THE BLAZE: The game was fixed long before the bets were legal
The integrity of sports is in trouble again, or so the headlines say. The FBI last week arrested more than 30 people in a wide-ranging gambling probe that ensnared Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups and Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier.
A former Cleveland Cavaliers player, Damon Jones, was also charged in two separate cases — one involving sports betting improprieties, the other tied to Billups’ alleged participation in an illegal poker ring linked to the mafia. Given the timing — amid public debate over legalized sports wagering since 2018 — the FBI’s sweep might look like vindication for critics of betting. It isn’t.
When federal agents arrest millionaire athletes and coaches for gambling crimes, it raises an obvious question: Is legalized sports betting really to blame? Rozier’s salary cap for the 2025-26 season is $26.6 million. His career earnings total more than $160 million. Billups made $4.7 million during the 2024-25 NBA season. Disgraced Toronto Raptors player Jontay Porter, 25, had earned $2.7 million before his ban for sharing medical information to steer bets.
When people earn sums that most Americans can’t even imagine, they often invent new ways to ruin themselves. The average NBA salary in 1991 was $800,000; today it’s more than $8 million. As David Cone of Crain and Company observed, “Even if you’re just on a roster, you make more than doctors make. There’s no excuse.”
There really isn’t. This scandal is less about gambling and more about human nature — about greed, self-destruction, and the moral rot that wealth alone can’t fix. The Supreme Court’s decision to legalize small wagers didn’t make multimillionaires betray their sport for a few illegal dollars. They did that on their own.