Mary Drexler and John Martin discuss the Maryland Center of Excellence on Problem Gambling assistance, offerings and resources to help a loved one in need with this addiction. Nestor asks lots of questions and wonders what happens if (or when?) you call the 1-800-Gambler helpline. With football back, it’s time to have a serious talk about limits.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
mary, gambler, people, gambling, week, maryland, game, john, helpline, nestor, betting, point, football, lottery, problem, year, month, bet, riches, resources
SPEAKERS
Nestor Aparicio, John Martin, Mary Drexler
Nestor Aparicio 00:00
John, welcome home. We are W, N, S, T, tousle, Baltimore and Baltimore. Positive. This is going to be an interesting one, an educational one. We have John Martin on each and every week. He is the executive director of all things Marilyn Lowry and gaming. And he, along with Marilyn Lowry, provide these gold rush seven stumblers. I’m going to have the Raven scratch offs next week. We’re getting out and about, whether it’s Cocos this week, whether it Cooper’s next Friday down in Fells Point. Lots of great guests. Mark Viviano, Angela also, Brooks is joining us. Larry Hogan’s joining us. John SAR major, we’re going to be doing all things all month long. It’s all brought to you by the Maryland lottery, conjunct with our friends at Liberty, pure solutions, where we’re also doing 26 oysters in 26 days in 26 ways, while hopefully the Ravens go four and oh and the Orioles win the American League East John, welcome in. I know we got a really special segment today, so we’re going to do quick business on how many hundreds of millions of dollars are in Mega Millions, and hoping the bats wake up for home run riches. But a happy fall to you. And more than that, happy kickoff to you. And happy football season.
John Martin 01:04
Happy all that. Back to you. You know what? This is a great show. Unfortunately, I wish I was home watching it. Oh,
01:10
okay, wait
01:11
a minute. Well, here
01:12
we are. Oh,
John Martin 01:13
okay, all right. Hey, lots of fun. Mega Millions. $740 million as we speak. But for four lucky people, actually three lucky people. Don’t know if there’s a fourth one involved. They won over $10,000 last night in the drawing. If you bought your ticket Saturday at giant and Olney, check your ticket. If you bought your ticket Monday, Labor Day in Capitol Heights at 711 please check your ticket. And if you were lucky enough on Sunday to go to the Wawa in Dunkirk and pay for the additional dollar on the Mega player. Not only did you win $10,000 but the mega player was four you won $40,000
Nestor Aparicio 01:49
you always want people to do that, right?
John Martin 01:51
I do? I do. You know, know the game you’re playing.
Nestor Aparicio 01:56
I’m listening for royal farms or wise markets in Towson, because my wife’s all in now it’s all seven three quarters of a billion. You get this gets this gets her attention, and it makes us lead with that, instead of like, leading with like, home run riches or the Raven scratch off, which is rocking right now. I mean sports seasons here, and that’s what this whole segment’s going to be about, and a welcoming football season, and some warnings as well. But this is an exciting time for the lottery. I guess both of these things sort of overlap. And I knew, you know, coming into Labor Day, this was going to and we’ve talked about this. We’re about sports fans. We knew this was going to be the most exciting couple of months we’ve had here in a whole long time. Not
John Martin 02:35
only that, but if you’re Christopher Coggins, and within the sound of my voice in Greenbelt, Maryland, you are one of the 16 lucky finalists on the Powerball NASCAR promotion. We talked about that several weeks ago. 27 lotteries around the country participated. We sent 35 people into the Grand virtual drum. There were hundreds of applicants, and 16 lucky winners were selected last week. Christopher Coggins is the Maryland representative from Greenbelt. And over the next several weeks, as the NASCAR folks work along their their ultimate drive to the Phoenix Raceway in November for the ultimate championship, each week, Chris will be in a kind of think of it like a bracket, and if he continues to progress through that, he may have a chance to win a million dollars. We’ll update. There’s
