Gambling in Sports

Gambling on Sports

Gambling is something that I am sure has been around a lot longer than sports have been professionally played. But I believe that these are two things that really should not be mixed. For the most part, gambling on sports is illegal in the United States, with only a few exceptions. As far as I am aware, I believe that the only place where it is legal to bet on sports is in Nevada.

For the most part, when someone wants to start gambling on sports, they find professionals that manage gambling books, appropriately called “bookies”. This business is definitely a “shady” one because of the implications that may arise. To begin, this practice is illegal and it may be fair to say that some bookies are indeed criminals. The risk could go both ways, of the person that is making the wager wins; there is no guarantee that they will receive any of their winnings. And if the bet is lost by the person that placed the wager, and they can’t pay, there is a good chance that the bookie is going to come after them. This could result in theft and even physical harm arising.

I believe that gambling does in fact take away some value from fans and the following that comes with sports. I think that one of the biggest parts of sports is the fan following. There is a line that is drawn between people that are rooting for their team and people that just want to make money off the sporting event. I would attribute this as a loss of loyalty; a true gambler can never have a single team to root for if they are always looking to turn a profit.

Betting on sports can also result in corrupting the sport directly as seen in the yearly years of baseball. We can look to the World Series of 1919 for proof of this. It was reported at the time that eight players on the White Sox took bribes of around $10,000 to fix the game. And as a result, all eight players were banned for life of the game. I think that this was a fair punishment, as it truly is criminal to do such a thing....