The National Basketball Association has had its share of scandals related to gambling. They’ve snared both players and coaches, the famous and not-so-famous.
Here’s a recent example, involving an accomplished scoring guard who had played with six different teams over his nine-year career:
Ex-NBA guard Malik Beasley to plead guilty after involvement in gambling scheme
Beasley was indicted in June after prosecutors said he manipulated several NBA games in a larger gambling scheme
A quick summary: Beasley is said to have owed millions due to an escalating gambling habit. To help pay off the debt, he decided to borrow money from a retired player named Ed Davis, himself a former NBA journeyman with stops at eight different teams over little more than a decade.
At some point, the two allegedly decided to launch an adventurous betting scheme of their own. I suppose they reasoned that if they couldn’t beat the syndicates, why not join them?
The two men and their associates conspired to place bets on games in which Beasley himself played, counting on him to successfully shave points to their advantage.
It’s the simplest possible criminal scheme that anyone could think of. And like other attempts by other players, it did appear to work — for a while.
Then a Federal investigation intervened.
Long story short: Beasley and the others who conspired with him are now going to court on criminal charges.
For the most part, they’re pleading guilty. Their attorneys must have examined the evidence and concluded there was no better option.
As the article notes, this is actually the second such case involving a similar scheme, in just the last few years. In the first case, the NBA subsequently banned the player for life. Speculation is that Beasley could receive comparable treatment.
It’s worth noting that retired player Ed Davis, who prosecutors say was actually the driving force behind this “caper”, has entered a plea of not guilty.
It’s a sad circle. An athlete with a gambling problem goes into deep debt, then can’t pay it off. Solution: borrow even more money, adding a second debt to what remains of the first. Eventually he is approached, perhaps by a “friend”, to engage in an illegal betting scheme. Prop bets only, he tells himself, and only till I’m out of debt for good. Then I’ll quit. No one will know.
Famous last words.