Nestor Aparicio 03:21
a million dollars. I was going to ask, what’s the grand prize? I didn’t even know, a
John Martin 03:25
million dollars and 118 degrees in Phoenix, Arizona, but that’s an all other story. We’re not going to talk about that
Nestor Aparicio 03:32
today. $1 million as you will, we will a whole lot more Mega Millions here. Um, speaking of that, you’ve been giving a whole lot of money away on home run riches. Um, every Eloy Jimenez had the bases loaded the other night. It was like the game was over. You know what? I mean, it was one of those, give me a cheapie. Give me a night. I want John to have to run. I always think, if you was like the little guy in monopoly that has to go into the community chest and pull the $5,000 out, I’m literally so I think if you So, I’m thinking like, make John give Eloy Jimenez, let this get this winner 5000 because cheap brand slams at the end are what you want to be doing. They
John Martin 04:05
all count. They all count Nestor home runs this season. I think they still lead major leagues. Is that correct? That’s correct. And there are no cheap home runs to Marilyn lado, no cheap grand slams. No seven grand slams over $200,000 we’ve awarded to players on our home run riches contest. Go to MD lottery.com, for details. We’ve already selected the rest of the season if you are ready for the I guess Tampa Bay coming in this weekend, right? Yeah,
Nestor Aparicio 04:30
yeah, yeah. And that’s piggy Yankee series two weeks from now. We got a couple of football games in the way, and we got pitching issues and bullpen issues and rushman hitting the ball, there’s going to be a focus on football that begins. Oh, right about now, you know, kickoff. My wife’s trying to figure out how we’re getting this peacock channel on Friday so we can go to Brazil and see that, because we don’t. We’re trying to figure out, like, how to actually get the games right, because, you know, the prime Thursday and the NFL, so we’re doing all of that. But the. Ravens, full circle, full focus. For you guys, you’re giving away some really cool stuff. And, um, this is where my little segue starts spreading. The news is that my good New York segue for you, for the grandmother,
John Martin 05:11
I get I get it. I see what you did there. Yeah, you know what? You can go to MD lottery.com, and check out all of our ravens Second Chance prizes. We’ve done a couple things this year a little different, and one of them is our fan of the game, after our very successful contestant of the game with the with the o’s and the home run riches this last season, the fan of the game and start on Thursday’s kickoff game against the chiefs. Mozamal Hossein is the lucky fan of the game, and just for being selected $1,000 winner for every touchdown scored by the Ravens in that game, another $1,000 so we’ll be tracking that all through 17 games of the regular season. Fans will be selected, and very similar home run riches. They get some cash just for being selected. And then each touchdown will will add to their
Nestor Aparicio 05:57
Oh, listen, if I were in the room and I’m not, and this is where you break K Fabe, and I just tell the Executive Director of the Maryland lottery what I would I would have done points. I would have done 1000 for, you know, 37 points, 37 grand, or maybe 3700 I don’t know. Like for
John Martin 06:12
me, make that note, next season, 16
Nestor Aparicio 06:15
games, and you guys are the lottery. You’ve been millions, you
John Martin 06:19
know, next season, we’re gonna see the Nestor Aparicio account for points per game. Did I get that right?
Nestor Aparicio 06:26
Let’s get I misunderstand. No, I’m gonna edit that out. Let’s pretend that didn’t happen at all. Uh, John Martin is here. He’s the Executive Director of all things Maryland lottery game. You know, I will get the tickets from Roz. I will have them next Friday. We’re doing crab cake tours all month. I’m gonna be at state fair on the 24th cost us the 27th Eastern Shore, Southern Maryland, oysters, oyster recovery partnership, lots of education, including with our friends at Liberty. Do we did everything on the on the Raven scratch officer, can we save that for next week and just get to absolutely no, we’re
John Martin 06:55
ready to kick it off.
