Top Trending: 'Sports Betting King' Mazi Smith Sentenced to 12-24 Months
Sports betting tout Mazi Smith has been sentenced to 12-48 months in state prison after pleading guilty to fraud charges recently. Scroll down for all the top gambling stories across the globe.
Mazi, whose real name is Darnell Smith, has been transferred to DOC. It's unclear what institution he's currently at due to the site being down.
Smith often boasted of his high-stakes winnings that include wins like $1.45 M on the Chiefs and $548 K in another instance. He claimed to have made dramatic profits such as $317 K in a single day. Some reports suggested he has been in police custody since May 16. That just happens to be the day Mazi stopped posting on X (formerly known as Twitter).
The story has captivated Gambling911.com readers in recent months. While not a mainstream story, per se, Gambling911 has seen better than 50 percent of all searches pertaining to Mazi Smith coming to the site for more details.
The New York Times even profiled Smith as "a major influencer by flaunting his expensive lifestyle and his big-winning wagers. Other gamblers say he can’t be what he seems."
That paper interviewed a professional sports< bettor from the Boston area, 24-year-old Ryan Noel. If that name sounds unfamiliar, you'd be forgiven. Noel is none other than X Spaces phenom, Elf.
“He is where he is for a reason — he’s the best marketer in the business,” says Elf. Noel told the Times that would-be clients should ask themselves, when they’re looking at an Instagram page like Mazi’s: “What are they really selling? Are they selling sports picks or are they selling lifestyle? If you’re an uninformed gambler, you’ll look at him and be like, ‘Damn, this guy has the life.’ And he does. He has the life,” Noel says. “But that’s what he’s really selling. And that’s what the people purchasing his picks really want.”
Indeed, it was Elf who helped break the news of Smith's legal issues.
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More Headlines Gambling911 is Following
Gambling
- Netflix Releases ‘Ballad of a Small Player’ Trailer With Colin Farrell As Gambling Addict - In the film, Farrell plays Lord Doyle, who spends the majority of his time gambling at the casinos in the autonomous region of China. The film is scheduled for a limited U.S. release on October 15 and will be available on Netflix starting October 29.
- Sporting CP’s Estádio José Alvalade to Host Legends Charity Game - The inaugural Legends Charity Game, organised by Sport Global, will be staged at Sporting CP’s Estádio José Alvalade, marking the start of a series set to run annually until 2030. The match will see Portugal Legends face off against World Legends on Monday, 15 September 2025, with Calema performing live at half-time, and all in support of the goal of raising €1 million for charity. The venue confirmation came after the Champions League schedule was finalised, introducing Estádio José Alvalade as the host of the opening match of the series. Kick-off is scheduled for 20:00, with player arrivals at 18:00 and gates opening at 18:30. Fans can enjoy a pre-game show at 19:40, while half-time will feature a live performance by Calema, the São Tomé and Príncipe-born, Portugal-based duo known for their blend of pop and Afrobeat, performing in front of 50,000 fans and millions watching worldwide. The Portugal side will be captained by Luís Figo and include a host of stars from the nation’s greatest footballing moments. Figo said: “It’s always a pleasure to come back to my country and play football! Hope to see a full stadium in my hometown, Lisbon, for this amazing Legends Charity Game and raise funds for important charity causes.”
- Meet the Guys Betting Big on AI Gambling Agents - Online gambling is a massive industry. The AI boom keeps booming. It was only a matter of time before people tried to put them together. (read more at Wired)
- Prediction Markets: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly - My twitter timeline seemingly overnight turned from can’t lose CFB parlays to crypto prediction market bullposting. I honestly don’t know which is worse at times, as even smart people on prediction market twitter are somehow capable of tweets that rival the ignorance of the lowest IQ of gambling twitter. I’ll break down the PM landscape, where we are and where (I think) we should go, later, but let’s start with the lowest-hanging fruit first. (read more of this Substack here)
Sweepstakes Casinos
- Latest on California Efforts to Crack Down on Sweepstakes Casinos - NEW: California Senate Floor Analysis of AB 831 cites Sup. Ct.'s decision in Grewal, where patrons received 100 sweepstakes credits for every $1 purchased of internet time to play virtual slots for prizes; characterized as a "subterfuge to mask the illegal gambling activity."
Poker
- Barstool Is FINALLY Streaming Poker Tuesday Night - 18 Players, $30k For First - Tonight 18 Barstool employees are playing a tournament, live streamed with cards showing, with $30,000 for first! Lots of money and a stacked list of players including Dave, Big Cat, PFT, and Ben Mintz.
