The United States Congress has asked NBA Commissioner Adam Silver for details regarding a gambling scandal that rocked the league yesterday. Portland Trail Blazers Head Coach Chauncey Billups was arrested as the FBI carried out warrants on more than 30 suspects. Billups, Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier, and former NBA player Damon Jones were all implicated in the indictments. Billups and Rozier were suspended by the league indefinitely following the arrests.
ESPN reported the requests from the government to Silver, signed by six members of Congress on the House Committee on Energy and Commerce who requested a briefing with the commissioner.
Committee members requested more details on alleged NBA-related illegal gambling activity, the actions that the league has taken “to limit the disclosure of non-public information for illegal purposes” and if the NBA’s code of conduct is effective in prohibiting players and coaches from such activity.
They also questioned in the letter if the league is “reevaluating the terms of its partnerships with sports betting companies.” DraftKings and FanDuel are the NBA’s official gambling partners, alongside a number of authorized gaming operators.
In the letter, committee members also asked for clarification of any gaps in existing regulations that allow for fraudulent betting activity.
On a side note, it’s curious that sports betting companies are coming under direct fire as a result of this scandal. There’s an argument to be made that they allow an outlet for gambling addiction and thus pose a risk in general. But one of the specific allegations this week has nothing to do with legal sports betting (illicit, rigged in-person poker games). In the other, wherein bets were fixed with inside information, the companies receiving those bets could be seen as victims of the scam. They certainly weren’t perpetrators, nor the cause.
I’m not sure public-facing sports betting companies should be defended as moral or justifiable in abstract terms, but you could do away with all of them without affecting the crimes allegedly committed by the principals in this week’s arrests.
Any thoughts on that from readers? Is congress barking up the wrong tree here or not?
Source link