Nestor Aparicio 06:56
Do we kick it off? Okay, so I do these segments with you. We started doing these years ago, before really you could sports wager. And then that happened. The casinos happened. You and I talk mobile, mobile. When’s mobile coming? John’s a bad guy to swark. Let’s get mobile going. We got mobile going. And then there’s the point where, like, it’s all happening. Now. We all see it happening. We’re football fans, we’re baseball fans, big Poppy with the hose, all of that. And I think I am unabashedly as a lifelong journalist, Mary, I want to welcome you. And Mary Drexler is here today. She’s with MD, Problem gambling.com we’re now LinkedIn, which I appreciate. She’s the director at the Maryland Center of Excellence on problem gambling. And John tell Mary how long I’ve been talking to you about every time we talk about this, because I’m not a bet forward person. I’m not a sports better. I’m a blackjack I go to Vegas. I’m not a teetotaler about any of it. But I also have seen people in my life with problems all of that, John, I really appreciate you making this segment happen, and I know we’ve been talking about it all summer long, because this is this is an important thing as we get ramped up for football in
John Martin 08:01
September is a great time to do that Nestor a season. But as Mary’s well aware, the American gaming Association, the Aga, just down the road in Washington, DC, has labeled the September responsible gaming Education Month. And I can’t think of a better time than to bring Mary on to chat with us about the pitfalls. I mean you and I have some fun. We enjoy all the bright lights and the winning side of it, but there’s an equally important side, and Mary will share with us her experiences. And I’ve known Mary for several years now. She’s a great partner. We work together very closely on trying to get the message out and educate players of all shapes and sizes on what really goes on with being responsible when you’re when you’re playing these games. Is that right? Mary, that
08:49
is absolutely true. We do try and work really well together. We know how important it is for people to gamble responsibly, and we know on our end, the impact it has not just on the gambler, but on the family members of the gambler who may not even be ready for help yet. Well, I
Nestor Aparicio 09:06
think the crux of this for me, I’m a kid from Dundalk Mary, right? Like people ran numbers in my neighborhood. You know, I joke when I lost Harvey Meyer six months ago. He’s placed the Emerald tavern the phone booth outside in the 1990s there’s a bookmaker salad, kind of famously, pretty damn good one too. He got up the street from State Fair over in Catonsville and see our friends at Franco’s. But this was happening on the streets. This was happening violence, you know, all crime, like all the part of that to bring this in. And when people talk to me about it, and I talked to John a few weeks ago, we talk all the time about where the money goes, that this is now. And I use this term all the times. My dad’s term on the up and up and and it’s so available. And I believe the built in, we can stop you, what’s your budget? And those messages we all hear them. But I do think this is, this is a disease, right? And this is something that more. More than alcohol, drugs, and I talk about all of these issues on my show all the time, with with real leaders. This is something that kind of happens very, very privately, and it just happens between you and your app and your bank account. And that can be even more frightening.
10:13
Yeah, it can be. I mean, it’s so now with mobile and online betting, obviously the accessibility, how easy it is. You have your phone in your hand, especially with sports betting, people can isolate themselves as well. So go in the bedroom, you start making bets. Nobody knows how much you’re betting on a particular game, but you’re not just saying who wins or loses. You’re betting on every play now of the game, and you lose track of the money, because your bank accounts right there. The app is right there. So we’re finding a lot of individuals getting into trouble. What we’re seeing, and starting to see an increase, is the younger adult male population. So we’re seeing that college age group up to, like, 24 years of age, and even up as high as 32 years these
Nestor Aparicio 11:00
are kids that don’t have any money. These are kids that don’t have any experience with I mean, I’m an old guy. I mean, I know looking I shave today, but I mean, I, you know, I remember friends of mine in the neighborhood, and everybody had a 900 number, and they had inside and they went to the track and took that to the football and down to the point where my dad would bring the pool cards home and all of that. I think there was a limited amount of trouble you could get into, but still a lot of trouble you could get into. I just think the the every pitch, every at bat, and I would think it’s very obvious when someone has a problem, like, right like, it’s tracked, it’s digital, it’s this, this isn’t it’s all there for you, and when you see it right away, it must be telling as to how long they can’t lie to you, I guess is the point. I could go into any doctor and say, Oh, this really doesn’t hurt. Or this is very, very obvious what their finances would be, right? Yeah,
Mary Drexler 11:53
probably problem gamblers don’t tend to reach out for help until they’re almost at rock bottom. That seems to be what we see when calls come into the one 800 gambler helpline. And we do have trained staff there that will kind of find out why are they calling. What’s going on right now? What do they need help with? Um, so you know, there are signs, like you said, especially for family members or concerned others. You know, this person is isolating more. They can’t seem to keep their mind off of when they’re going to make the next bet. Gamblers are really good liars, so they hide things. You know, they may go get the mail out of the mailbox so a spouse or a partner doesn’t know that bills aren’t being paid, that the mortgage isn’t being paid. So there, there are definitely signs, more anxious, more irritable, especially when they don’t have access to the gambling but what’s important is there are a lot of supports for them here in the state of Maryland, and that’s why either calling the helpline or going to our website, the one I recommend is the helpmygamblingproblem.org and that’s because we have a self assessment on that site where someone could actually see for themselves if they think they’re developing a problem. Well, I
Nestor Aparicio 13:12
know I’m going to get served every ad now that I’m hitting all of these websites on my browser, for sure. John’s chuckling, but it’s true. Help forget helpmygamblingproblem.org have in front no cost treatment. I mean, all of these sites have the same thing, take a self assessment, find a counselor, talk to peer support, call the helpline. But to your point, they they reach to you in this number, and they call in a cold sweat after having lost another $100 bet, $1,000 I mean, you know, I can’t I’ve been in a lot of casinos and a lot of nights, and I’ve lost money in casinos. I know what that feels like, and when they when they call you, what happens? What happens when I pick this up 11 o’clock Sunday night? I had a bad weekend this weekend. Start the weekend. I know I’m not good at this. I know I don’t like baseball, so I this is my thing. It’s football, and I just can’t have it be this season that I lose money when they call what? What do they find on the other end of a counselor?
