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Shwetha Surendran
Major League Soccer announced a multiyear partnership with Polymarket on Monday, the latest in a growing list of sports leagues and teams partnering with prediction markets despite recent scandals and increasing public concerns about the mixture of gambling and sports. The NHL became the first major professional U.S. league to announce a deal with prediction markets in October last year.
Prediction markets such as Polymarket and Kalshi allow users to trade on the yes/no outcome of events, including sports. Officials of those companies insist they do not offer gambling services but function more like buying and selling shares on a stock exchange. Unlike sportsbooks such as FanDuel and DraftKings, Kalshi and Polymarket can operate in all 50 states, including California and Texas, where sports betting is not legal.
Regulation of prediction markets is a hotly contested legal issue. Multiple state gaming regulators have sued Polymarket’s competitor, Kalshi, and allege that the company is violating state laws by offering event contracts that mimic sports bets. Kalshi argues that it does not fall under state jurisdiction and is instead regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, a federal agency.
Earlier this month, the Nevada Gaming Control Board filed a similar complaint in district court to stop Polymarket from offering certain event contracts, including sports, asserting that the contracts violate state wagering laws.
Chris Schlosser, senior vice president of emerging ventures at MLS, told ESPN that the conversation around the partnership began in mid-2025. He acknowledged that maintaining the sport’s integrity was a priority.
«Polymarket and many of their peers offer markets on MLS. And so, we really looked at it and said, well, if we want to ensure the integrity of our sport, of our competition, we really need to lean in and figure out how best to partner with them so that we can ensure that the integrity principles that we hold dear are able to be upheld, not dissimilar, frankly, to what we do in sports betting,» Schlosser said.
Schlosser said that Polymarket’s availability across the country and the ability to engage soccer fans in states such as California and Texas, where sports betting isn’t allowed, was «intriguing» to the league.
Polymarket is available globally but is currently invite-only in the United States. Would-be U.S. clients must get on a wait list to use it.
Schlosser said that MLS and Polymarket are working on ways to engage fans as matches and seasons are in progress, such as allowing them to view real-time market activity to trade on the expected winner or which team might emerge as MLS champion.
Schlosser said that the partnership will also include integrity safeguards such as independent monitoring of trading activity on the MLS and Leagues Cup markets by integrity monitors such as IC360 and Sportradar. Individuals who might have insider information, such as league and club staff, players, referees and owners, will be banned from trading.
Schlosser told ESPN that players are prohibited from granting their name, image and likeness not just for prediction markets, but in other gaming markets such as sports betting.
