Anyone that believes the thieves got out of there with a half a million in cash and/or chips believes I can fly. At that hour of the day, the most the sportsbook would have on hand would be one tenth that amount and that's stretching it. The casinos and the police in this dumpy town are equally full of shit. They constantly make up stuff and feed it to the media who then reports it to the public who are so fucking stupid that they'll believe whatever anyone tells them.
I don't know, I think it's possible that they had that much money. Here's why:
1 - There was football on Thursday night. If they were anticipating needing to pay out tickets, it would make sense that they loaded up. Plus, lots of MLB teams closed out their season on Thursday. It makes total sense that the cashiers would be full
2 - 500-large in chips is really not that much. If you're talking pumpkins (5-large) and higher then it's really not that many chips. Hell, you go to any major casinos BJ table at ANY time and the dealer is standing in front of at least 50-large. I wouldn't be surprised if the SB has 10x that.