2008 Woodie Awards
Gambling:
just don't do it
Matt Macaulay, Sports Editor
Issue date: 2/22/06 Section: Sports
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We're used to seeing the betting odds printed along side sports match-ups and listening to radio advertisements begging you to call some 1-800 number for the "sure lock pick of the week." So what's wrong with putting a little dough down on the 49ers to beat the Steelers?
Well, for beginners, you'd most likely lose. But unless you are actually in Nevada, it's against the law. Even calling a bet in to a bookie in Las Vegas is technically illegal.
Online poker sites are now beginning to be more closely scrutinized by the government, but there are more and more sites going up everyday. Google 'online poker' and you'll get about 106 million hits.
Just last week, a student athlete at SSU was determined to be athletically ineligible for wearing a shirt that displayed an online poker company's logo during a poker tournament. The student's punishment was not a direct result of playing poker, but the root of the problem does stem from the gambling industry itself. "We'll send you to this poker tournament if you wear our shirt."
Doesn't seem like a big deal, right? But the credibility of any said sport is at stake when an athlete takes to gambling.
Gambling, not so much unlike alcohol and drugs, is now known to be addictive. For a small percentage of the population, it can turn into a slippery slope of life altering proportions. An athlete that has become a compulsive gamble may not be able to resist the urge to turn the tide of a game in the favor of whichever way he or she bet.
Sports betting has recently popped up into the public eye when an alleged gambling ring was discovered by the FBI that implicated a hockey coach, at least six hockey players, Wayne Gretzky's wife Janet Jones, and maybe even the Great One himself. The hockey coach, Rick Tocchet is under investigation for supposedly financing the ring in which Jones is said to have bet upwards of $500,000.
Such scandals are not new to the world of sports.
Pete Rose was indefinitely banned from baseball when it was discovered that he was betting on games in which he played and managed. After many years, Rose finally admitted that he had indeed bet on baseball in hopes of being reinstated as a result of his honesty, but has yet to get back into the game.
Even Michael Jordan was linked to a gambling scandal in the early 1990's when a friend of his published a book that claimed Jordan had lost an estimated $1.25 million on the golf course alone. Conspiracy theorists hint that Jordan's 1993 retirement was an under-the-table punishment for his gambling infractions.