Journalist gambled like a problem player: DraftKings made him a VIP 

One night of basketball costs Jake Pearson $1,800. He tries to win back his losses with increasingly unlikely bets. For the experts advising him, these are clear warning signs. What follows is an invitation to qualify for DraftKings’ VIP programme. 

Pearson is a journalist at ProPublica. He is gambling as part of an investigation, using money provided by his newsroom, and deliberately mimics risky gambling behaviour. For ten weeks, he investigates what happens when a player keeps depositing money, tries to recover losses and barely responds to warnings. Does the bookmaker slow him down? Or does it mainly give him reasons to keep playing? 

The ProPublica publication provided, dated 6 October 2026, offers an uncomfortable answer. There are warnings, limits and options to take a break. At the same time, Pearson experiences an app that makes placing new bets attractive and easy. His story therefore raises a question that is also relevant for Belgian players: when does player protection move from being an available feature to actual intervention? 

Ten weeks deliberately crossing the line 

Pearson does not simply start placing random bets. He seeks advice from addiction specialists, people who have recovered from gambling problems and professional sports bettors. With their help, he tries to display behaviour that could give a gambling operator cause for concern. 

This is a journalistic real-world test involving a single account. That makes the findings concrete, but also limits the conclusions that can be drawn from them. The experience does not prove that every customer follows the same path. Nor is it a medical diagnosis of Pearson or a representative study of all bookmakers. 

It is precisely this limited scope that makes the story useful. The question is how one company responds to a sequence of signals that the experts consulted consider concerning. The five findings from ProPublica’s DraftKings investigation describe both Pearson’s experiences and the bookmaker’s response. 

A warning you can simply dismiss 

After just over a week, Pearson receives his first responsible gambling notification in the app. By then, he has deposited at least $2,500. The message refers to the option of setting deposit limits and using safer gambling tools. 

He can choose either to set a limit or confirm that he understands the message. Pearson chooses to acknowledge it and is able to continue. 

Such a notification can be useful. It makes the amount of money someone has transferred visible and points to options for setting limits on gambling. But understanding that a risk exists does not necessarily mean someone will stop. In this test, the warning does not affect Pearson’s access to new bets. 

This illustrates the tension around voluntary protection. The player must decide to apply the brakes themselves while the rest of the environment encourages them to continue. Someone who is already struggling to maintain boundaries therefore has to set those limits at a particularly difficult moment. 

Gambling Club previously described which signs of problematic gambling behaviour should raise alarm bells. Money, playing time and betting frequency all deserve attention. A single large deposit does not tell the whole story; changes in behaviour over time are also relevant. 

$21,600 deposited, no manual review 

In less than eight weeks, Pearson deposited $21,600 into his account, according to the publication provided. Despite the warning signs identified by his panel of experts, his behaviour did not trigger a manual review under DraftKings’ criteria, according to the investigation. 

That amount needs to be interpreted carefully. It refers to deposits: money transferred to his gambling account. It is not automatically his net loss. To determine that, payouts and the remaining account balance would also need to be taken into account. Treating $21,600 in deposits as $21,600 in losses would misrepresent the facts. 

DraftKings says it monitors accounts and can close them itself when enough warning signs are detected. Lori Kalani, who is responsible for responsible gambling at the company, describes a team of 51 employees who manually review suspicious accounts. The company does not tell Pearson how often this actually results in an enforced account closure. 

This raises a measurable question: what combination of signals leads to human contact or restrictions? Simply stating that a system exists does not show how it works in practice for an individual player. 

The app makes further deposits easy 

As Pearson continues gambling, the suggested amounts on the quick-deposit buttons increase, according to his account. Larger sums therefore become an easily accessible choice within the interface. 

That does not in itself prove that the app causes his behaviour. Pearson had, after all, decided in advance to gamble in a risky way. But it does show the environment he encounters: transferring more money is made easy, while setting limits remains a decision he must make himself. 

Commercial notifications are added to this. Pearson says he receives up to six push notifications a day about rewards and betting opportunities. A single notification may appear harmless. In a series, however, each message can provide another reason to open the app. 

DraftKings says it sent him 32 responsible gambling messages during the test, including general emails. Pearson counts in-app notifications about his gambling behaviour on 14 of the 71 days on which he gambled. These figures measure different things and should therefore not be presented as directly contradictory without explanation. 

