I don’t pay for TV so I only get channels that come off-the-air. One of those is Fox. They have Saturday baseball so I watched the Giants game this weekend.

After the opening sequence the camera panned onto the field and the home plate area. A graphic came on the screen advertising a gambling outfit and giving some odds for today’s events. I don’t remember if it was Bet365, FanDuel, DraftKings, or something else, but it was MLB-approved. I remember when MLB had “official” bat-makers, glove manufacturers, and whatnot. Now they support casinos!

Hypocrisy is nothing new in pro sports, so an anti-betting entity like Major League Baseball supporting betting isn’t a shocker, really. MLB likes money streams and people like to make bets so they are getting their piece of the action.

People are going to gamble. So making it illegal won’t work. So, we regulate gambling. We make it inconvenient. You have to go somewhere to place a bet. It takes effort and time, not just money.

But now we have the mobile phone and the apps that do everything for you. Enter the betting app. Now you can gamble whenever and wherever you want. You don’t even have to be an adult. All you need is the app.

I can’t see gambling-at-my-fingertips as a social good. A net positive. I can only think of the negatives. It makes me think of when the cellphone came to classrooms. Once the dam was breached there was no going back and the change was irrevocable.

Bets are blood money. Recreational betting (think Super Bowl pool) has never needed an app or anyone’s help. Prop bets in bars have been around as long as bars and betting. People who want to throw money down on elections or ballgames can do it all by themselves. Mostly, that stuff is harmless. But gambling is like drug addiction. Some folks can’t do it. They go down the tubes and take their loved ones along for the ride. Gambling is bad and EVERYONE ALREADY KNOWS THIS.

But MLB thinks it’s okay. I think they are fools. At some point the gambling money will be bigger than the prize money and the outcomes will be more important than just fans’ bragging rights. And that won’t be okay.