sports betting

The NBA and MLB Investigate Gambling Corruption While Taking Money from the Gambling Industry

The NBA and MLB took steps this week to prove they can police gambling corruption in their leagues following two damaging sports betting scandals.

Given their track record, sports fans and legislators remain skeptical.

The NBA is “barreling” toward changing the way teams report injuries, The Athletic reported Monday, as the league expands its investigation into a fraudulent sports betting ring exposed last month.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York indicted Miami Heat point-guard Terry Rozier and former NBA player Damon Jones on October 23 for using confidential information about injuries to make illegal sports bets.

Though not named in that indictment, Oregon Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups is thought to be “Co-Conspirator 8,” who allegedly disclosed the Blazers would throw a game against the Chicago Bulls. A subsequent indictment accuses Billups and Jones of using their fame to lure wealthy people to poker games rigged by the mafia.

“The federal indictment in which Billups is a defendant suggests ties between certain NBA players and coaches and organized crime,” Senators Ted Cruz and Maria Cantwell observed in an October 28 letter to NBA Commissioner Adam Silver.

Cruz and Cantwell serve as chairman and ranking member, respectively, of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, which oversees professional sports.

“Needless to say,” the senators continued, “these connections are disturbing and suggest that gambling-related corruption threatens to infect professional sports.”

The MLB capped bets on individual pitches at $200 last week after the Eastern District of New York indicted Cleveland Guardians pitchers Emmanuel Clase and Luis L. Ortiz for rigging pitches.

DID YOU KNOW?
A parlay is one bet made up of at least two smaller bets, or legs. To win a parlay, a gambler must win all the legs. An example of a two-leg parlay might be: “Emmanuel Clase will pitch three balls in the first inning” and “The Cleveland Guardians will hit two home runs in this game.”

The odds of winning a parlay are lower than a single proposition bet, but the payout is usually higher. If a gambler has inside information, placing fraudulent parlay bets is the easiest way to maximize profit.

The new rules, which also prevent wagers on pitches from being rolled into parlay bets, make it more difficult for gamblers to win big on the kinds of “micro-bets” Clase and Ortiz manipulated.

The NBA and MLB hope policy changes discouraging fraudulent sports betting will convince legislators and sports fans the leagues can reliably root out gambling corruption while maintaining partnerships with sportsbooks.

FanDuel and DraftKings, the two largest online sports betting companies in the country, are official partners of the NBA and MLB. The sportsbooks further sponsor several basketball and baseball teams.

The leagues past gambling investigations don’t engender confidence. Last year, the NBA and MLB busted players for fraudulent sports betting. In both cases, the investigations failed to pick up on larger, more serious offenses.

MLB banned infielder Tucupita Marcano in June 2024 for placing more than three hundred bets on professional baseball over several months. The investigation revealed Marcano bet on the Pittsburgh Pirates while on the Pirates’ roster, though he was not playing at the time.

In a November 14 letter to MLB Commissioner Robert D. Manfred, Senators Cruz and Cantwell wrote:

While the Pirates claimed there was ‘no evidence of any games being compromised, influenced or manipulated’ by Marcano, the evidence of game manipulation [in the case of Clase and Ortiz] is clear. Which raises the question: How did MLB catch Marcano and ban him for life but failed to notice Clase allegedly rigging pitches for two years?”

The NBA banned Toronto Raptors’ player Jontay Porter in April 2024 after finding he left certain games early to profit from bets placed on his underperformance. The league reportedly initiated an investigation into Rozier around the same time — but found no evidence of wrongdoing.

“This Committee needs to understand the specifics of the NBA’s investigation [into Rozier] and why he was cleared to continued playing basketball,” the senators wrote in their October letter to NBA Commissioner Silver, continuing:

This is a matter of Congressional concern. The integrity of NBA games must be trustworthy and free from the influence of organized crime or gambling-related activity. Sports betting scandals like this one may lead the American public to assume that all sports are corrupt.