The underlying question remains: how much impact does a warning have when a player is also regularly exposed to new commercial incentives? 

From a losing night to a personal VIP host 

The most striking moment comes after the basketball evening when Pearson loses $1,800 and tries to recover the money through increasingly unlikely bets. He receives an invitation to begin the process of obtaining VIP status. 

After around three weeks and $5,800 in deposits, he formally becomes a VIP. He receives a personal contact who can arrange offers and benefits for his account. Here too, the amount refers to deposits, not proven net losses. 

For Pearson, this creates a mixed message. His advisers see cause for concern, while his commercial relationship with the bookmaker becomes more personal. VIP status can also be experienced as recognition: the player receives attention and access to additional benefits. 

According to his account, placing bets at long odds can also help players earn credits for higher VIP levels more quickly. A high potential payout can make such a bet attractive, but it says nothing about any guarantee of winning. When a rewards programme is added to the equation, the wager gains an additional incentive. 

The investigation does not prove that every VIP customer has a gambling problem. It does, however, show why commercial recognition and risk assessment need to be carefully aligned. 

A break, followed by a new offer 

Later, after losses on tennis, Pearson voluntarily takes a three-day cooling-off period. Within a week of setting that break, he contacts his VIP representative. The representative helps him obtain an offer under which a $5,000 deposit is topped up with $1,250 in DK Dollars. 

The sequence matters. Pearson initiates the contact himself. The publication provided therefore does not show that DraftKings allowed him to gamble during an active restriction. Nor does this passage prove that the representative contacted him unsolicited to encourage him to break the pause. 

The episode does, however, raise a question about what happens after a break. Should the commercial relationship simply resume as normal, or should the earlier need for distance first be taken into account? A temporary break can have different reasons, and the context determines how concerning what follows may be. 

What does DraftKings say? 

DraftKings disputes the suggestion that its protection system falls short. The company points to the tools, monitoring and training it provides. According to its response, all of its more than 5,000 employees receive annual training on responsible gambling, and player protection forms part of both its operations and the sustainability of its business. 

Kalani tells Pearson that the system worked as intended. This is an important part of the story: the bookmaker views the presence and application of its measures differently from the experts assessing Pearson’s behaviour. 

The discussion therefore shifts towards the desired outcome. When is protection successful? Is it enough for a player to receive information and tools? Or should concerning patterns actually lead to a noticeable intervention? Answering that question requires clear criteria and data on interventions. 

In the interview with Mindway AI about the early detection of risky gambling behaviour, the interviewees describe how technology and human expertise can be combined. Their position is that multiple signals together provide a better picture than a single monetary amount. Detection is only one step: the operator must then decide which action is appropriate. The existence of software alone is therefore not proof that every at-risk player is protected in time. 

Why Belgium should interpret this test differently 

Pearson’s experience takes place in the US market. It cannot be directly translated into Belgian rules or used as evidence that Belgian licence holders operate in the same way. 

Belgium has, among other measures, a standard limit for online deposits. According to the Belgian Gaming Commission’s official explanation of the weekly gambling limit, this is €200 per week per website. It concerns funding the gambling account. A deposit limit is therefore not a guarantee that losses will remain within the same amount, for example when money is already available in the account. 

Gambling Club explains the system further in its article on deposit limits at Belgian online casinos. The distinction between a limit per website and a complete picture of someone’s gambling behaviour remains relevant to the discussion about player protection. 

There are also options for stepping away from gambling. Closing an account with one operator and excluding yourself through Belgium’s EPIS system have different consequences. The explanation of gambling exclusion through the EPIS list helps clarify that distinction. 

The real test begins after the warning sign 

Above all, Pearson’s investigation shows how commercial incentives and protection tools can coexist within the same account. He sees warnings, but also larger suggested deposit amounts, offers and personal VIP attention. 

One journalistic test cannot support a conclusion about an entire industry. It can, however, raise important questions. Are risk signals assessed together? Does a cooling-off period affect later promotional offers? And when does an operator decide that simply clicking an acknowledgement button is no longer enough? 

For players, the practical lesson is not to confuse the availability of protection tools with certainty that a company will intervene in time. Setting a personal limit, taking a break or choosing self-exclusion does not have to wait for a phone call from a bookmaker. For operators and regulators, the challenge lies in the next step: demonstrating what actually changes once concerning behaviour becomes visible.