Have you watched a football game this season? Then you probably saw more than a handful of advertisements for one of the two big players in daily fantasy sports leagues, FanDuel or Draft Kings. Those who follow the NFL got a heavy dose of ads from both companies in the opening weekend of the National Football League, and now the college football power conferences are making an effort to keep the leagues out of the college game.
You know, because nobody makes money off college players but the power conferences.
Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott, according to Stewart Mandel of FOX Sports, says the power conferences have sent letters to both FanDuel and Draft Kings asking them to stop college daily fantasy leagues. That has about about as much chance of happening as Kansas making the College Football Playoff. There is nothing stopping these businesses from using college players for daily fantasy college football leagues, and neither company is selling the college game by using college players in advertising.
The power conferences will want you to think they are protecting the interest of the student-athletes, and that may be true in part. What really bothers them, and they will never admit to this, is seeing its assets be used for profit outside of their control. The only way college daily fantasy leagues are going to end will be if fantasy sports gambling is outlawed, and we all know that is not going to happen.
Daily fantasy leagues are here to stay, and the commercial breaks during your football viewing activities will never cease to remind you of that.