Silver needs to clean up the sport

[Sixers in 4]

Every major sports league is/has/will be dealing with gambling issues as long as sports betting is legal. This isn't unique to the NBA.

There is a moral quandary involved with a league *accepting* to be in partnership with sports betting websites, but unfortunately, no league is going to see the MLB/NFL/NHL benefit massively from these deals and miss out on their piece of the pie.

Sure but why wasn't Rozier suspended. Why wasn't Billups? Like both guys were active. Rozier we knew was involved the NBA could have known about Billups too eventhough the information was not public.

But it's nuts to me they were active one game arrested the next show the league where that would happen where the league was aware of the investigation

[PushDaRock]

I dont think everyone fully understands the situation with Silver, the NBA, and online Casino partners. While Silver had a cavalier (no pun intended) attitude about these partnerships, and he deserves some blame for that, this is really not about him. He didnt create it, and he cant end it. Do you really think the NBA is going to miss out on the billions of dollars offered by these partnerships while the NFL and MLB continue to rake in that money? What's the saying? The toothpaste is out of the tube. Cant put it back.

To be clear, I hate this ****. I question whether it should even be legal, but I certainly do not question the obvious negative impact it has on professional sports culture. The average person having the ability to throw serious money on a game like theyre playing **** candy crush sucks. And I'm not even anti-gambling btw. I like Vegas as much as the next guy... but we dont need the whole **** world to be Vegas.

Anyways, back to the point. This is an unstoppable force as long as its allowed and its making rich people even richer. Is what it is.

Ding, ding, ding.

People want to replace him for a person that would do the exact same thing? Even sillier is getting mad at the game not being like the 90s of being mad at the NBA Cup or something.

Your issue is with capitalism, my dudes. This is an unfortunate result of it.

Unfortunate for who though? Players are making more money than ever. Franchises reaching crazy valuations. Network Deals paying billions. The game keeps growing globally. I would say the vast majority of people involved in the NBA are very happy with where things are at and heading.

[davidv2001]

Rozier and Billups weren’t suspended until now likely because of protections given to NBA employees in the league’s collective bargaining agreement.

It’s sort of like how in legal-based television dramas, if the district attorney wants to go after a big fish in a criminal organization, they must have an air tight case before going to trial.

[Bad Bart]

He needs to cut the NBA's ties with betting companies and he won't do that.

When Silver brings that up to the board of governors (the owners) and they all look at how much money they are making, do you think he will get support for that?

It's still wild to me that NBA fans don't get that Silver doesn't just make these decisions unilaterally and that all these decisions are made by whomever owns your team via the rep in the board of governors.

Of course Silver is accomplishing his role by diverting the criticism from them, but guys, wake up, it's your teams owner (unless they voted against it), who wants gambling or whatever other thing you might hate.

Adam Silver is Tom Hagen and the owners are the Corleone family.

[SOUL]

Every major sports league is/has/will be dealing with gambling issues as long as sports betting is legal. This isn't unique to the NBA.

There is a moral quandary involved with a league *accepting* to be in partnership with sports betting websites, but unfortunately, no league is going to see the MLB/NFL/NHL benefit massively from these deals and miss out on their piece of the pie.

Sure but why wasn't Rozier suspended. Why wasn't Billups? Like both guys were active. Rozier we knew was involved the NBA could have known about Billups too eventhough the information was not public.

But it's nuts to me they were active one game arrested the next show the league where that would happen where the league was aware of the investigation

I think there are legal specificities that none of us are aware of. There was an external federal investigation going on while internal investigations couldn't find enough to justifiably suspend Rozier, which also would come with massive ramifications if they were wrong on that front.

Also, the NBA now compared to the 90s and early 2000s (Kobe, Kidd, lots of others) actually does crack down on assault cases and domestic stuff way more than people think, although even then there are legal things to work through when it comes to actually being charged versus an accusation.

[nikster]

Yep all the people who say 'there's no evidence!' try hard to pretend that Donaghey doesn't exist.

Doesnt requiring any pretending. The FBI investigation into Donaghey did not find any evidence to support the league was involved. You only have Donagheys claim that the league rigged certain games, a gambling addict who has had numerous claims about this ordeal debunked.

What do you think he word evidence means?