In their November letter to MLB Commissioner Manfred, Cruz and Cantwell reflect on the implications of both leagues facing back-to-back sports betting scandals:

An isolated incident of game rigging might be dismissed as an aberration, but the emergence of manipulation across multiple leagues suggests a deeper, systemic vulnerability.

The systemic vulnerability is this: The NBA and MLB make money from partnerships with sports betting companies.

The leagues want to show legislators like Cruz and Cantwell they can root out gambling corruption with their own policy changes, because neither want Congress to forbid them from taking money from the gambling industry.

But the NBA and MLB’s problem cannot be solved with policy. They must cut financial ties with the gambling industry to prevent further corruption. Anything less remains a conflict of interest.

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Online Sports Betting Spawns Rampant Fraud in MLB, NBA

Twin sports betting scandals swept through professional basketball and baseball in the last month, leaving the NBA and MLB scrambling to defend the integrity of their respective games.

But both leagues continue to court scandal by promoting and partnering with online sportsbooks, which fuel rampant gambling corruption in professional sports.

“It’s sort of an unnecessary crisis of their own making,” Jonathan Cohen, author of Losing Big: America’s Reckless Bet on Sports Gambling, told PBS.

“With a little bit more foresight [and] a little bit less greed, they wouldn’t have had this problem in the first place.”

Between October 23 and November 9, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York charged a current NBA player, two current MLB players, a former NBA player and an NBA head coach with using inside information to profit from fraudulent sports bets.

Emmanuel Clase and Luis L. Ortiz, two pitchers for the Cleveland Guardians, allegedly conspired to place illegal sports bets by rigging pitches, per an indictment filed on November 9.

Clase netted conspirators an estimated $400,000 over two years by agreeing to throw certain kinds or speeds of pitches ahead of time.

Clase recruited Ortiz in June. Both players allegedly accepted $12,000 bribes for Ortiz to throw pre-determined pitches in two different games. Wagers on Ortiz’s pitches alone racked up some $60,000 in fraudulent gambling profits.

Bets on whether the next pitch will be a ball or strike are some of the many proposition or “prop” bets gamblers can place at contemporary sports books.

“Prop” bets wager on event outcomes or player performances within a single game — like whether the next play will result in a first down or a player will hit a certain number of home runs.

Gamblers can place dozens of these per game, which is why many prop bets are also called “micro-bets.”

Micro-betting did not exist prior to online sports betting. Gamblers cannot wager on each play without the speed and connectivity of the internet.

Micro-bets are also uniquely vulnerable to fraud, because individual players like Clase and Ortiz can single-handedly manipulate the outcome of a micro-bet without doing something obvious, like throwing a game.

The ease and perceived stealth of prop-bet fraud make fraudulent sports betting a constant temptation for professional athletes and league employees looking to cash in.

Perhaps that’s why, less than three weeks before charging Clase and Ortiz, the Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York indicted Miami Heat point guard Terry Rozier and former NBA player and coach Damon Jones for using confidential information to help accomplices place illegal sports bets.

Rozier allegedly profited from micro-bets on his tepid performance after he faked an injury and left a game early.

Though not named in the indictment with Rozier, Oregon Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups is thought to be “Co-Conspirator 8,” who allegedly disclosed the Blazers’ plan to throw a game against the Chicago Bulls.

A subsequent indictment claims Billups and Jones used their fame to lure wealthy people to poker games rigged by the mob.

The NBA and MLB opened the door to rampant sports betting fraud by promoting and partnering with online sports books.

FanDuel and DraftKings, the two biggest online sportsbooks in the country, are official partners of both leagues. Each sportsbook sponsors many professional baseball and basketball teams, as do other major players including Caesars, BetMGM and Fanatics.

Sportsbooks made nearly $3.5 billion off Americans in the third quarter of 2024 alone, per the American Gaming Association. MLB and the NBA ignored the obvious risk of fraud, Cohen believes, to capture a slice of the profits.

He emphasized to PBS:

Maybe, if the leagues had had a little bit more foresight, they wouldn’t have ever offered the chance to bet on the speed of a baseball pitch — because who in their right mind is gambling on the speed of a baseball pitch?

