The Worst Sports Book in Vegas

By Spencer Hall
Much of a Vegas trip for basketball fans will be spent in sports books this weekend, the space reserved by casinos for sports wagering. As with casinos, the quality varies wildly across the spectrum, extending from the plush white chairs of the Wynn and the raucous arena vibe of Caesar’s down to these, the two lowest quality sportsbooks I’ve seen thus far.
Runner-up: The Sahara Sports Book.
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The Sahara Sports Book doesn’t even sit in its own room, instead occupying a sad alcove cordoned off from the rest of the world by a wall of plants and a velvet rope indicating that yes, you have entered the Sahara Sports Book, and no, this is not a joke. You could, in theory, cobble together most everything you see in the Sahara book from a quick survey of your friends’ garages and make your own home version. The lone exception: The digital odds board, an innovation that even the worst sports book has. Right?
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The Sports Book at Circus Circus. Negative, Ghost Rider. If you were really into the retro-Vegas feel, you can get a peek at it in the dismal Circus Circus book, a sorrow-evoking collection of desks in rows and tiny RCA televisions that, in the words of a companion of mine, “looks like my high school language lab.”
If you can walk past Circus Circus’s horrifying clown sign -- he has eyeballs on his shoes! -- you’ll find that not only is the book mostly empty, it uses the most advanced technology of 1973 for its board: Plastic placards slapped up by hand and miles of scrawly dry-erase marker delineating odds and outcomes.
Add in the lonely, antisocial white cubicles and placards referring to “Texas U”, and the Book at Circus Circus would surely make anyone at least think about picking up the Nevada Gaming Commission’s ubiquitous “When the Fun Stops,” a gripping narrative regarding gambling addiction. I’ll save you the trouble of reading it and give you a simple test: If you spend longer than five minutes in the book at Circus Circus, you have a problem. A serious one. Seek help immediately.
Spencer is covering the manic gamblefest out in Vegas. Follow his work here., and check out his Twitter feed. ↵