Posted on 03/25/2024 5:14:45 PM PDT by MinorityRepublican
Two lawmakers who are pushing bills aimed at reining in the sports betting industry say there is a silver lining to the scandal that has ensnared the Japanese interpreter of Los Angeles Dodgers baseball phenom Shohei Ohtani: It will shine a spotlight on the plague of gambling addiction.
“This situation clearly demonstrates the impact and harm that gambling addiction can inflict,” said Rep. Paul Tonko, D-N.Y, who this month introduced the SAFE Bet Act to deal with what he has called a “public health crisis.”
Both Tonko and Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., introduced their bills before the news broke that Ippei Mizuhara had allegedly stole $4.5 million from Ohtani to pay off bookies in Southern California who were being investigated by the U.S. government.
“The widespread legalization and promotion of sports gambling will only make this type of incident more common moving forward,” Tonko said in an emailed response to a question from NBC News. “We have an obligation to address the predatory practices of this industry and protect consumers, which precisely what my SAFE Bet Act aims to do.”
The act would require states to meet certain rules related to sports betting, including on advertising, money deposits and the use of artificial intelligence.
The American Gaming Association, which advocates on behalf of the industry, said that the Ohtani case involved illegal gambling and that should be the focus of lawmakers.
(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...
It’s amazing how the media bought his BS unquestioned today. He may not have been actually betting, but his story now is his interpreter was stealing from him and he didn’t know anything about it. How you don’t realize that $4.5M is missing from your account stretches all credibility. He knew and he was probably also betting.
He’s the golden child.
“”I think the Dodger’s season just took a serious nosedive.””
Ohtani shouldn’t hurt them if he didn’t participate as he claims - hope he’s being truthful - but Yamamoto’s poor showing at spring training might... I don’t have a dog in the hunt - my time is spent with the Braves....
Yet, Pete Rose was banned for life from MLB for less.
Professional sports is now beholden to the bookies.
I knew it...
If he was white, he’d be suspended and banned from baseball
And while MLB acts all astonished and horrified, they push ahead with the notion of the Las Vegas Athletics. Las Vegas will turn baseball into horseracing. Disgraceful. Like Cassius Clay said, “it’s what tigers do. You ain’t gonna change the tiger.”
No he wasn’t. Pete Rose personally bet on his own team to lose. Shohei Ohtani paid off the gambling debts of a friend who was his interpreter. MLB so far has no evidence that Ohtani received any money (which might suggest he had actually bet himself).
Do you believe that?
Not one iota of evidence that Pete bet on the Reds to lose. Not that I have seen.
Not sure of any updates, but at the time I wrote that, that was the position of Major League Baseball, which also added that Ohtani was NOT the subject of the investigation, nor did they have any reason to believe that he had been involved in gambling, nor that he had received any money from this friend.
Pete Rose was found by the Dowd report to have bet on games in which he both played and managed. An ESPN reviewed and published the documents from this investigation; they appear to show Rose “winning” on games that the Reds lost. Dowd, while not mentioning this in his report, claimed he “believed” Rose had bet against the Reds
I would have to see a slip. Say Pete bet that the Reds would get 10 hits, e.g, and they got the hits but lost the game. Pete wins, but he did not throw the game.
The slips were actually published. Stuff like “Phils -15 2 000.” The alternative take is even worse than that he was betting for the Phils to lose: it’s that he was point-shaving. Wanna let your mind run to unproven, but apparent crimes? We do know he was betting with the mob, and was deeply in debt. From ESPN:
To Dowd, one of the most compelling elements of the newly uncovered evidence is that it supports the charge that Rose was betting with mob-connected bookies through Bertolini. Dowd’s investigation had established that Rose was hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt at the time he was banished from the game.
“Bertolini nails down the connection to organized crime on Long Island and New York. And that is a very powerful problem,” Dowd said. “[Ohio bookie] Ron Peters is a golf pro, so he’s got other occupations. But the boys in New York are about breaking arms and knees.
“The implications for baseball are terrible. [The mob] had a mortgage on Pete while he was a player and manager.”
Oh, and let’s just say you’re right. Let’s say the slips meant “Phillies - get 15 hits” even though the notation LOOKS like Phillies minus 15. So he’s deeply in debt (proven) to the mafia (proven) and he’ll lose the bet if the Phillies don’t get 10 hits. Suppose he’s got 8 hits, two outs, a runner at first and his hitter has a 3-0 count. A walk puts a runner in scoring position. You think he’s going to issue a take sign?
Doesn’t matter. Pete broke the big rule, on a phone, NEXT to where the big rule was posted.
And really, do you believe him? Let’s look at it:
When the whole thing started unraveling he said he never bet on sports
Eventually too much evidence came out, he admitted that was a lie, but insisted he never bet on baseball
Of course that too unraveled, so he admitted that was a lie, BUT he never bet on games involving his team
At the risk of being repetitive, more evidence, another admission of lying, sure he bet on games involving his team but always to win
So according to Pete he LIED about this whole thing 3 times already. So the question is: are you going to take the over or the under? I’m taking the over, I don’t believe him. Meanwhile of course he still gambles incessantly, gets in debt constantly, holds tons of signings in casinos to pay those debts off. And then complains about his ban. He hasn’t learned. He never will. Never trust an addict.
Actually it happens all the time. Business managers rip off famous a lot. The world is full of rock stars, sports stars, actors and bunched of other famous people getting ripped off for a lot of money. There’s easy math on this:
First you have work that takes a lot of hours and keeps you from spending a lot of time looking at bank accounts
2nd put a bunch of money in those bank accounts
3rd give somebody else the keys to the kingdom to handle that stuff for you
Then you wake up a few years later and find out you’re not rich and that guy is living somewhere we don’t have extradition.
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