We have long decried the sports gambling portals both because of the personal toll they take on people who should not be gambling and because of the possibility of corrupting the integrity of the games themselves. No one believed us. Well, as this WSJ article reports, federal prosecutors have been investigating whether veteran NBA player Terry Rozier manipulated his performance as part of an illegal sports betting scheme. The inquiry into Rozier is part of a wider government probe into a sprawling ring of gamblers and poker players who have allegedly rigged games across the sports landscape, people familiar with the matter said. The same investigation has already led to a criminal charge and a lifetime ban from the NBA for former Toronto Raptors forward Jontay Porter. Authorities believe some of the people who arranged for Porter to fix his performance in two games last season had inside information that prompted them to bet large sums of money against Rozier a year earlier. The gambling ring accused of conspiring with Jontay Porter to manipulate his performance in NBA games also bet heavily against Rozier in a 2023 game for the Charlotte Hornets.
PS: While Porter's salary was "just" $411K, Rozier's is close to $20M. I guess unbridled greed is not limited to the political oligarchy that likely has an even more corrosive effect than does sports gambling.
[EOP]
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