14:09
Well, first they find individuals staff that are trained on the issue of problem gambling. So these are individuals not only trained on problem gambling, but also in crisis intervention and suicide prevention, because we do know that suicide is one of the addictions Problem Gambling is the addiction with the highest rate of suicide. So we’re always making sure that they’re not in immediate crisis at that point. But we listen to why they’re calling what are their you know, problems at the moment, what are they seeking help for? We provide options. We’re not trying to tell people where they need to go. But there are support groups, self help groups, gammon on gamblers, anonymous, every
Nestor Aparicio 14:52
neighborhood, right? Every socioeconomic group. I mean,
14:55
we have information on all of that. This
Nestor Aparicio 14:58
is primarily male. Uh,
15:02
yes, maybe 60% 40% but we’re seeing more and more, and if you read some of the articles, more and more women now, with the convenience of even the sports betting, are starting to gamble. So people who would never thought of it or would never go into a brick and mortar casino are gambling more online. So I expect that we’re going to see that rise a little bit with women. So you know, that’s our expectation. But we also send out printed material. If somebody calls the helpline and wants just information, it’s free of charge. We send out information. We send out some print materials for them. But I think one of our most valuable assets at the center is right now we have five peer Certified Peer recovery support specialists. These are individuals who are in recovery, have been in recovery for a while, who have had a problem with gambling. So when someone calls the helpline, they’re offered either a counselor or the peer recovery specialist or support group. Many of them want to talk to a peer recovery support specialist because they want to talk to someone who’s been there, who’s had some lived experience, and then that peer who works for the center helps them and guides them to getting further help. And that help could be credit counseling because of the financial that help could be where to go for housing if they’re now homeless, it could be anything, but a lot of people like to talk to someone who’s been there.
Nestor Aparicio 16:28
John Martin is with us. I want to bring you back in on this, John, because I, for me, you and I talked at length about this, but this was something long before, when you were just a lottery guy, before there was, you know, this part of gaming and casinos came and then, and then, you all were prepared for this, right? You all knew that this, this was going to have to be part and parcel of doing this, quite frankly, you
John Martin 16:53
know, and Mary has the statistics, and probably knows them better than I do, but, but to put it in the context, the vast majority, 90% 95% of people play responsibly. They they adhere to the guidelines that Mary’s group and our group put out there. Have a plan. Stick with it. Have a budget. Enjoy it as entertainment, not as a way to get out of any financial problems. Don’t chase losses. I mean, there’s a whole litany of things. And, and most people acknowledge that, and they know that. And, and, first and foremost, I think you alluded to earlier Nestor, this is, this is a disease. This is an addiction, and it differs substantially from someone who may have an alcohol addiction or someone who has a drug dependency. I mean, you walk down the street and you say, Oh, that guy’s got a problem. Walk down the street and tell me where the problem gambler is.
