Not so FAN-tastic anymore
During the NBA Finals, Person A told me about Person B's opinion of the series. A knew I would value B's opinion, because B is a professional sports bettor who uses computer models to predict the correct bets.
"[B] says this Finals is fixed," A said. "All of the models say the Cavs should be winning."
I pshaw'ed him. "That doesn't make any sense," I said. "The NBA should want LeBron to win! Why would they fix it against him?"
"Gambling," A replied flatly.
I assumed A was a Cavs fan, just bitter about his team losing. Maybe not.
Can there be anything worse for the NBA? NBA referees have soooo much power. As ESPN's TrueHoop blog pointed out, a hand-check or loose ball foul could be called on almost every play. Forget the bad Finals ratings; it seems like the sport itself could be in deep shit. I would not want to be David Stern right now.
"[B] says this Finals is fixed," A said. "All of the models say the Cavs should be winning."
I pshaw'ed him. "That doesn't make any sense," I said. "The NBA should want LeBron to win! Why would they fix it against him?"
"Gambling," A replied flatly.
I assumed A was a Cavs fan, just bitter about his team losing. Maybe not.
Can there be anything worse for the NBA? NBA referees have soooo much power. As ESPN's TrueHoop blog pointed out, a hand-check or loose ball foul could be called on almost every play. Forget the bad Finals ratings; it seems like the sport itself could be in deep shit. I would not want to be David Stern right now.