A New Way to Put Your Sports Knowledge to the Test
If you follow sports, you’ve probably heard friends debate who’s going to win the big game or whether a star player will score over 20 points. What if you could actually put money on those predictions—not against a casino, but against other fans just like you? That’s exactly what’s happening with a groundbreaking partnership between PrizePicks and Polymarket.
Yesterday, Remy Blair from Fintech TV sat down with Mike Ybarra, CEO of PrizePicks, to discuss their innovative collaboration. Together, these companies are launching the first federally regulated prediction market specifically designed for sports fans. This isn’t just another betting app—it’s a completely new way to engage with sports that combines blockchain technology, social connectivity, and a marketplace where fans compete against each other instead of against the house.
What Exactly Is PrizePicks?
PrizePicks has been the number one Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS) operator for several years running. If you’re not familiar with DFS, here’s the basic idea: instead of managing a fantasy team for an entire season, you pick players for a single day or week and compete based on their real-game performance.
PrizePicks made this concept incredibly popular by making it simple, fast, and engaging. But the company isn’t stopping there. By partnering with Polymarket, they’re taking things to the next level.
How Is This Different from Regular Sports Betting?
This is where things get interesting. Traditional sports betting works like this: you place a bet with a sportsbook (the “house”), and the house sets the odds. If you win, the house pays you. If you lose, the house keeps your money. The house always has an edge built into the system.
Prediction markets work completely differently. Instead of betting against a company, you’re betting against other people. Think of it like a stock market, but instead of buying shares of companies, you’re buying and selling predictions about sports outcomes.
Here’s How It Works:
Let’s say you think the 49ers will beat the Rams. You can buy a “share” in that prediction. If other people disagree and think the Rams will win, they can buy shares in that outcome. The price of each prediction goes up or down based on what everyone thinks will happen—just like supply and demand in any marketplace.
When the game ends, if you were right, you get paid based on how many shares you bought. If you were wrong, you lose your investment. The key difference? You’re competing against other fans’ opinions, not against a company that’s designed to always have an advantage.
Why Use Blockchain Technology?
Polymarket brings blockchain infrastructure to this partnership, which might sound complicated, but it actually makes things better for users in several important ways:
Transparency: Every transaction is recorded on the blockchain, which means everything is visible and can’t be changed or manipulated. You can see exactly what’s happening in the market at all times.
Trust: Because the system runs on blockchain, there’s no single company controlling the outcome. The technology itself ensures fairness, which gives users more confidence that they’re getting a fair shake.
Federal Regulation: Unlike some betting platforms that operate in legal gray areas, this prediction market is federally regulated, meaning it follows official rules and provides legal protections for users.
Mike Ybarra emphasized that this transparent nature could fundamentally change how fans interact with sports. When you can see exactly how the market is moving and know that everything is recorded publicly, it creates a different level of trust than traditional betting.
What Can You Actually Predict?
The partnership will allow fans to make predictions on all sorts of matchups and outcomes:
- Game winners: Will the Giants beat the Jets?
- Point spreads: Will a team win by more than a certain number of points?
- Player performance: Will a specific player score over a certain number of points?
- Various other metrics: Rebounds, assists, yards gained, and more
Basically, if you have an opinion about how a game or player will perform, there’s probably a market for it. This gives fans way more options than traditional fantasy sports or simple win/loss bets.
Who’s Using PrizePicks?
One of the most interesting things Ybarra shared is who’s actually using the platform. PrizePicks attracts a young, diverse audience that’s highly engaged with the brand. These users aren’t passive—they’re constantly giving feedback and asking for new features.
This demographic reality drives the company to keep innovating. When your users are actively involved and vocal about what they want, you have to stay responsive and keep improving. That’s partly why this partnership with Polymarket happened—PrizePicks customers were asking for more engaging options, and the company listened.
Expansion Across the Country
Here’s something that could make this even bigger: the prediction market is expected to roll out in 38 states, including places like Washington that haven’t had access to PrizePicks before. This massive expansion means millions more sports fans could soon have access to this new way of engaging with games.
For PrizePicks, this represents a huge opportunity to grow their user base and compete more effectively against traditional sportsbooks and other fantasy sports platforms. For users in states that previously couldn’t participate, it opens up a whole new world of sports engagement.
The Social Side of Sports Betting
Mike Ybarra also talked about where he sees this industry heading in the future. His vision? Making prediction markets more social and interactive.
Imagine being able to create a private prediction market just for your friend group. You and your friends could compete against each other on specific games or matchups, share your results, and build a community around your shared love of sports. This concept of “social betting” takes advantage of how connected we all are through technology and social media.
Think about how much more fun trash-talking becomes when there’s actually something on the line between friends. Or how satisfying it would be to prove you know your team better than your friends do. This social element could transform prediction markets from a solo activity into something you do with your community.
Why This Matters Beyond Sports
While this partnership is focused on sports, the implications reach much further. Here’s why:
It’s changing gambling regulations: By creating a federally regulated prediction market, PrizePicks and Polymarket are helping shape how the government thinks about these new types of platforms. This could influence regulations in other areas.
It’s making blockchain practical: Many people hear about blockchain and think of cryptocurrency hype or scams. This partnership shows how blockchain can actually solve real problems (like transparency and trust) in mainstream applications.
It’s about financial literacy: Prediction markets work like financial markets. By participating, users learn about concepts like supply and demand, market prices, and risk assessment—skills that translate to understanding investments and economics.
It could extend to other areas: If prediction markets work well for sports, why not for other things? People already create informal prediction markets around elections, entertainment awards, and even business outcomes. This could be the beginning of a much larger trend.
Lessons from PrizePicks’ Approach
The PrizePicks story offers valuable insights for anyone interested in business, technology, or entrepreneurship:
Listen to your customers: PrizePicks developed this partnership because users were asking for more engaging options. Successful companies pay attention to what their audience wants.
Stay innovative: Even when you’re the number one operator in your space, you can’t rest. PrizePicks continues to push boundaries and try new things.
Use technology thoughtfully: The blockchain integration isn’t just about being trendy—it solves real problems around transparency and trust.
Think about the social element: As our lives become more connected online, building social features into platforms makes them more engaging and sticky.
Play by the rules: By ensuring federal regulation, PrizePicks builds legitimacy and trust rather than operating in legal gray areas.
What Comes Next?
As this partnership rolls out across 38 states, we’ll get to see whether prediction markets become the next big thing in sports entertainment. Will fans embrace this new model of competing against each other rather than against the house? Will the transparency of blockchain technology actually build more trust? Will the social features create vibrant communities of sports enthusiasts?
The answers to these questions could shape not just the future of sports betting, but how we think about entertainment, finance, and technology working together. PrizePicks and Polymarket are betting (pun intended) that fans are ready for something new—a more transparent, engaging, and social way to put their sports knowledge to the test.
For high school students thinking about the future of technology and business, this partnership is worth watching. It demonstrates how established companies can innovate by embracing new technologies, how listening to customers drives product development, and how different industries (sports, finance, and technology) can merge to create something entirely new.
Whether you’re a sports fan, a tech enthusiast, or just someone interested in how businesses evolve, the PrizePicks and Polymarket collaboration shows us that the future of entertainment is interactive, social, and built on technologies that prioritize transparency and trust. And that’s a future that could change far more than just how we watch the game.