Nestor Aparicio 17:44
You don’t know unless you see their financial the apps on their bank. That’s the only way you would possibly know, yeah, and or if they owed you money
John Martin 17:52
well. And that’s what makes it difficult. That’s what makes it challenging is that is that people who in any addictive behaviors are probably the last to know that they need help, family members, fellow employees, other people see it and notice it. And all these tools are great and they’re wonderful, but people have to get pointed in that direction. Mary and her group do an amazing job. When someone calls, if they don’t call, it’s difficult for her and her staff to do that job. Mary, I’m sure you’ve got statistics and anecdotes to back that up. Yeah,
18:23
we’re also seeing, especially with the younger adult population, more and more of them going to the website to read up on information, to take the self assessment, to look to where a counselor is, because they’re not as apt to make a phone call. They just don’t do that. So we try and get out the help my problem gambling.org website as much as possible, because we know some of them will reach out that way. And we do know they’re clicking through to the pages that talk about it. We know we have a text in chat as well, and they’re clicking the chat button or the text button. So we are getting people that way, because calls all over the country, with all of the affiliates, all of the other councils across the country are seeing more and more people going internet or online to websites to do it. But yeah, we in and and at this time of year, with the kickoff of NFL, we know football is a pretty big on betting, so we’re expecting that our calls and our, you know, chats and texts might increase a little bit, and they’re expecting this year to be like 30% more people betting than they did the year before. The AGA is saying that. So we’re just making sure that we’re prepared and be able to get people linked to the resources they need. Mary Trax
Nestor Aparicio 19:47
was here. She’s the director of Maryland Center of Excellence on problem gambling. John Martin is also here from Lanark. Go ahead, John, I just want
John Martin 19:53
to underscore something Mary said there and talked about other jurisdictions. This is a united effort. This isn’t just Mary and John. Woke up one day and said, Hey, let’s try this. The one 800 gambler number is is a national number. You know, people don’t stop at a border of their state if they’re pursuing casino gaming, sports wagering, whatever, whatever gambling options they they select. And so next week, for example, I’ll be at a meeting of lottery directors. I talk with our gaming regulators on a regular basis, and we share stories and we look at resources. We have great support from people like FanDuel and DraftKings and bed MGM and all of the players who are in the sports wagering segment, the casino gaming segment. They all have great staffs and resources to help people with Responsible Gambling and and that’s that’s something that I think is, is of note, is that there is a resource available in every jurisdiction, and so the people can’t get the help of them and the resource regardless of where
Nestor Aparicio 20:59
they are. Mary, last question for you, because you’ve sort of pointed it out. But I want to expand upon it, because it’s September, and because we’re trying to educate people and talk to people and say, Hey, man, slow your roll. At Oreo games every night, we got football games. They’re all yelling at you to bet that bet right now, the acceleration of this this time of the year. And listen, I’ve been doing sports ready here 33 years, you know, since before this place was built, right? So I never knew anybody that bet on baseball. And I told John that I’ve said, Hey, I say it on the air. I talk about all the time like nobody even knew, knew baseball well, even knew what seven and a half over a pitcher was when you looked up in Vegas on the wall. And now it’s different. With innings home runs. We play games with no more riches and all of that, the football part of it, traditionally, all of my life has been when people who don’t bet on much of anything at all bet on football. And the acceleration that we’ll see here, and maybe even when it comes to holidays, will it have a a graph of some way to say we’ll learn right at Christmas time, or the phone lines will ring in Halloween. Because eight weeks in, is there a tolerance? Part of this where it’s high tide for you, for problems? Because I don’t the problem is Labor Day weekend. The problem is three, four weeks from now, if you’ve lost more,
22:15
yeah, usually we see more starting into mid October and then maybe heading towards the end of the year, we definitely see a higher increase on the betting behaviors, or the phone calls just before the Super Bowl. The Super Bowl is huge. It’s one of the biggest betting events of the year. So between Super Bowl and then there’s a little low but then there’s March Madness, and people also that’s a high time for betting, but people don’t call us right after they made a bet. It’s usually two, three weeks later or four weeks later when they realize they just are continually betting, and now there’s some serious financial issues or relationship problems are huge with the gambler because of the anxiety and the irritability and the need to continue to bet. But John made a good point. 90 to 95% of individuals can do it recreational. Lee, we’re not saying everyone is going to develop a gambling problem, but there is that two to 5% that can either have a problem with the gambling or actually be diagnosed with what we call disordered gambling, or pathological gambling. And in 2022 there was a prevalence study here in Maryland. And every two years, almost in the last 10 years, and there was one just done in 24 where we’ll have some information coming in June of 25 when they get all the data gathered and figure it out. But we’re at about 4% of Marylanders that do, from the survey have a gambling problem, and you’re talking over 200,000 people. That’s a lot of people. That’s a
