
Losing Big
America's Reckless Bet on Sports Gambling
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
3 months free
Buy for $13.50
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
George Newbern
About this listen
Inside America’s preventable sports-gambling debacle
In 2018, the United States Supreme Court opened the floodgates for states to legalize betting on sports. Eager for revenue, almost forty states have done so. The result is the explosive growth of an industry dominated by companies like FanDuel and DraftKings. One out of every five American adults gambled on sports in 2023, amounting to $121 billion, more than they spent on movies and video games combined.
The rise of online sports gambling—the immediacy of betting with your phone, the ability of the companies to target users, the dynamic pricing and offers based on how good or bad of a gambler you are—has produced a public health crisis marked by addiction and far too many people, particularly young men, gambling more than they can afford to lose. Under intense lobbying from the gaming industry, states have created a system built around profit for sportsbooks, not the well-being of players.
In Losing Big, historian Jonathan D. Cohen lays out the astonishing emergence of online sports gambling, from sportsbook executives drafting legislation to an addicted gambler confessing their $300,000 losses. Sports gambling is here to stay, and the stakes could not be higher. Losing Big explains how this brewing crisis came to be, and how it can be addressed before new generations get hooked.
“Losing Big demonstrates how legalized sports betting became a gigantic business, a ceaselessly annoying marketing presence, and a genuine danger to hundreds of thousands of people.”—Daniel Okrent, author and inventor of Rotisserie League Baseball
©2025 Jonathan D. Cohen (P)2025 Penguin AudioPeople who viewed this also viewed...
-
For a Dollar and a Dream
- State Lotteries in Modern America
- By: Jonathan D. Cohen
- Narrated by: Tom Lennon
- Length: 12 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For a Dollar and a Dream shows how, in an era of stagnant upward mobility, millions of Americans turned to the lottery as their only chance at achieving the American Dream. Gamblers were not the only ones who bet on betting. As voters revolted against higher taxes in the late twentieth century, states saw legalized gambling as a panacea, a way of generating revenue without cutting services or raising taxes. Alongside stories of winners and losers, Jonathan Cohen charts the untold history of the nation's lottery system, revealing how players and policymakers alike got hooked.
-
-
Lots of info, but I found it a bit tedious.
- By D. Frrazier on 11-24-22
-
Skipper
- Why Baseball Managers Matter and Always Will
- By: Scott Miller
- Narrated by: Bob Souer
- Length: 12 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Skipper takes on an ambitious Moneyball-esque premise: a deep dive into the ongoing struggle for control that often takes place behind the scenes between Major League Baseball managers and the ownership groups, and now, their data analysts. In a culture still attempting to come to terms with the Digital Age, there’s a bigger story behind the evolution of authority of managing inside the major leagues.
-
-
A Grand Slam for Baseball Lovers
- By Allie on 06-09-25
By: Scott Miller
-
Baseball
- By: Geoffrey C. Ward, Ken Burns
- Narrated by: Ken Burns
- Length: 6 hrs and 52 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The authors of the acclaimed and best-selling The Civil War, Jazz, and The War turn to another uniquely American phenomenon: baseball. Geoffrey C. Ward's and Ken Burns’s moving and fascinating history of the game goes beyond stolen bases, double plays, and home runs to demonstrate how baseball has been influenced by, and has in turn influenced, American life.
-
-
Abridged
- By David Munoz on 02-15-16
By: Geoffrey C. Ward, and others
-
Hedged Out
- Inequality and Insecurity on Wall Street
- By: Megan Tobias Neely
- Narrated by: Tina Nakhleh Falkenbury
- Length: 11 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Who do you think of when you imagine a hedge fund manager? A greedy fraudster, a visionary entrepreneur, a wolf of Wall Street? These tropes capture the public imagination of a successful hedge fund manager. But behind the designer suits, helicopter commutes, and illicit pursuits are the everyday stories of people who work in the hedge fund industry—many of whom don't realize they fall within the 1 percent that drives the divide between the richest and the rest.
-
The Volunteer
- The Failure of the Death Penalty in America and One Inmate's Quest to Die with Dignity
- By: Gianna Toboni
- Narrated by: Gianna Toboni
- Length: 9 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Scott Dozier was sent to Nevada’s death row in 2007, convicted of a pair of grisly murders, he didn’t cry foul or embark upon a protracted innocence campaign. He sought instead to expedite his execution—to hasten his inevitable death. He decided he would rather face his end swiftly than die slowly in solitary confinement. In volunteering for execution, Dozier may have been unusual. But in the tortuous events that led his death date to be scheduled and rescheduled, planned and then stayed, his time on death row was anything but.
