3/24/2023

-Nominee must receive at least 75% board vote to be elected.

-Living Nominee must not be in the Nevada Black Book or have any ongoing investigations pending with Nevada Gaming.

-Nominee must be eligible to place a sports bet in a Nevada sportsbook subject to Nevada KYC regulations.

-Bookmaker nominees may not be actively operating in any unregulated markets or have operated in any unregulated market in the past 10 years.

-Living Nominee may not have been convicted of a gambling related crime in the past 10 years. -Nominee may not currently be under indictment or have a pending legal case.
-Nominee may not currently be in custody for any gambling or non gambling crime.
-Living Nominee must willfully accept membership into the SGHOF.

-Living Nominee may defer induction for 1 year if unable to attend the induction ceremony2. -Nominees can only be individuals. i.e. no groups can be inducted3.


Annual Enrollments

At most, 5 living individuals for the SGHOF can be admitted each year. Moreover, the Advisory Board can advance 5 individuals into the SGHOF in memoriam4.

The living and in memoriam nomination and votes into the SGHOF will be undertaken separately.

Nominations for the living and in memoriam categories will be undertaken by the Board of Advisors, with each individual able to propose up to 5 nominees for the living category and 5 nominees for the in memoriam category5. Each advisor’s nominations will be privately emailed to the SGHOF administration staff or alternatively posted in the private SGHOF anonymous chat room. The hall of fame administration staff will then consolidate all nominee suggestions and put up for voting the nominees who have received the most consideration. A list of nominees, ordered by decreasing nomination count, will be provided to the board before any voting commences. The actual nomination count will be withheld from the board until AFTER the class is voted in6. The board member is encouraged to include sourced facts as well as personal stories of the nominee to convince the board of approval. The anonymous chat room will allow for robust debate without fear of receiving any potential backlash. All board discussions are confidential within the Board – and when a decision is made, the Board moves as a team.

Each member’s vote of the advisory board is equally weighted.

For a nomination to pass, a candidate must receive a minimum of 75% of the vote. The candidate will then be required to accept admittance into the SGHOF. All members of the SGHOF and the Advisory Board will use their best efforts to assure that the individual or his or her heir(s) will attend the induction ceremony.

2 Board vote 3/20/2023
3 Board vote 3/2/2023
4 Board vote 1/29/2023. Total amount and ratio subject to new vote every year 5 See 3
6 Board vote 2/28/2023

When it comes to the hall of fame induction vote, a board member must abstain from voting for him/herself. The board administrator will serve as a fill-in vote for the nominee.

When it comes to the nomination count, a board member can not nominate him/herself; however, every board member will receive a plus 1 for nomination count which will be considered the board administrator’s tie breaker vote.

Consideration for a nominated board member will be conducted in a private chat room where said board member will not be present. The board member will only be informed on the final decision of his/her induction and not be privy to the actual Yay/Nay breakdown7.

The final vote result for each nominee will be shared with the board; however, individual board member voting will always remain private. Furthermore, for any failed nomination, we ask that the nominee never be informed of his/her nomination. Lastly, for any successful nomination, we ask the final vote result NOT be shared with the newly inducted hall of famer.

Induction Ceremony

The SGHOF induction ceremony will take place every August at Circa as the capstone event of BetBash (betbash.co). As a board member, you are entitled to receive complimentary admission to BetBash and are encouraged to attend.

Proposed Rule Amendment/Change

Any member of the Advisory Board can submit a proposal for a rule or policy amendment/change to the Board Administrator, and that information will be sent to all Board members and acted upon within 60 days, with a requirement of needing a simple majority to be passed. A rule that the board has voted on can not be proposed to be re-voted on until the next hall of fame cycle. In order to maintain the SGHOF high standards, the required 75% nominee approval rating and the required 75% new advisory board member approval rating are exempt from any reconsideration in perpetuity.

Board Administrator

The Board Administrator(s) will ensure votes are executed in a timely manner. To perform this task properly and ensure it is done without bias, the board administrator will be ineligible to vote on any SGHOF nominations except as a fill-in if a board member is nominated. In the rare occurrence that a rule or policy vote ends in a tie, the board administrator will vote to break the tie.

Voting System

ElectionBuddy.com will be the independent 3rd party used to help with tabulating votes and ensure anonymous voting.