What I've realized is that about 40% of this board believes in large scale conspiracy theories and coverups and there's nothing you can do to change their minds. Ignoring the fact that there has been similar issues in EVERY major American sport, what realistically makes sense are occasional bad actors, just like with any company. Won't stop people from thinking everyone is in on it though.

Yeah I get that. It's just funny that people who claim to be 'skeptics' are so eager to take the word of a known liar

[Calvin Klein]

You spend you whole summer training like crazy, return with all time great game ready to take over only for the league's reputation to be completely destroyed the next morning.

[Sixers in 4]

Every major sports league is/has/will be dealing with gambling issues as long as sports betting is legal. This isn't unique to the NBA.

There is a moral quandary involved with a league *accepting* to be in partnership with sports betting websites, but unfortunately, no league is going to see the MLB/NFL/NHL benefit massively from these deals and miss out on their piece of the pie.

Sure but why wasn't Rozier suspended. Why wasn't Billups? Like both guys were active. Rozier we knew was involved the NBA could have known about Billups too eventhough the information was not public.

But it's nuts to me they were active one game arrested the next show the league where that would happen where the league was aware of the investigation

I think there are legal specificities that none of us are aware of. There was an external federal investigation going on while internal investigations couldn't find enough to justifiably suspend Rozier, which also would come with massive ramifications if they were wrong on that front.

Also, the NBA now compared to the 90s and early 2000s (Kobe, Kidd, lots of others) actually does crack down on assault cases and domestic stuff way more than people think, although even then there are legal things to work through when it comes to actually being charged versus an accusation.

Then the people they hired f'ed up royally.

I mean or they could have called the FBI and asked if the Rozier investigation was still active. Letting someone continue to play who is under investigation by the FBI for fixing bets is nuts. They need to own that failure because it really is inexcusable. Rozier shouldn't be allowed around a team or the league until he is cleared.

[SOUL]

Unfortunate for who though? Players are making more money than ever. Franchises reaching crazy valuations. Network Deals paying billions. The game keeps growing globally. I would say the vast majority of people involved in the NBA are very happy with where things are at and heading.

The fans, regular people. You can only squeeze so much out of the working class before it backfires on a global scale. I think there's massive distrust of organizations and governments, which is why you see the sort of responses you see in this thread.

The reality is always much more boring than people would like to admit though. Humans are greedy. Commissioners (of every league) work for the owners who want to make money, players who think they can make a quick buck may decide to make even more money, and you get mini scandals. I think it would be similar as long as sports betting existed, tbh, whether the NBA was partnered with them or not. Also, this one is going to be propped up by Kash Patel and Trump because of other reasons, I'm sure.

Emmanuel Clase (Cleveland Guardians ace reliever) and another player on his team was involved in a gambling probe not long ago, suspended. Ohtani's interpreter, etc. Calvin Ridley and others got suspended from the NFL for sports betting, NBA has their own issues with Rozier/Jontay.

[davidv2001]

Unfortunate for who though? Players are making more money than ever. Franchises reaching crazy valuations. Network Deals paying billions. The game keeps growing globally. I would say the vast majority of people involved in the NBA are very happy with where things are at and heading.

The fans, regular people. You can only squeeze so much out of the working class before it backfires on a global scale. I think there's massive distrust of organizations and governments, which is why you see the sort of responses you see in this thread.

The reality is always much more boring than people would like to admit though. Humans are greedy. Commissioners (of every league) work for the owners who want to make money, players who think they can make a quick buck may decide to make even more money, and you get mini scandals. I think it would be similar as long as sports betting existed, tbh, whether the NBA was partnered with them or not. Also, this one is going to be propped up by Kash Patel and Trump because of other reasons, I'm sure.

Emmanuel Clase (Cleveland Guardians ace reliever) and another player on his team was involved in a gambling probe not long ago, suspended. Ohtani's interpreter, etc. Calvin Ridley and others got suspended from the NFL for sports betting, NBA has their own issues with Rozier/Jontay.

Jameson Williams with the Detroit Lions was also suspended for gambling. The other player on the Guardians was a starting pitcher, Luis Ortiz. As you said, these kinds of suspensions aren’t going away any time soon. This is just the tip of the iceberg.