Nestor Aparicio 23:52
whole people. So that’s kind of alarming. So we do these segments. I, you know, literally, I, you know, people love sports. They’re addicted to sports. They follow sports, but they think they know more than they do, right? And in
24:03
regard to it’s kind of implanted in them. I have, I’ve raised three sons who are now all grown, but everybody seems to think they know the game. They know what’s going to happen next, because I followed this team for
Nestor Aparicio 24:13
you. I took phone calls for 33 years here. I used to be the expert, then I became the village idiot. So the more I know, the less I understand. Is Don Emily once, uh, Mary’s Rexel is here, Director of Maryland Center of Excellence on propaganda and excellent children who know football and sports Well, John Martin’s here. I don’t know how much he knows about football, because it’s brown season. We gotta find out here in the coming weeks. But not only home run riches, Raven scratch offs, all the fun stuff, our Maryland crab cake tour. I do hope that people, if you have someone in your life, a married last thing, I kind of could go all night with you guys. But if, if I’ve got a problem and my wife knows about it, well, tell me about that. When that somebody else makes that call and says, my husband, brother, son, loved one, has this problem, that seems to me to be the way. A that at least 50% of the people I would think it’s I’m calling because this is wrecking my family.
25:07
Yeah, we, we, as we would with the gamble, we let them know of the resources that are available for the gamblers. Should they choose to reach out, but we let them know what resources are available to them. You know, the gambler may not be ready, so they may need some assistance with credit counseling because of financial issues. They they may be having an issue because now the house is, you know, the mortgage hasn’t been paid. So we try and help them, and we work with an organization called the Maryland coalition of families, and they have a specific peer recovery specialist who works with the family member so that information is also available through our helpline. I
Nestor Aparicio 25:44
just want to make sure I say that out loud, because I would have been a guy, you know, I had a person in my life at one point, I would have called and said, this is, this is out of control, you know, like I knew people, and that that was long before they could get an app and do it so it, you know, I speak of this with grave concern for everyone out there that they use this number, use these resources, and more than that, have a good time. Get a lottery ticket. Come get one from me. Play. You know, have a have a really good time with it, but just be careful and slow the roll. John, I guess I will see you next week. I know we got crab cakes, oysters, all this stuff. I didn’t even give you a chance to make all your football picks here next week, but we’ll do that next week. And I really appreciate you setting this up with Mary, because I know it’s important to you too. Well,
John Martin 26:26
absolutely. And then you actually have Seth Elkin, next week, I will be on assignment as
Nestor Aparicio 26:31
Steelers week. Why you send it in to me? Steelers be all one by then. That’s why Doug, we’ll get
John Martin 26:37
somebody in there, the Bengals fan
Nestor Aparicio 26:39
at the Maryland lottery, to come in and complete the whole, you know, this whole thing, we won’t, you won’t
John Martin 26:45
find one. But again, I want to thank Mary for taking the time. As I said, we’ve been friends for several years, and we enjoy working with her team. We do stand shoulder to shoulder on a common cause here. And the takeaway is, please play responsibly and there are resources available, and help can be can be attained.
27:02
John and you Nestor for having me on today,
Nestor Aparicio 27:05
well, you won’t be stranger. I was gonna say you’ll, you’ll, you’ll, you’ll come back here, because this isn’t a problem that we’re going to solve today or tomorrow. It’s something that we need to keep in our minds eye on. I know you guys are doing great awareness all month long. All right, on to the games. Luke is in Owings mill. Luke is at the warehouse. I’m not you can read about that at Baltimore positive as well. Um, we are just onward and upward into September. We’re going so much fun. This month we’re going to eat a bunch of oysters, meet a bunch of people, tell a bunch of stories. We’re doing it all for the oyster recovery partnership, in conjunction with our partners at the Maryland lottery, liberty, pure solutions, keep my water clean, as well as Jiffy Lube, MultiCare. I am Nestor. We are wnst. Am 1570 Tao super Baltimore, we’re always gambling responsibly. We’re Baltimore positive. Stay with us. You.
