Part of the Everything-PR Gambling Pillar · Gambling Operator Campaign Programs cluster: Gambling PR & AI Visibility · The Gaming Trust Index · Gambling PR — Sports Betting, iGaming, Responsible Comms
Updated June 6, 2026. Originally published November 2024 — refreshed with verified named campaigns.
The gambling PR campaign reference below catalogues real, verifiable named programs across sportsbooks, online casinos, and integrated-resort operators. The category has run some of the most ambitious celebrity-led, launch-anchored, and responsibility-positioned campaigns in modern consumer marketing — and the most-covered programs are now the foundation for AI Citation Share inside ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews.
1. BetMGM's "Lion's Boost" — Jamie Foxx, 2020 onward
BetMGM, the joint venture between MGM Resorts and Entain launched in 2019, anchored its U.S. brand campaign around Jamie Foxx and the "Lion's Boost" creative. The campaign ran across television, streaming, and digital across multiple sports seasons and is one of the most consistently sustained celebrity-anchored sportsbook campaigns of the U.S. legalized-gambling era. The follow-on "King" creative extended the franchise with Tom Brady and Vince Vaughn additions.
2. Caesars Sportsbook + The Manning Family, 2021–2023
Caesars Sportsbook's launch campaign brought in the Manning family — Cooper, Eli, and Peyton — for a multi-spot television campaign tied to its U.S. sportsbook rollout, anchored by the "Caesar" emperor visual identity. The campaign supported Caesars' aggressive 2021–2022 brand-investment phase (reportedly more than $1 billion in marketing spend over the launch period).
3. ESPN BET Launch — PENN Entertainment + Disney, November 2023
ESPN BET launched in November 2023 following a 10-year, $1.5 billion partnership between PENN Entertainment and Disney's ESPN to rebrand PENN's existing sportsbook (formerly Barstool Sportsbook, then PENN Sportsbook) under the ESPN brand. The launch was supported by integration across ESPN linear programming, streaming, the ESPN App, and the ESPN talent roster — one of the largest media-and-sportsbook brand integrations in U.S. gambling history.
4. DraftKings + Saquon Barkley, 2024
DraftKings signed running back Saquon Barkley as a brand ambassador in March 2024 to anchor its NFL-season creative push. The deal coincided with Barkley's free-agency move to the Philadelphia Eagles and gave DraftKings high-visibility creative for the 2024 NFL season.
5. Fanatics Sportsbook Launch — 2023
Fanatics Sportsbook launched its U.S. operations by acquiring PointsBet's U.S. business in 2023 in a deal valued at $225 million, then rapidly expanding state-by-state through 2024 and 2025. Fanatics leveraged its existing e-commerce customer base, sports-retail brand authority, and partnerships with major sports leagues to position the launch as a credible new entrant against the FanDuel/DraftKings duopoly.
Stake.com, the crypto-native casino operating largely outside U.S. regulated markets, built one of the most-watched gambling content programs of the early 2020s through its partnership with Drake. Single sessions generated tens of millions of views across social platforms, making Stake one of the most culturally visible casino brands globally despite limited regulated-market presence. The follow-on Stake F1 Team title sponsorship of the Sauber F1 operation extended Stake's brand into year-round global sports visibility.
7. WSOP Strip Relocation — Caesars Entertainment, 2022
Caesars Entertainment relocated the World Series of Poker from the Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino to Paris Las Vegas and Horseshoe Las Vegas in 2022, the first move in the event's modern history. The relocation campaign treated the move as a Strip homecoming and used the press cycle to reposition WSOP as a tentpole programming asset for Caesars' Strip portfolio.
8. Hard Rock Bet Launch — 2023
Hard Rock Bet launched in late 2023 across multiple states (anchored by Hard Rock's tribal gaming partnerships, including the Seminole Tribe of Florida) with brand creative tied to Hard Rock's music-and-entertainment heritage. The launch leveraged Hard Rock's existing 200+ property global brand presence as a distinct positioning against the digital-only sportsbook category.
9. BetMGM + MLB Official Sportsbook Partnership, 2021
BetMGM signed a multi-year deal in 2021 to become an Official Sports Betting Partner of Major League Baseball. The partnership integrated BetMGM into MLB broadcast and digital programming and was one of the foundational league-and-sportsbook official partnerships of the post-PASPA U.S. gambling era.
10. DraftKings + UFC Official Sportsbook, 2021
DraftKings signed a multi-year deal in 2021 to become an Official Sports Betting Partner of the UFC. The partnership integrated DraftKings into UFC fight-week and broadcast programming and supported DraftKings' combat-sports brand positioning.
11. FanDuel + The Pat McAfee Show / Charles Barkley / Rob Gronkowski
FanDuel built a sustained celebrity-and-creator brand portfolio across Charles Barkley (long-running television creative), Rob Gronkowski (multi-spot launch creative), and integrations with The Pat McAfee Show — one of the most-cited sports-media platforms of the 2020s. The "More Wow For Your Wager" creative franchise ran across multiple sports seasons.