[52-12-7]

People need to accept the fact that NBA is an entertainment product, and is not a legitimate competitive sport. At least not anymore. There's just too much money involved. People who still think NBA is not rigged to a certain degree need to get a reality check and move on.

[Optms]

People need to accept the fact that NBA is an entertainment product, and is not a legitimate competitive sport. At least not anymore. There's just too much money involved. People who still think NBA is not rigged to a certain degree need to get a reality check and move on.

We'll accept it when the next commissioner also doesn't move the needle to get rid of the corruption. Or at the very least, doesn't openly invite more corruption into the game the way Silver has been doing the last half decade. Until then, most of won't accept it.

Silver needs to go. He needs to step down already and get pushed out.

[JimmyFromNz]

I agree with those who believe Silver has pushed the partnership side of sports betting too far. But one thing...

Can we please stop pretending legalised NBA betting hasn't existed prior to this?

I get for an american audience this is new, the rest of the world has been betting on the NBA for decades, and domestically the american sports betting was just done in the shadows, unregulated with no enforcement.

There have always been ample opportunities for players, staff and those involved in the league to make money off this fraudulently.

It might be more visible on your tv sets, but no one seems willing to admit this issue existed many years prior to the Supreme Court legalisation.

What we are seeing now is - yes over saturation from a marketing perspective, but with new regulation comes new enforcement and increased monitoring from legal authorities. That is the system doing its job.

That said, the 'league is rigged' narrative, well that's not a grown up conversation.

[Capn'O]

He's not gonna be the one to do it. He's in this deep himself, if not illegally.

[TheAlchemist23]

Yeah, if it was a small market franchise instead of LA/richest owner do you think he'd hestitate to fairly ajudicate that situation? I doubt it

[PushDaRock]

Unfortunate for who though? Players are making more money than ever. Franchises reaching crazy valuations. Network Deals paying billions. The game keeps growing globally. I would say the vast majority of people involved in the NBA are very happy with where things are at and heading.

The fans, regular people. You can only squeeze so much out of the working class before it backfires on a global scale. I think there's massive distrust of organizations and governments, which is why you see the sort of responses you see in this thread.

The reality is always much more boring than people would like to admit though. Humans are greedy. Commissioners (of every league) work for the owners who want to make money, players who think they can make a quick buck may decide to make even more money, and you get mini scandals. I think it would be similar as long as sports betting existed, tbh, whether the NBA was partnered with them or not. Also, this one is going to be propped up by Kash Patel and Trump because of other reasons, I'm sure.

Emmanuel Clase (Cleveland Guardians ace reliever) and another player on his team was involved in a gambling probe not long ago, suspended. Ohtani's interpreter, etc. Calvin Ridley and others got suspended from the NFL for sports betting, NBA has their own issues with Rozier/Jontay.

I can agree with that, you want to keep the "herd" just happy enough that so they don't riot. The entire financial system is also built on people not being financially literate, it would literally collapse if people were. The question is what is the alternative to capitalism? An authoritarian regime where everyone is equally poor except the ones ruling it? There's no perfect system and everything will have it's positives and negatives, but capitalism is probably still the best of the options available.

The view this stuff as the cost of doing business. A couple bad headlines and scandals in exchange for explosive growth across the board for everyone is probably well worth it to the NBA.

[Silvie Lysandra]

it doesn't matter who is commish. What matters is will 329 people in Congress (269 Congresspeople + 60 Senators) bother to do something about it? Or barring that, will tens of millions of people do something about it by not watching or engaging with the NBA? Probably not on both counts.

[GeorgeSears]

He's been actively destroying the league since becoming commissioner.

Plummeting ratings, load management, partnership with gambling sites, betting scandals, ownership scandals, billion dollar deals with streaming services.

The worst commissioner in sports, and that includes Gary Bettman.

NBA revenue is going up and up, did you see the TV deals that he just signed. Amazon is paying $19M PER GAME. The owners don't care as long as they make more money.

that's the problem and it's killing the league.

[Quattro]

The same guy who runs the organization who investigated and "cleared" Rozier is gonna clean up the sport? Fat chance. Hes there to do one thing and one thing only: keep the money rolling in.

[durden_tyler]

Silver can't control the players or the syndicate (if true) behind it.