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'I was out': Crazy cooler ends WSOPC New Orleans Main Event - Six years ago, at this very event, Yousef Saleh was cruising along at the final table before a blunder during seven-handed play cost him most of his stack, and he finished in a disappointing seventh place. This year, he wasn't going to make that same mistake, and after letting the game come to him, he defeated a field of 510 entrants to claim his second career WSOP gold ring, the $149,268 first-place prize, and the $5,000 package to WSOP Paradise. "It is so awesome to come back and just get it all," Saleh said immediately following the victory. "It was a hard job, I was down a lot after taking three bad beats earlier in the tournament, and I didn't think I was gonna recover, but I was never all in and I think this proves you can win a tournament without flipping." (read more from Poker.org)
Politics
- Mystery as Viral Video Shows Object Being Thrown Out of White House Upper-Level Window: 'Melania is Mad' - This article, featured on the top of the Drudge Report all day Tuesday, comes from the UK's more right-leaning Daily Mail. A mysterious video showing an object being tossed out of an upper-level window at the White House is going viral, with social media users suggesting the thrower could have been Melania Trump. The footage shows an unknown individual throwing an object from the top window on the side of the White House to the ground below. The clip circulating online did not have any context around the date and time the footage was taken. The video player is currently playing an ad. You can skip the ad in 5 sec with a mouse or keyboard. The White House confirmed to the Daily Mail that the video was indeed recent. An official said that an object was thrown out of the window by 'a contractor who was doing regular maintenance while the president was gone.' The president was out of the White House this past weekend. As unverified rumors circulate surrounding President Donald Trump’s health, the video helped fuel the flames of those concerns, though some of the rumors suggested that these were "Epstein Files" being thrown out the window (we won't go there). The Melania rumors were running rampant by Tuesday evening, with the help of The Daily Mail, we should add. 'Given that women usually throw things out of windows, would safe to say that this is a very mad female,' a user wrote on X, continuing, 'and females do this when they really want answers. 'Was Melania in Washington DC today?' they went on.
Crime
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IRS Criminl Investigators Target Illegal Sports Gambling - The Internal Revenue Service’s Criminal Investigation unit has been cracking down on illegal sports gambling, even as the legal sports betting industry explodes in popularity. Every fiscal year, IRS-CI opens over 30 illegal gambling cases, scoring a 92% conviction rate for prosecuted cases. Over the past five fiscal years, 96 defendants have been convicted of crimes tied to illegal gambling, getting jail sentences averaging between five and 33 months in federal prison. In February, 10 men pleaded guilty to managing a multimillion-dollar sport betting operation named Red44 that ran online bookmaking and betting activities through an offshore server in Costa Rica.IRS criminal investigators target illegal sports gambling (source: CDC)
- Hong Kong Police Arrest 86 in Wweeping 15-day Crackdown on Triad Activities - Force seizes HK$280,000 of etomidate, arrests suspects for litany of crimes including drug trafficking, illegal gambling and money laundering. The force said on Tuesday that the operation, mounted between August 18 and September 1, had led to the arrest of 66 men and 20 women, aged between 17 and 65, for allegedly operating or taking part in illegal gambling establishments and breaching their conditions of stay. The long list of charges also includes trafficking in and possession of dangerous drugs, operating premises for drug taking, possession of offensive weapons and apparatus intended for dangerous drug use, criminal damage, wounding, theft, obtaining property by deception and handling stolen goods.
Las Vegas
- Vital Vegas: What Sin City Will Be Doing to Turn Things Around - "We’ve been asked what LVCVA is doing to counter the “Vegas is dead” and “gouging” narratives. To-date: Zilch. Next week: A hell-ton. Sweeping changes are being made related to fees and guest experience. We’ve screamed for years a marketwide approach is vital—they’re listening." (source: Vital Vegas)
Betting Markets
- $374K bet on Notre Dame vs. Miami game on Sunday at Polymarket compared to $359K bet on Virginia Tech vs. South Carolina. Compare that to $1.3 million bet on the Texas vs. Ohio State game. Note: Polymarket does not currently accept customers from the US.
- $123 milliion bet on this week's college football games at Kalshi alone, and still counting.
- Will Bill Belichick and Jordon Hudson be married before 2027? 30% say YES (Kalshi)
- Will Trump's Federal Takeover of DC be extended? 10% chance (Kalshi)
- Zohran Mamdani 83% chance of becoming next NYC mayor (Kalshi)
- Chris Costigan, Gambling911.com Publisher
