The NFL strongly opposes gambling. Except when the gambling is in the form of fantasy football, which the league doesn’t consider to be gambling even though, you know, it is.
New Jersey wanted to institute legalized gambling on football, passing a law that the NFL and other sports leagues quickly fought in court. The NFL won (as it often seems to do in court) at the federal appellate level, forcing New Jersey to take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Before getting the Supreme Court to rule on a given case, the Supreme Court must be persuaded to review the case. And most of the cases presented to the Supreme Court are never reviewed.
And even though the folks in New Jersey found hope in the decision of one of the three appeals court judges to vote in the state’s favor, at least five members of the U.S. Supreme Court voted to leave it alone. As pointed out by our Mike Wilkening on Twitter, the Supreme Court has declined to review the New Jersey sports betting case.
It means that the legal odyssey has ended, adding yet another notch in the NFL’s considerable legal belt. So if you’re in New Jersey and you’re interested in gambling on football, you’ll have to continue to call your bookie. Or you can play fantasy football -- in a league set up through the NFL’s website.