U.S. details gambling cases involving pro athletes and mafia families

The pro sports leagues made a Faustian bargain when they partnered with sports books like FanDuel and BetMGM. Those deals brought in licensing revenue and drove up short term fan engagement because the punters betting on games watch the whole thing without switching channels. But long term I think it's going to burn their business model. The temptation for players to take a bribe is huge and now every time fans see something happen on the field that seems unexpected they start to doubt whether it's real. If the leagues don't get a handle on this then in a few decades they'll be seen as jokes: anyone still watching will be doing it for campy or ironic entertainment like professional wrestling.

You could sports bet in the US before this. The people I know now who are heavy into sportsbetting were using under the table bookies before legalization. You could also sportsbet in vegas. Lest we forget they were controlled by the mob and there was much less oversight into this sort of thing decades ago. Arguably old records are the ones that are most suspect either gambling or doping issues neither of which will probably ever be uncovered if they haven’t already by this point.