People used to laugh at Wayne Henderson for his obsession with sports. But ever since sports betting became legal in New Jersey, he’s the one laughing now...
To be fair, his obsession is pretty extreme.
Henderson studied baseball as if it were the bible. At six, his head was already filled with statistics, ready to be recited. If his interest stopped there, he might have been more popular in school.
His interest was hyperlocal. Henderson lived and breathed New Jersey sports. Whenever his buddies left the bar after watching the Devils play an away game, he stayed and watched ESPN's programming until last call.
"I've always been a bit of a knowledge keeper among my friends. Sports are my passion – I just don't play them," he explained.
Tickets to professional sports events were way too expensive for Henderson to afford, but that was a minor inconvenience. As a result, he attended tons of national women's soccer and women's hockey games. He had binders of stats from those sports, too.
In addition to tracking New Jersey's finest, Henderson has an encyclopedic knowledge of NHL, NFL, golf, and UFC stats. Plus, he was really into table tennis, so he recently started following the top players in that sport, too.
"Most people think I’m weird. My last high school reunion was rough. I didn’t have a girlfriend or spouse to bring as a date, and people kept calling me 'Stats Master', which sounds like a compliment, but it sure wasn't when I was a freshman," he said.
It's hard to say whether he'll find a girlfriend before the next reunion, but one thing is for sure: he'll be returning to his hometown a wealthy man.
He has Play Sugarhouse to thank for that. Henderson found a way to turn his vast knowledge into cash.
The state started to allow sports betting in 2018. Henderson was excited, but he didn't love casinos and had no knowledge of horse racing. He did some research and realized there were some great online and mobile options, including one that caught his eye: Play Sugarhouse
The diversity on the site attracted him. It catered to his every sports interest.
"They have the entire alphabet! MLB, NBA, WNBA, NHL, NFL, UFC, and NCAA football, I know I'm missing a few. Play Sugarhouse stood out from the rest of the sites already, but their promotion really sealed the deal," said Henderson.
Play Sugarhouse is currently offering a special promotion for first-time members like Henderson. They're matching initial deposits up to $250.
"I just deposited $250, and they matched it, 100 percent. It’s like money for free."
Little did he know, he was about to earn a lot more.
Henderson recently bet on a Jets game and won big. He took home $10,000 when they bested the Los Angeles Rams in an upset last December. His supreme knowledge of each player's skills and vulnerabilities was finally coming in handy.
While $10,000 is a lot of money for most people, winning five figures is now a common occurrence for Henderson. He was surprised since he never had any major success with other betting platforms or even other sites.
Henderson's fanaticism meant that not only did he have a broad knowledge of sports, but he also knew every niche category inside and out. He'd been getting flack about watching table tennis since he was in his teens.
"I say the name 'Fan Zhendong', and no one bats an eye. For someone like me, Zhendong is a big deal. He’s the number one player in the world. People don't even know that there’s an international league, the International Table Tennis Federation," said Henderson.
The last time he bet on table tennis, he won about $800, which went straight to his retirement fund. He was investing heavily in betting, and he still had plenty left over for savings.
To date, Henderson has won over $1 million. His goal is to join the greats. Sports betters like Billy Walters and Bob Voulgaris.
"They're millionaires, and I'm getting there. I take big risks. Of course, I've had a few losses, but these high-risk bets are necessary to make the kind of money I want to make," he said.
Henderson's buddies didn't believe him when he first told them he was making ten times more than he did at his day job.
They were still skeptical when he quit after a few months of discovering Play Sugarhouse.
"Wayne is more than a super fan. He's fanatical and has so many statistics and projections in his brain, I figured they were taking over. I thought he was making it up," said Don Finkley, Henderson's lifelong friend.
"We're pretty hard on him, I've got to admit. Wayne's just weird! We love him for it, but our teasing really affected him. You should've seen his smile when he told us it all paid off."
Once Henderson paid his friends' $1,000 bar tab that night, they started to pay attention.
"He told us about this promotion Play Sugarhouse is running. When you sign up and make your first deposit, they match it. I put down $100, started playing with $200, and made $5,000 that month," said Finkley.
Like many others across the country, Finkley was most interested in betting on football – the NFL especially. At Henderson's urging, he started to branch out. Finkley has been betting on WNBA games after scouring his friend's notes and committing as much as he could to memory.
It didn't take much convincing to get the entire group to sign up to Play Sugarhouse. Henderson's next challenge? Getting them to bet on table tennis.
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