About PlayCA

PlayCA provides readers with the latest news about legal gambling options in California. We report on the state’s tribal casinos and card rooms, the California Lottery, horse racing and other gambling-related news. We also often highlight legislative efforts to expand gambling in the state. That includes the ongoing push to legalize sports betting.

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Catena Media US, Inc.: 8565 S. Eastern Avenue, Ste 150, Las Vegas, NV 89123

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What is PlayCA?

PlayCA is an affiliate news site, part of the Catena Media network. Catena Media owns and operates dozens of sites throughout the country that cover all forms of legal gambling. The network includes both state-specific sites that focus their coverage on individual states (like PlayCA) and sites reporting on US gambling at the national level.

At PlayCA, we only cover legal gambling stories and issues, including legal online gambling sites. Gambling sites that operate without a license or legal authorization are not our concern, other than to warn readers about the obvious risks associated with such sites.

We have affiliate partnerships with several prominent gambling companies. As a result, advertisements for legal gambling options appear on our site pages. However, none of these companies have any editorial control or influence over the content at PlayCA. All of the stories we report and information we provide about California gambling are produced independently and without any input from affiliates. Additionally, we do not accept any paid advertisement offers or promotional requests from external sites, nor will we ever do so.

Our mission

Simply stated, our mission at PlayCA is to accurately cover all areas of California gambling, including casinos, card rooms, the lottery, horse racing, and efforts to legalize sports betting and other potential gambling expansion in the state.

PlayCA strives to improve the experience of all California gamblers by providing reliable reporting and expert analysis of current gambling news in California, as well as by offering the best available bonus offers for legal gambling options. We additionally aim to be a valuable resource of information to anyone seeking answers to questions about gambling in California, be they Californians looking for legal gambling options or other media members who are themselves reporting on gambling in the Golden State.

Who writes for PlayCA?

Our contributors here at PlayCA come from many different backgrounds, although all of our writers have experience and expertise both in the gambling industry and in journalism. Many have backgrounds as reporters writing for newspapers, magazines, websites and other outlets. Some have worked in casinos, sportsbooks, poker rooms or other gambling-related contexts. All have covered gambling news and/or sports for a variety of markets, both local and national.

Such outlets include ESPN, the Los Angeles Daily News, LA WeeklyLos Angeles Magazine and USA TODAY.

Our team includes avid sports fans and sports bettors, too, as well as handicappers and poker players. In other words, many of our writers themselves have firsthand experience with different forms of legal gambling in California.

Jason Jarrett is the managing editor for nine Catena Media state-oriented websites, covering sports betting and gambling. He has more than 25 years of journalism experience, spending nearly 10 years as a senior editor at the Austin American-Statesman.

 

Andrew Champagne is a Content Manager at Catena Media, as well as an award-winning writer and producer. A passionate storyteller, Andrew boasts a career that has included stints at The Daily Racing Form, TVG Network, and HRTV.

Born and raised in upstate New York, Andrew now resides in Northern California’s Bay Area. You can often find him handicapping horse races, planning his next trip to Las Vegas, bowling reasonably well, and golfing incredibly poorly.

Dan Holmes, playca.com

Dan Holmes is a Staff Writer for PlayCA who may know more about baseball than anyone at Catena Media. He has written three books about sports and had career stops at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Major League Baseball. He reported thoroughly on Prop 26 vs. Prop 27 in California back in November for Catena Media.

Read more about Dan Holmes

Dave Bontempo is a writer for PlayCA, and has covered the horse racing and boxing industry extensively since the 1980s. He serves as the go-to authority on horse race betting across multiple websites, including PlayCA and California Casinos. As a broadcaster, he has won the Sam Taub Award for Excellence in Boxing Broadcasting, issued by the Boxing Writers Association of America. He is in the New Jersey and Atlantic City Boxing Halls of Fame.

Read more about Dave Bontempo

 

Rashid Mohamed is an international journalist with a special interest in sports writing. He is a Poli-Sci graduate of Ohio University and holds an AAS in journalism. He has worked in several countries and has extensive experience in the United Nations and other regional, national, and international organizations. Rashid lives and writes out of Denver, Colorado.

Read more about Rashid Mohamed

 

Cheryl Coward, playca.com

Cheryl Coward is a Staff Writer for PlayCA with a background in sports journalism. She started her career as a news reporter in Washington, DC. She’s a die-hard women’s basketball fanatic and founded the website Hoopfeed.com as a result of that passion. She has extensive experience covering gambling and sports betting in California, including coverage of the Prop 26 vs. Prop 27 election battle.

 

Aleeyah hails from Toronto, Ontario and has been working predominantly in the poker industry since 2015. From writing articles, to interviewing big winners and live reporting on poker’s biggest stages, she’s seen it all. When she is not writing, Aleeyah loves to cook and create content to showcase her passion for food and travel.

Our process

Our editorial process is such that even though much of what appears at PlayCA might feature a single byline, nearly everything you read on the site has received input from multiple staff members.

The process begins with the editorial team collaborating to decide which stories to report on or what information to provide. From there, our writers routinely seek to support their articles with information from primary sources. They consult original legal documents, speak directly to lawmakers or gambling officials, and otherwise pursue firsthand, reliable information to share in their reporting. By these means, we seek to maintain high journalistic standards and avoid reporting questionable information and/or dubiously sourced gossip.

Every news article, review and informational page that appears on PlayCA then undergoes a thorough review process before being published on the site. Usually, multiple readers provide feedback during the revision process, with PlayCA’s managing editor, Connor Grootenhuis, reviewing each piece for accuracy and tone. Each article and page additionally receives careful proofreading for surface-level issues like spelling and grammar before we post it.

If you encounter any reporting or information here at PlayCA that you believe to be erroneous, don’t hesitate to let us know. We strive to present an objective, trustworthy record of California gambling, and we want to make corrections whenever necessary.

Want to join PlayCA?

We here at PlayCA are always keeping an eye out to add new talent and expand our team of experts reporting on California gambling. Whether you are in California and have special insight and experience with CA gambling or you reside elsewhere and have similar expertise in other areas of the US, there could be opportunities at Catena Media for you.

If you are interested in joining our team, drop us a line. You can also visit our careers page to find out more about our current needs at Catena Media.

How to get in touch with us

PlayCA writers and our editorial staff are available to share their knowledge about legislation, sports betting, tribal casinos and card rooms, and anything else concerning legal gambling in California. For media inquiries, contact our communications team. For all other queries, you can email us here.

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