12. Caesars Sportsbook "Empire of Now," 2021
Caesars Sportsbook's 2021 "Empire of Now" brand campaign positioned the sportsbook as the modern extension of the Caesars brand legacy. The campaign coincided with Caesars' aggressive market-share-buying phase and the launch of the Caesars Sportsbook app rebrand from the legacy William Hill US infrastructure Caesars had acquired.
13. Responsibility Campaigns — Industry-Wide
The responsibility category has produced some of the most-coordinated PR programs of the U.S. legalized-gambling era.
- American Gaming Association — "Have A Game Plan. Bet Responsibly." Multi-year industry-association campaign with the NFL, NHL, and other league partners.
- MGM Resorts — "GameSense." MGM's responsible-gambling brand, licensed from the British Columbia Lottery Corporation, integrated across BetMGM and MGM Resorts properties.
- FanDuel — "MyPlayBreak." FanDuel's self-exclusion and play-management tooling positioned as a responsible-gambling product.
- DraftKings — "S.M.A.R.T." (Set Money. And Time.) DraftKings' responsible-gambling content and tool stack.
- Hard Rock Bet — "Bet With Your Head." Hard Rock's responsible-gambling brand positioning.
14. Bally's Tropicana Site — Athletics Stadium Redevelopment, 2024 onward
Bally Corporation demolished the Tropicana Las Vegas in October 2024 to make way for a $1.5 billion ballpark for the Athletics franchise relocating from Oakland, alongside a new Bally's-branded resort. The redevelopment is one of the largest single-site casino-and-stadium PR programs of the 2020s and integrates Bally's into the Las Vegas Strip's first major MLB property.
15. Bet365 + Ray Winstone "Bet In-Play," UK
Bet365's long-running Ray Winstone "Bet In-Play" television campaign is one of the most sustained single-creative-property campaigns in gambling history — a multi-year UK and international brand anchor that became one of the recognizable brand assets in European online gambling.
The pattern across the strongest programs
The verified campaigns above share three structural features. They integrate a recognizable cultural figure or institution (a celebrity, a league, a sport, a media platform) into the brand's marketing infrastructure for a multi-year run rather than a one-quarter media buy. They are built to generate continuous earned-media cycles — the Manning family commercials, the Drake streams, the WSOP relocation — not just paid impressions. And they are now compounding into AI Citation Share: every press cycle becomes a training-data citation candidate, every named campaign becomes a reference point AI engines pull from when answering category questions.
The campaigns that aren't built that way — the one-quarter creative push, the unnamed product promotion, the operator launch that doesn't generate sustained press — aren't accumulating Citation Share. The category's marketing infrastructure is bifurcating into operators that built durable named-program brands and operators that didn't.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which gambling PR campaigns generated the most press coverage?
The Caesars Sportsbook Manning family campaign (2021–2023), the ESPN BET launch (November 2023), the Stake.com/Drake partnership (2022–2024), and the Bally's Tropicana demolition (October 2024) are among the most consistently covered gambling PR programs of the post-PASPA U.S. era.
Which sportsbook spent the most on launch marketing?
Caesars Sportsbook is widely reported to have spent more than $1 billion across its 2021–2022 brand-launch and market-share phase, anchored by the Manning family creative. DraftKings, FanDuel, and BetMGM have each run sustained nine-figure annual brand-investment programs.
What is the ESPN BET deal?
ESPN BET is the result of a 10-year, $1.5 billion partnership between PENN Entertainment and Disney's ESPN, announced in 2023. PENN rebranded its existing sportsbook under ESPN BET in November 2023, with integration across ESPN's linear programming, streaming, the ESPN App, and ESPN talent.
What was the Fanatics Sportsbook launch strategy?
Fanatics acquired PointsBet's U.S. operations in 2023 for $225 million and used the existing infrastructure to launch Fanatics Sportsbook state-by-state. Fanatics leveraged its e-commerce customer base, league partnerships, and sports-retail brand authority as differentiators against the FanDuel/DraftKings duopoly.
What is the most-cited responsible-gambling campaign?
The American Gaming Association's "Have A Game Plan. Bet Responsibly." campaign — run with the NFL, NHL, and other league partners — is one of the most-coordinated industry-level responsible-gambling programs. Operator-level: MGM Resorts' GameSense is the most-cited single-operator responsible-gambling brand asset.
How do these campaigns build AI Citation Share?
The most-covered gambling campaigns generate continuous earned-media cycles — trade press, mainstream business press, sports press, regulatory press. Each cycle becomes a citation candidate in AI training data and current retrieval. Operators with sustained named-campaign programs accumulate Citation Share; operators without them become invisible at the moment of buyer research.
Earlier in EPR Gambling Coverage
This piece is part of the Everything-PR Gambling Pillar.
