David Purdum, ESPN
Before he was fired by the Los Angeles Dodgers last week, Shohei Ohtani‘s longtime interpreter, Ippei Mizuhara, detailed to ESPN how he started betting with a bookmaker and accrued millions of dollars of debt.
Mizuhara told ESPN he met bookmaker Mathew Bowyer at a poker game and started betting on sports with him in 2021. Bowyer set him up with a line of credit and access to an online sportsbook site, Mizuhara said, adding that he placed bets on international soccer as well as the NBA, NFL and college football — but not baseball. He said he had previously bet on DraftKings and assumed bets placed through Bowyer were legal.
Mizuhara initially told ESPN that he asked Ohtani to pay off his gambling debts, which had ballooned to $4.5 million, and Ohtani wired payments of $500,000 to an associate of Bowyer’s over several months under Mizuhara’s direction. But Mizuhara later changed his story and told ESPN in a subsequent interview that Ohtani had no knowledge of his gambling, debts or the payments. Ohtani then accused Mizuhara of theft.
Mizuhara did not respond when asked if he took money from Ohtani’s accounts without his knowledge. It remains unclear if Ohtani’s representatives have contacted any law enforcement agencies with their theft allegation.
Thirty-eight states and the District of Columbia offer legal sportsbooks, but a robust underground betting market remains prevalent, including in California where Mizuhara, Ohtani and Bowyer live.
The scandal has offered a glimpse into the secretive underworld of bookies and raises questions about why people continue to use them in the age of legal sports betting, how they operate and whether a bookie would allow a client such as Mizuhara, with relatively modest income, to go millions into debt. Here’s what we know.
Is there still an underground market when so many states have legal sports betting?
With a lack of regulation comes a lack of visibility, so determining the size of the underground betting market and the impact of legalization, if any, is an inexact science. A veteran bookmaker told ESPN that the legal market has undercut the offshore market’s clients. “Offshore will have to have lower pricing or better offers to exist,” he said.
However, a report released this month by the Campaign for Fairer Gambling estimated that illegal sports betting operations generated $40.9 billion in gross gaming revenue in 2023 — nearly four times the $10.9 billion generated by sportsbook companies licensed in the U.S. in 2023, according to industry trade group the American Gaming Association.
Why does anyone bet with a bookie instead of a legal sportsbook?
There are several possible reasons:
They live in one of the dozen states that have not legalized sports betting, including California and Texas.
Bookmakers often offer lines of credit, a huge incentive for bettors who do not want to put cash up front to wager.
Bookmakers offer more anonymity than U.S. sportsbooks.
Bookmakers may offer more favorable odds or higher betting limits than licensed sportsbooks.
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