The solution is clear: The NBA and MLB must stop promoting the same companies creating new ways to undermine fair sports.

Until then, the integrity of basketball and baseball games will remain a losing bet.

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Public Opinion on Legal Sports Betting is Souring, Survey Shows — But Young Americans Are Betting More Than Ever

More Americans believe legal sports betting is bad today than in 2022, a new Pew Research survey shows.

Unfortunately, more Americans than ever are betting on sports — a dangerous trend driven almost exclusively by young people placing online sports bets.

Of the nearly 10,000 American adults Pew polled on the question this year, 43% said legal sports betting is bad for society and 40% said it’s bad for sports.

In a similar 2022 survey, only 34% of surveyed adults said legal sports betting was bad for society. Even fewer (33%) felt it was bad for sports.

The data suggests Americans are becoming more aware of the harms of commercial sports betting — an inherently predatory industry that makes most of its money by targeting people who are addicted to gambling.

But increased public disapproval of legal sports betting has not yet decreased the number of Americans who bet on sports. An estimated 7% of U.S. adults placed a commercial sports bet in the last year, according to Pew, compared to just 4% in 2022.

This increase is driven entirely by online sports betting. The number of respondents who reported placing an online sports bet in the past year nearly doubled from 2022 (6%) to 2025 (10%), while the number of people who reported betting on sports in person stayed constant.

This is bad news. Online sports books use the same technology that makes smartphones addictive to offer endless potential wagers, instantaneous money transfers and ways to bet without missing a second of the big game.

In other words, it has never been faster or easier to bet money, lose it and chase your losses.

But it isn’t just about addictive product design. Online sportsbooks actively target their most lucrative customers — problem gamblers.

In April, the city of Baltimore sued DraftKings and FanDuel, the two biggest online sports books in the country, for using deceptive and fraudulent business practices.

The complaint alleged the sports books used extensive data collection to identify professional and problem gamblers. Professionals were purportedly banned from the platform while problem gamblers were assigned VIP hosts to funnel them perks, promotions and encouragement to keep gambling.

Worse, the overall increase in online sports betting between 2022 and 2025 was driven by young people. This year, 17% of surveyed adults under 30 reported betting on an online sportsbook in the past year — a 10% increase from 2022.

Young people, particularly college-age men, were early adopters of online sports betting and some of the first to become addicted. They are also some of the most vulnerable to addiction because their brains are still developing.

The same is true of adolescents. The Lancet’s 2024 Public Health Commission on problem gambling estimates 10.3% of adolescents around the world gambled online in 2023 — often illegally. Of those who bet on sports, the commission estimates more than 16% could have a gambling disorder.

Problem gambling is a horrible, often hidden addiction with cascading impacts on the families and communities of those suffering.

Problem gamblers are statistically more likely than their peers to both commit and be the victim of domestic violence. Upwards of 30% of problem gamblers experience suicidal ideation, per the American Psychological Association.

As America contends with the proliferation of legal commercial sports betting, Les Bernal, the National Director of Stop Predatory Gambling, says parents can do two important things to protect their kids — beyond refusing to gamble themselves.

First, Bernal tells the Daily Citizen, parents should include predatory gambling — particularly online gambling — in the list of addictive products to warn their kids about. Commercial gambling should never be normalized as a harmless form of entertainment.

Second, Bernal encourages parents to support online gambling reform in their communities and at the ballot box. The gambling industry must take responsibility for selling addictive products, he argues, the same way tobacco and opioid companies do. 

Legal commercial sports betting is not harmless entertainment. As baseball season winds down, and football and basketball ramp up, please consider how you will protect your children and family from its influence.

Additional Articles and Resources

Baltimore Sues FanDuel, DraftKings for Targeting Problem Gamblers

March Madness Sends Gambling Industry Profits Sky High

‘Addictive, Exploitative, Manipulative’: Les Bernal Breaks Down Predatory Gambling Ahead of the Super Bowl

Online Sports Betting Hooking Young Men on Gambling, Research Suggests

Online Super Bowl Betting Breaks Records