(I wrote quite a bit about the news from yesterday in this blog post. Just posting more thoughts here, today...)
Remember that classic scene in the classic film Casablanca? The one where Inspector Renault, played by Claude Rains, rebukes cafe owner Rick Blaine -- the Humphrey Bogart character -- after a police raid complaining, "I'm shocked, shocked there is gambling going on here!" On cue an errand boy steps up to him with a wad of cash and tells him, "Your winnings, sir."What a picture of what is going on in major North American professional sports now. In fact it has very likely been a part of all of any major organized sports in any part of the world when there is some substantial amount of cash involved in some way.
Someone who is rich and powerful and wicked wants in on the action.
It is comical if it weren't so idiotically lethal. The news has spewed this NBA gambling involvement scandal all over the place, and the association is now working overtime to try to wipe the rotted scrambled egg off of its face. Comical. Why? Easy. This stuff has likely been going on for eons, with many many many more people involved than have ever been exposed.
What else is going to come out into the open? Will it? Will there just be more dissembling and showcasing partial hangouts to keep people from seeing the reality of competitive duplicity in all its forms? I say all its forms because, ironically, as the World Series begins tonight there is no way on earth the Los Angeles Dodgers would be there without the free agency-enabled MLBer powers-that-be many-of-them-certainly-not-so-wholesome helping them out immensely.
How long has all this been happening, especially the gambling related revelations of late? How much of it has been standard yet very hushed procedure? For years? Decades? For always? The comical: Now everyone's squawking about it? We've all been that blind to the power and infiltration of criminal syndicates in all of it? We've never even looked at what casinos do to destroy lives and livelihoods, we've never bothered to observe what life is like for people in Native American Indian reservations when we told these people to just make casinos and let them generate the wealth. "You don't have to do anything, you poor dumb Indians!" was the message served them. It destroyed their communities.
Thing is we've already seen much of it, already. Social media is now posting clips of various people involved -- athletes and whoever else intimately involved with the games -- from years ago, admitting they've had pressures from everywhere about this shit. That they've had conversations or reacted or addressed at the time these things, shared them with someone in some way, again even being recorded in video-taped confessions! Incident after incident after incident that clearly reflected game action being compromised.
There have been those few people who have already even been prosecuted for this stuff, like that NBA official some 20 years ago who confessed to manipulating outcomes. This is not even to mention how screwed teams like the 2000 Sacramento Kings were when they were dominating the Lakers in that one critical playoff game, but the officials simply couldn't keep from hosing the Kings. It was so plainly obvious it was sick. That's just one. But it is true, making sure a Los Angeles team or a New York team is successful means more of the gravy train for whoever calls the shots.
Just the whole massive operation with implicit enablement or even willful empowerment forcefully shaping any outcome the way they want is a house smothered in lies.
All the connections to organized crime, to organized gambling operations whether they are casinos or mob syndicates or the sweetest nicest online sports betting sites, anyone involved with any of that, from the desperate slot player to the cigar-smoking casino mogul enjoying the spa treatment in his luxury suite, from top to bottom, it infects the soul of the individual, the family, the community, the nation.
We've even been talking about the pros, but it seems the most vulnerable are the big-time college programs. Oh my, how gruesome it was for these people to do anything NIL, portals, and even shifting their schools all around the country to try to get into better money-generating conferences. All of that is part of the same stupidity.
What was ever wrong with student athletes getting a full-ride scholarship going to the same school for four years, playing hard for the team against other teams from the same general region, and enthusiastically preparing for a fine future life, livelihood, and family after those four years extremely likely not anywhere near the pros, and being genuinely grateful for the opportunity? Instead, we had the most immature, irresponsible children whining about this or that inconvenience, and children in big-people bodies pretending to be mature, responsible adults gave in.
Now with all that nice new crap you've got to deal with the influences. And now it is very young, gullible, impressionable people who are thinking of having their families taken care of financially for some time if they just take a good chunk of change for simply doing certain things on the field that will make some very real and threatening "influencer" happy.
What are those in power going to do with that? Are they going to stand up to those influences, or do too many of them have too little courage and principle to do it? Are they all just too immature and irresponsible and foolish as children pretending to be adults to not take pride in just doing the right thing here?
I've also argued for years, on other web platforms, that baseball should get rid of, or at least modify to a dramatic extent, the free agency that shapes the competitive duplicity in major league baseball. The whole thing is just as wicked, with the Los Angeles Dodgers' main players all bought and paid for. Speaking of Shohei Ohtani, there were still many questions surrounding his scandal from a year ago that involved money and possible related illicit associations. But I do understand, nothing will ever happen with any of that because the Dodgers' money stream is flowing well for everyone in major league baseball -- it is made to be that way so everyone gets their cut.
The NFL's Kansas City Chiefs players, on the other hand, are all legitimately assessed, drafted, and developed, all within the confines of an expertly managed salary cap. Still, with all the questionable associations coming to light, could any of them be compromised? Of course they could! Not saying they are or aren't or anything, but what we do see there is a distinct difference in the respect for the overall integrity of the whole enterprise.
In my devotional time this morning I read the 101st Psalm. (Here, read it too, click the link, it is well worth it.) What a terrific piece to bring to the table in all of this. It is merely about really wanting one's own house to be managed with righteousness and probity, simply to take pride in honoring God with active respect for truth and honesty and integrity in that way.
