Match fixing has occurred in soccer leagues around the world, so why should the NFL (or college football, for that matter) be any different? In fact, according to this devious report by Brian “The-Fix-Is-In” Touhy, it is much easier to “fix” or tamper with a North American football game than you might think. From a potential fixer’s point of view, the main problem for the fixer is finding a place where to place one’s bet, or in the words of Mr Tuohy:
I’ve been told by more than one gambling insider that you’d have to be a complete idiot to bet on a fixed game in Las Vegas. Thanks to state regulations and the sports books’ corporate atmosphere, all bets are monitored. Wager over $10,000 and a Vegas sports book will kindly ask for your ID and social security number—that is if they’ll even accept your bet (sports books do have limits, especially if you’re unknown to them and/or wagering on an unpopular game). And to make any fix worth its while, the betting would certainly need to exceed five figures.
By the way, what’s to prevent umpires and referees from secretly betting (through third parties) on the games they are calling, or is such corruption less likely the more umpires or referees are assigned to call the same match? Also, what if players on both teams of the same match are engaged in match fixing? How frequent is such two-sided corruption or “double fixing” in sports? Does such double fixing cancel each other out in the aggregate?
