NBA opening week is always a special time for those of us who follow the game.
There is excitement about the season. We’re trying to figure out who will be the next breakout NBA star. It’s early, but maybe the first few games can give us some idea of who the top teams are in the Eastern and Western Conferences. And ultimately, there is speculation about which team will unseat last season’s champion.
But we were thrown a loop last week when the primary discussion was that Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups, Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier, and former NBA player Damon Jones had been arrested by the FBI and charged in two separate but connected criminal investigations about gambling and organized crime. The NBA has a serious problem on its hands.
But is the NBA alone? Why would we think the NFL, MLB, NHL, NASCAR, and maybe even major college sports don’t have similar gambling issues?
Let’s get it out there off the rip: The things Billups, Rozier, and Jones are accused of, passing on sensitive information that influenced betting outcomes, making decisions to fake injuries to affect gambling lines, and Billups also being alleged to have tricked associates into playing rigged poker games, are all egregious and troubling charges. All three have a right to their day in court before any of us start passing judgment on them.
But while we are out here judging them and their alleged actions anyway, I don’t hear anybody questioning the NBA or any of these other sports leagues’ culpability in this madness that threatens the credibility and integrity of their competition. Sports and gambling have always been synonymous. Let’s be honest.
What’s different now is how the NBA, NFL, MLB, and the rest have openly invited gambling in their leagues by forming partnerships with online gambling entities like FanDuel. Is it so unreasonable that players, coaches, and even referees might be a little confused about the relationship and their latitude? Sports used to be smart enough not to have any visible connection or partnership with gambling. Not anymore.
If Billups, Rozier, and Jones are guilty of any of the charges being waged against them, they should have known better. You don’t decide to pull yourself out of a game and let people know in advance to influence the betting line on yourself, as Rozier is being accused. You don’t give out insider injury information that hasn’t yet been made public, as Jones and Billups are said to have done. You don’t talk casually to your friend and former Cleveland Cavaliers teammate about his status and then sell that information, as Jones is said to have done with LeBron James.
You definitely don’t get involved in the sophisticated, high-stakes poker scams set up by the Mafia and then bring your associates in to get ripped off, as Billups is alleged to have done. All three should be banned from the sport, and Billups should not be in the Basketball Hall of Fame anymore if they did what they are accused of.
But the NBA’s hands definitely aren’t clean in this scandal to start the season. The league outwardly profits from folks betting on their game, on outcomes, and on who does what on any given night. It makes sense that gamblers would want insider information to mitigate their risks. Who wouldn’t, if they could?
The problem is that to obtain this information, you need to have people on the inside. Throwing already high-paid players and coaches a little untaxed cash makes far more sense than asking the ballboys to snoop around to find out who might not be in the lineup that night.
The NBA, like other leagues, has invited gambling into its house and has made it seem welcome and okay. It’s important that this fact isn’t overlooked as this latest scandal unfolds, with more names likely to come.
