After making his highly-anticipated debut at The Genesis Invitational, golf icon and host of the tournament, Tiger Woods, has withdrawn due to an undisclosed illness.
As a result, one major sportsbook operator, bet365, has opted to void all bets made on one of their Super Boost promotional offers for Woods to record over 3.5 birdies in Round 2.
Tiger Woods has withdrawn in the second round of the Genesis Invitational.
— bet365 US (@bet365_us) February 16, 2024
As a gesture of goodwill, we will be voiding all bets on the below Super Boost as a cash refund. https://t.co/ZfkVTmsFla pic.twitter.com/wCkLskNZCm
History of refunds
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen a sportsbook operator issue a betting refund.
Refunding a sportsbook wager due to injury is a highly debated topic in the online sports betting industry. We’ve seen this occur recently during the NFC Divisional Round game between the San Francisco 49ers and Green Bay Packers.
49ers wide receiver Deebo Samuel caught two passes early before being sidelined with a shoulder injury sustained during the first quarter. As a result, DraftKings Sportsbook announced it was refunding all losing bets on Samuel with bets that were undetermined before exiting the game, including straight and parlay wagers with Samuel as the only losing selection. They issued bonus bet credits to placate bettors for this untimely injury.
Issuing betting refunds due to injuries doesn’t happen too often, as most online sportsbooks choose to include unforeseen injury as a part of the risk associated with placing sports bets. DraftKings and Bet365 are the latest operators to utilize a betting refund, with the latter occurring during Friday’s second round at The Genesis Invitational.
Tiger's liability
Ironically, Tiger Woods was the biggest liability for sportsbooks during the 2024 Genesis Invitational this week. Woods is the primary sponsor of this Signature Event, plus the fanfare surrounding his name drove the number of wagers placed on him in the outright betting market, totaling 8% of all bets made in the outright betting market at BetMGM.
Woods finished Round 1 at +1, recording five birdies and six bogeys. He had twice the number of bets compared to any other golfer at Genesis, despite only playing a couple of times in the past calendar year.
At +13,000 to win outright, it was the most profitable outright line ever set for Woods in a golf event. He wound up drawing the ninth-highest betting handle and the sixth-most number of bets on DraftKings for various betting markets. This included 3% of the betting handle and 5% of total bets to win outright.
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