Will Wall Street gamble on DraftKings? Sports betting giant plans to go public, close two mergers

Sports betting giant DraftKings plans to merge with two other firms and go public, the Boston-based company announced Monday. DraftKings said it will complete its merger with gambling tech firm SBTech and acquisition company Diamond Eagle …

Sports betting giant DraftKings plans to merge with two other firms and go public, the Boston-based company announced Monday.

DraftKings said it will complete its merger with gambling tech firm SBTech and acquisition company Diamond Eagle Acquisition sometime in the first half of 2020.

DraftKings said the combined company will be valued at $3.3 billion, and it will have $500 million on hand once the deal is complete.

The new company will retain the DraftKings moniker and company co-founder and CEO Jason Robins will continue to lead it, along with a management team that includes co-founders Paul Liberman and Matt Kalish.

DraftKings said it will also reincorporate in Nevada but remain physically headquartered in Boston, where it’s one of the city’s largest tech companies, with roughly 600 workers in its recently opened headquarters in the Back Bay neighborhood of Boston.

The three companies are merging through a special purpose acquisition, a method of taking a company public that differs from the more familiar initial public offering, or IPO, process, DraftKings said.

The new company will effectively assume Diamond Eagle’s publicly-traded status, though under a new stock ticker symbol.

It will also receive a $400 million infusion from the Los Angeles-based company, which was founded earlier this year by Jeff Sagansky, a former president of CBS Entertainment, and Harry Sloan, a former chairman and CEO of MGM, in order to invest in media and digital entertainment ventures.

SBTech’s management team, meanwhile, will be integrated into the new company, but the details of that won’t be made public until next year, according to DraftKings.

The company has offices on the Isle of Man, in London and elsewhere in Europe, and provides sports betting software and programs to gambling operations globally. It was founded in 2007.

DraftKings was founded in Boston in 2012 as a purveyor of daily fantasy sports contests, which are are online games that challenge players to build rosters of actual athletes in order to vie for cash and other prizes based on how those athletes do in games.

The company has since expanded into online and retail sports books operations in the handful of states that have legalized sports betting, including Indiana, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Iowa, Mississippi, New Jersey and New York.

DraftKings had previously attempted to merge with its chief rival, FanDuel.

But the two companies scrapped the plans in 2017 after the Federal Trade Commission and the attorneys general of California and the District of Columbia sued to block it over antitrust concerns.

New York-based FanDuel completed a merger with Dublin-based gaming giant Paddy Power Betfair last year instead.

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Broncos RB Phillip Lindsay on 1,000-yard season: ‘I’m going for it’

Broncos running back Phillip Lindsay will likely rush for over 1,000 yards in each of his first two seasons in the NFL.

Broncos running back Phillip Lindsay burst onto the NFL scene last season, earning a Pro Bowl nod after rushing for 1,037 yards and scoring 10 touchdowns as a rookie. His numbers haven’t been quite as good this year but he’s still within reach of another 1,000-yard season.

Lindsay needs just 43 rushing yards in Sunday’s game against the Raiders to pass the century mark. The 25-year-old RB knows how close he is.

“Oh yeah, I’m going for it,” Lindsay said on Sunday evening.

Lindsay won’t put himself above the team, though, so he’d be willing to finish the year under 1,000 yards if it means beating Oakland.

“At the end of the day, I just want to win though,” the running back said. “If it’s 970, 980, or 1,000, it’s just a stat.”

Few could have foreseen this kind of production from Lindsay when Denver signed him as an undrafted free agent out of Colorado last spring. Since making the roster last summer, Lindsay has gained 2,432 yards from scrimmage and scored 17 touchdowns.

“It means a lot to be able to play in this game,” Lindsay said. “I dreamed about it my whole life. Coming from being an undrafted free agent, you’re not supposed to really make the team, let alone play and start in any games. So for me to be able to do this, it’s a great, great thing for me.”

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Ben Simmons joins elite company with latest triple-double

The 76ers earned a solid 125-109 victory over the Pistons on Monday night, and there were plenty of great individual performances that helped them along the way Ben Simmons was fantastic as well, and his performance put him in some very good company Simmons finished with 16 points, 17 assists, and 13 rebounds to help spur the Sixers to their relatively easy victory It was the 24th triple-double of Simmons’ career and it moved him into a tie for third-most such performances in a player’s first three seasons

The 76ers earned a solid 125-109 victory over the Pistons on Monday night, and there were plenty of great individual performances that helped them along the way Ben Simmons was fantastic as well, and his performance put him in some very good company Simmons finished with 16 points, 17 assists, and 13 rebounds to help spur the Sixers to their relatively easy victory It was the 24th triple-double of Simmons’ career and it moved him into a tie for third-most such performances in a player’s first three seasons

Ben Simmons joins elite company with latest triple-double

The 76ers earned a solid 125-109 victory over the Pistons on Monday night, and there were plenty of great individual performances that helped them along the way Ben Simmons was fantastic as well, and his performance put him in some very good company Simmons finished with 16 points, 17 assists, and 13 rebounds to help spur the Sixers to their relatively easy victory It was the 24th triple-double of Simmons’ career and it moved him into a tie for third-most such performances in a player’s first three seasons

The 76ers earned a solid 125-109 victory over the Pistons on Monday night, and there were plenty of great individual performances that helped them along the way Ben Simmons was fantastic as well, and his performance put him in some very good company Simmons finished with 16 points, 17 assists, and 13 rebounds to help spur the Sixers to their relatively easy victory It was the 24th triple-double of Simmons’ career and it moved him into a tie for third-most such performances in a player’s first three seasons