Beyond the thrill of competition, professional sports leagues grapple with an enduring threat to their integrity: widespread gambling scandals that periodically surface to shake the very foundations of athletic trust.
The landscape of sports betting dramatically shifted following a May 2018 ruling that struck down a federal law barring sports betting in most states, unleashing a wave of incidents involving athletes and officials and introducing online sportsbooks as a prominent, yet sometimes problematic, element of the ecosystem.
Historically, the specter of fixed games has haunted athletics, exemplified by the 1951 college basketball scandal where 35 active and former players, including members of the Kentucky Wildcats, faced accusations of fixing at least 86 games between 1947 and 1951, leading to severe penalties like the cancellation of Kentucky’s 1952-53 season following an NCAA investigation into numerous violations.
Decades later, in 1981, another high-profile case emerged as former Boston College basketball player Rick Kuhn and four associates, notably New York mobster Jimmy Burke, were convicted for conspiring to manipulate outcomes in the 1978-79 season, further cementing the historical pattern of athlete misconduct impacting game integrity.
Major League Baseball, in particular, has faced its own reckoning with gambling, most famously with Pete Rose, who in 1989, after an MLB investigation by John Dowd, was found to have placed numerous bets on the Cincinnati Reds while playing for and managing the team from 1985-87, a transgression that, even at 82, keeps baseball’s all-time hit leader ineligible for the Hall of Fame.
The NHL also had its brush with a significant sports betting controversy in 2007 when current Vancouver Canucks coach Rick Tocchet pleaded guilty to conspiracy and promoting gambling while an assistant coach with the Coyotes, resulting in a two-year probation and highlighting how sports integrity can be compromised even by team staff.
More recently, the NBA delivered a stark warning in April 2024 by banning Toronto Raptors player Jontay Porter for life after a league probe found he disclosed confidential information to sports bettors and wagered on games, even betting against his own team, with Commissioner Adam Silver denouncing the actions as “blatant” following an investigation into unusual betting patterns.
MLB reinforced its commitment to combating gambling in June 2024 by issuing a lifetime ban to Tucupita Marcano for betting on baseball, making him the first active player in a century banned for such reasons, while also suspending Oakland Athletics pitcher Michael Kelly and three minor leaguers—Jay Groome, Andrew Saalfrank, and José Rodríguez—for one year for similar betting infractions, underscoring the league’s rigorous stance against athlete misconduct related to gambling.
Even officials are not immune; in February 2025, highly-rated MLB umpire Pat Hoberg was fired for sharing his legal sports gambling accounts with a friend who bet on baseball games and for intentionally deleting electronic messages pertinent to the league’s investigation, a move upheld by Commissioner Rob Manfred despite no evidence Hoberg personally bet on or manipulated games, reinforcing the league’s zero-tolerance policy on sports betting breaches.
