SPORTICO: Fanatics Closes Part of $225 Million PointsBet Deal

“Get it done before the NFL season.”

Every year, that’s the unofficial mantra for many U.S. sportsbooks launching new products or new features. The long-awaited Fanatics betting vertical just successfully hit that target, closing a large chunk of its $225 million acquisition of PointBet’s U.S. business Thursday, a week before the NFL’s opening night.

The completed agreement, which covers eight of the 14 states in which PointsBet currently operates, will allow Michael Rubin’s nascent betting business to dramatically increase its footprint prior to NFL games kicking off. Deals for the other six states are expected to close sporadically over the next handful of months.

Fanatics will go with a dual-brand strategy at the outset. Its own Fanatics Sportsbook is currently operating in four states, and the PointsBet app will continue to operate in the eight states that were just acquired (they will be rebranded as “PointsBet, a Fanatics Experience.”). Most important, according to Fanatics Betting and Gaming CEO Matt King, the move allows the company to insert some of its consumer rewards programs into the PointsBet app immediately…