It seems like fans of certain teams are quite convinced that the umps and refs favor certain teams, usually the big market ones such as the Yankees and the Dallas Cowboys. Former ref Tim Donaghy has claimed that the fix was in for Game 6 of the NBA Western Conference Finals where the Lakers were allowed to get past Sacramento. Obviously Donaghy has some inside knowledge of the NBA but if the NBA was really fixing games, I suspect Donaghy would have been “silenced” by now for speaking up. Anyhow, Vegas seems to police its lines pretty well and “circles” games where there are large sums of money placed on either side of a wager and they seem okay with reporting to the NFL if players are wagering on their game just like the Lion players who are suspended.
Of course, could a basketball ref call fouls on on team over another or an NFL ref make some “iffy” holding calls that could affect the momentum of a game? Absolutely but I suspect it is not a league wide conspiracy but could someone like Donaghy shave points and have a third party bet on the game, that is pretty likely as well. Not sure about David Stern rigging the NBA lottery but here are some thoughts on this from SB nation:
It seems like fans of certain teams are quite convinced that the umps and refs favor certain teams, usually the big market ones such as the Yankees and the Dallas Cowboys. Former ref Tim Donaghy has claimed that the fix was in for Game 6 of the NBA Western Conference Finals where the Lakers were allowed to get past Sacramento. Obviously Donaghy has some inside knowledge of the NBA but if the NBA was really fixing games, I suspect Donaghy would have been “silenced” by now for speaking up. Anyhow, Vegas seems to police its lines pretty well and “circles” games where there are large sums of money placed on either side of a wager and they seem okay with reporting to the NFL if players are wagering on their game just like the Lion players who are suspended.
Of course, could a basketball ref call fouls on on team over another or an NFL ref make some “iffy” holding calls that could affect the momentum of a game? Absolutely but I suspect it is not a league wide conspiracy but could someone like Donaghy shave points and have a third party bet on the game, that is pretty likely as well. Not sure about David Stern rigging the NBA lottery but here are some thoughts on this from SB nation:
https://www.sbnation.com/nba/2019/5/14/18616630/nba-draft-lottery-rigged-conspiracies