-
-
Outstanding story.
- By dom_a_j on 05-28-25
By: Gianna Toboni
-
The Last American Road Trip
- A Memoir
- By: Sarah Kendzior
- Narrated by: Sarah Kendzior
- Length: 10 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is one thing to study the fall of democracy, another to have it hit your homeland—and yet another to raise children as it happens. The Last American Road Trip is one family’s journey to the most beautiful, fascinating, and bizarre places in the US during one of its most tumultuous eras. As Kendzior works as a journalist chronicling political turmoil, she becomes determined that her young children see America before it’s too late. So Kendzior, her husband, and the kids hit the road—again and again.
-
-
(another one of) sarah's masterpiece(s)
- By t43 on 05-13-25
By: Sarah Kendzior
-
For a Dollar and a Dream
- State Lotteries in Modern America
- By: Jonathan D. Cohen
- Narrated by: Tom Lennon
- Length: 12 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For a Dollar and a Dream shows how, in an era of stagnant upward mobility, millions of Americans turned to the lottery as their only chance at achieving the American Dream. Gamblers were not the only ones who bet on betting. As voters revolted against higher taxes in the late twentieth century, states saw legalized gambling as a panacea, a way of generating revenue without cutting services or raising taxes. Alongside stories of winners and losers, Jonathan Cohen charts the untold history of the nation's lottery system, revealing how players and policymakers alike got hooked.
-
-
Lots of info, but I found it a bit tedious.
- By D. Frrazier on 11-24-22
-
Skipper
- Why Baseball Managers Matter and Always Will
- By: Scott Miller
- Narrated by: Bob Souer
- Length: 12 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Skipper takes on an ambitious Moneyball-esque premise: a deep dive into the ongoing struggle for control that often takes place behind the scenes between Major League Baseball managers and the ownership groups, and now, their data analysts. In a culture still attempting to come to terms with the Digital Age, there’s a bigger story behind the evolution of authority of managing inside the major leagues.
-
-
A Grand Slam for Baseball Lovers
- By Allie on 06-09-25
By: Scott Miller
-
Baseball
- By: Geoffrey C. Ward, Ken Burns
- Narrated by: Ken Burns
- Length: 6 hrs and 52 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The authors of the acclaimed and best-selling The Civil War, Jazz, and The War turn to another uniquely American phenomenon: baseball. Geoffrey C. Ward's and Ken Burns’s moving and fascinating history of the game goes beyond stolen bases, double plays, and home runs to demonstrate how baseball has been influenced by, and has in turn influenced, American life.
-
-
Abridged
- By David Munoz on 02-15-16
By: Geoffrey C. Ward, and others
-
Hedged Out
- Inequality and Insecurity on Wall Street
- By: Megan Tobias Neely
- Narrated by: Tina Nakhleh Falkenbury
- Length: 11 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Who do you think of when you imagine a hedge fund manager? A greedy fraudster, a visionary entrepreneur, a wolf of Wall Street? These tropes capture the public imagination of a successful hedge fund manager. But behind the designer suits, helicopter commutes, and illicit pursuits are the everyday stories of people who work in the hedge fund industry—many of whom don't realize they fall within the 1 percent that drives the divide between the richest and the rest.
-
The Volunteer
- The Failure of the Death Penalty in America and One Inmate's Quest to Die with Dignity
- By: Gianna Toboni
- Narrated by: Gianna Toboni
- Length: 9 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Scott Dozier was sent to Nevada’s death row in 2007, convicted of a pair of grisly murders, he didn’t cry foul or embark upon a protracted innocence campaign. He sought instead to expedite his execution—to hasten his inevitable death. He decided he would rather face his end swiftly than die slowly in solitary confinement. In volunteering for execution, Dozier may have been unusual. But in the tortuous events that led his death date to be scheduled and rescheduled, planned and then stayed, his time on death row was anything but.
-
-
Outstanding story.
