Predictive markets for your favorite sport are coming, says NBA star Tristan Thompson

Prediction markets became a staple of politics last year but are now making a notable impression in the major leagues, according to NBA star Tristan Thompson.

Amid a growing list of partnerships and acquisitions, it likely won’t be long before odds from platforms like Polymarket become a common way for people to track the pulse of their favorite teams and athletes in real time, he said in an interview with Declutter.

“This is going to happen,” he said, recalling how television channels like TNT began incorporating social media posts into their broadcasts years ago, allowing viewers to interact with familiar faces like Shaquille O’Neal and Charles Barkley from their couches.

Last year, the prediction markets tracked swings in the US presidential election, which could occur over the course of weeks. For sports, Thompson shows a graph in the bottom corner of his TV, which “deviates from possession to possession” for less than a handful of hours.

In practice, sporting events can last only a few moments. For example, the fastest knockout in UFC history came five seconds after the opening bell, and earlier this week the MMA organization’s parent company riveted a multi-year agreement with Polymarket.

As part of the arrangement, a fan prediction scoreboard will be integrated into UFC broadcasts, visualizing global fan sentiment and fight predictions as events unfold.

In the first eight months of this year, Americans wagered $99 billion through commercial sportsbooks, up 12% from the same period a year ago, according to the American Gaming Association. And most sports broadcasts include betting odds.

In recent months, courts have begun to tackle the question of whether prediction markets are subject to a patchwork of state gambling rules some setbacksbut Thompson views their nature as different from that of the average bookmaker.

“Vegas and gambling are definitely big industries in America,” he said. “More importantly, I think with prediction markets […] it will actually increase the ratings.”

By design, prediction markets offer individuals the opportunity to exit bets before they are resolved. That could encourage people to watch events more closely, as an opportunistic exit isn’t always reflected in traditional metrics, Thompson said.

“It’s hard to tell how a game is going just by looking at the scoreboard,” he said.

Thompson himself backs a project called Basketball.fun, where users can speculate on NBA talent in a way that parallels an unaffiliated project called Football.fun. This last project started to mix elements of fantasy sports trading card games in august.

Last month, the NHL became the first major sports league to form a multi-year partnership with prediction markets, tapping both Polymarket and its biggest rival Kalshi. Also retail brokerage Robinhood started renting out customers will have access to sports-related prediction markets this year.

DraftKings, the fantasy sports giant, bought prediction market company Railbird for an undisclosed amount in October. However, in a press release, the company said its offering will focus on “finance, culture and entertainment.”