A local sports betting company in Tennessee, one that has no plans to offer gambling in any other state, is throwing some shade at its rivals who are not native to the Volunteer State.
TN Action247, an upstart sportsbook based in Nashville that is more or less an oddball in the nascent U.S. sports betting industry, is consistently trying to play off the “shop local” angle. In this case, betting local. On Wednesday, the book got into a friendly sparring match with DraftKings, based out of Boston.
Last month, DraftKings and TN Action247, along with FanDuel, based out of New York, and BetMGM, based out of New Jersey but just across the river from New York City, launched in the state of Tennessee. There is no publicly available data yet on their respective performances, but TN Action247 will likely be in fourth place.
There are no retail sportsbooks in Tennessee, as they are prohibited under state law.
TN Action247 ran a tongue-in-cheek poll claiming that its rivals most likely could not locate Murfreesboro, a town located about 30 miles from Nashville, on a map.
DraftKings responded with a witty remark, and the two sportsbooks went back and forth. This kind of public needling is uncommon in the sportsbook industry, but it is all in good fun. There have not been any “yo mama” jokes, at least not yet. Regulators with the lottery might step in then (we’re joking).
Love all of our bettors in the boro, thanks for asking pic.twitter.com/kz09FAP7oF
— DraftKings Sportsbook (@DKSportsbook) December 9, 2020
We’ll declare DraftKings the winner of Round 1, thanks to the relatively witty response to the poll, but then TN Action247 threw in a lobster reference, so we’ll give Round 2 to the local upstart in this super low-stakes social media sparring match.
We can Google, too. 😉
Send us a few lobster rolls down from Boston, will ya?
— Action 247 (@TNAction247) December 9, 2020
TN Bets is scoring Round 3 below a tie. So, there were no winners or losers here, just some good social media fun between the regulated books. There is plenty of handle to go around.
Love it! Let's meet there for lunch (or whenever your flight gets in).
— Action 247 (@TNAction247) December 9, 2020
BetMGM might be less amused by the poll, considering that sportsbook believes TN Action247 infringed on its trademark with a recent advertisement. TN Action247 called the ad “a parody which was obviously not intentional infringement.”