- By dom_a_j on 05-28-25
By: Gianna Toboni
-
The Last American Road Trip
- A Memoir
- By: Sarah Kendzior
- Narrated by: Sarah Kendzior
- Length: 10 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is one thing to study the fall of democracy, another to have it hit your homeland—and yet another to raise children as it happens. The Last American Road Trip is one family’s journey to the most beautiful, fascinating, and bizarre places in the US during one of its most tumultuous eras. As Kendzior works as a journalist chronicling political turmoil, she becomes determined that her young children see America before it’s too late. So Kendzior, her husband, and the kids hit the road—again and again.
-
-
(another one of) sarah's masterpiece(s)
- By t43 on 05-13-25
By: Sarah Kendzior
-
Lawless
- How the Supreme Court Runs on Conservative Grievance, Fringe Theories, and Bad Vibes
- By: Leah Litman
- Narrated by: Leah Litman
- Length: 7 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With the gravitas of Joan Biskupic and the irreverence of Elie Mystal, Leah Litman brings her signature wit to the question of what’s gone wrong at One First Street. In Lawless, she argues that the Supreme Court is no longer practicing law; it’s running on vibes. By “vibes,” Litman means legal-ish claims that repackage the politics of conservative grievance and dress them up in robes. Major decisions adopt the language and posture of the law, while in fact displaying a commitment to protecting a single minority: the religious conservatives and Republican officials.
-
-
Not For Me
- By George David fritts on 06-19-25
By: Leah Litman
-
Proto
- How One Ancient Language Went Global
- By: Laura Spinney
- Narrated by: Emma Spurgin-Hussey
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Daughter. Duhitár-. Dustr. Dukte. Listen to these English, Sanskrit, Armenian and Lithuanian words, all meaning the same thing, and you hear echoes of one of history’s most unlikely journeys. All four languages—along with hundreds of others, from French and Gaelic, to Persian and Polish—trace their origins to an ancient tongue spoken as the last ice age receded. This language, which we call Proto-Indo-European, was born between Europe and Asia and exploded out of its cradle, fragmenting as it spread east and west.
-
-
Brilliant research and narration
- By Dr. Krishnendu Ray on 05-16-25
By: Laura Spinney
-
I Regret Almost Everything
- A Memoir
- By: Keith McNally
- Narrated by: Richard E. Grant
- Length: 11 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A memoir by the legendary proprietor of Balthazar, Pastis, Minetta Tavern, and Morandi, taking us from his gritty London childhood in the fifties to his serendipitous arrival in New York, where he founded the era-defining establishments the Odeon, Cafe Luxembourg, and Nell’s. Eloquent and opinionated, Keith McNally writes about the angst of being a child actor, his lack of insights from traveling overland to Kathmandu at nineteen, the instability of his two marriages and family relationships, his devastating stroke, and his Instagram notoriety.
-
-
Bingeworthy!
- By murphy o'brien on 05-14-25
By: Keith McNally
-
Apple in China
- The Capture of the World's Greatest Company
- By: Patrick McGee
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 13 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For listeners of Walter Isaacson’s Steve Jobs and Chris Miller’s Chip War, a riveting look at how Apple helped build China’s dominance in electronics assembly and manufacturing only to find itself trapped in a relationship with an authoritarian state making ever-increasing demands.
-
-
Performance is so robotic it’s distracting.
- By robert Campbell on 05-29-25
By: Patrick McGee
-
Black AF History
- The Un-Whitewashed Story of America
- By: Michael Harriot
- Narrated by: Michael Harriot
- Length: 15 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
America’s backstory is a whitewashed mythology implanted in our collective memory. It should come as no surprise that the dominant narrative of American history is blighted with errors and oversights—after all, history books were written by white men with their perspectives at the forefront. It could even be said that the devaluation and erasure of the Black experience is as American as apple pie. In Black AF History, Michael Harriot presents a more accurate version of American history.
-
-
LOVE It!
- By KMB on 09-29-23
By: Michael Harriot
-
Undeniable
- How to Reach the Top and Stay There
- By: Cameron Hanes
- Narrated by: Andrew D. Huberman Ph.D., Cameron Hanes
- Length: 8 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
You become the best you can be by learning from others. That is how bowhunter and ultramarathoner Cameron Hanes approaches each day in his pursuit of greatness in this essential guide to finding success.
-
-
an embarrassment
- By Cynthia Callison on 05-10-25
By: Cameron Hanes
Easy, short, informative
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.