The whole gambling and duplicity thing in professional sports almost everywhere seems to be founded on the idea that one must show everyone around them how special they are by getting lucky in something, and it doesn't matter if they do it unethically as long as they can cover for it in some way. The exploiters take gratification in making so many people addict-er-happy.
Benjamin Franklin once remarked, "Nine men in ten are suicides." Some people, particularly men, live such miserable lives, failing so often, or at least considered failures, bored half the time, that it is the biggest thrill to have a chance to get that big score that will just make them, give them a thrill and just earn the favor of some young lady or someone they need to impress. If not, well, "Who cares if I lose and even die because my life is so miserable, that's just fine."
Otherwise, the substance of Psalm 101 applies to everything, not just this little sports thing. If we as a nation don't take care of business in the big-time sports house, and there at least just plain respect truth and faithfulness to God and His just and righteous behavior in all we do, it is likely everything else is infected with that wickedness too.
So yeah, there are a hundred other things that have nothing to do with sports that are so critically more important in life and livelihood, but it can't be denied that this sports thing is a microcosm of the wickedness and stupidity that is out there afflicting all of us.
Might want to think about considering the Living Word Who is that Love and Justice in that 101st Psalm, The One Who is the joy and deliverance out of the deceit and death mentioned there.
Will these people "conduct the affairs of [their] house with a blameless heart?"
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By the way, since this is a Chiefs blog, here's the Chiefs thing.
The Chiefs are thriving, working and playing the game on the straight-&-true with how their team is built with the organizational excellence top to bottom, from owner to water boy, given no advantages not available to anyone else to be successful. Let's look at each player group, from left to right, and you will see. (Just using first names for brevity and -- yeah -- some laziness, it isn't that I'm all best buds with them or anything.)
Running backs: Isiah and Kareem, both drafted by the Chiefs, even though Kareem took a detour to the Browns for a while.
Quarterback: Patrick, drafted and slowly developed spending a whole year on the bench learning from Alex Smith. This after decades of never being able to draft and develop a good QB.
Tight end: Travis, drafted. Noah, drafted.
Wide receivers: Rashee and Xavier, drafted. They did get Hollywood, JuJu, and Tyquan as free agents, but Rashee and Xavier are their main targets. Oh, and that great WR they had a few years ago, Tyreek? Drafted, even selected in the fifth round.
Defensive line: With a starting four of Mike, Chris, Omar, and George, you've got an all-drafted D-line. We did lose Omar to an ACL injury in the last game. Charles is a free agent who does start.
Linebackers: Leo and Nick are excellent and, yes, drafted. Drue is also very good yet a free agent.
Defensive backs: With starters Jaylen, Trent, Bryan, and Chamarri, it's all drafted. Throw Noah in there for the nickel package, still, all properly and deftly drafted with every team having the same chances as anyone to have players like this.
Every one of these players were drafted fairly, developed appropriately from within the organization, and rewarded with playing for people who not only do things with integrity but work that much harder to evaluate those players and get them to play well because they know the NFLers really do not want the Chiefs winning as much as they want other teams to win.
Now for the Dodgers. I pay no attention to any major league baseball because as we all know (or yes, should know) it is thoroughly rigged to favor the Dodgers, the Yankees, and a bit for teams like the Red Sox and Mets (all of whom made it to postseason play this year). Because I pay no attention to any of it, I do not know every player on the team -- actually I know very few of them. But I do know some of the players. Here are the ones I know are the better players on the team, and yes
They are all free agents poached from other teams who are exploited and unable to afford them.
The ones I know are Shohei Ohtani, arguably the very best baseball player ever to play the game, Freddie Freeman, Mookie Betts, Max Muncy, Blake Snell, some guy named Hernandez, and a Japanese pitcher who is supposed to be outrageously good. I know they have another very good pitcher, someone Glasnow, I've heard is really good. That's it, those are really the only players on the team I can identify. (To be fair I will admit I do know their catcher is Will Smith and he too is a very good ballplayer, but I think he came from within the organization. And I know I could look up Mr. Glasnow's first name and include it here, but I just want to be fair about what I do know without looking it all up.*)
Those are the only ones I know about, and I do know every one of them is exceptionally good. I also know every one of them was once a fine player for another team then as a free agent signed with the Dodgers because they were given the power to do so at the expense of other teams really having a fair chance to have them play for them.
This is competitive duplicity, plain and clear.
But it doesn't matter to most people because -- the main point to all of this --
It is because powerful people who like getting a piece of the expanding gravy train make it happen and conceal the duplicity. The gambling thing is just a particularly ugly part of it.
Is the way pro baseball is arranged a bit different than the way pro football is arranged? Of course. But it doesn't change the reality of the massive duplicity involved by anybody who is an MLBer, or even an NFLer or NBAer for that matter, who are too willing to succumb to the powers and principalities that tempt them.
Once again, quite a contrast to the Kingdom where Christ reigns with nail-scarred hands to invite all those wounded by any of the duplicity anywhere, not just in the sports stuff, to live rich, meaningful lives in spite of it.
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(*I should add a further note for those skeptical of my claim I pay no attention to any of the baseball stuff, yet at the same time here I am demonstrating that I am aware of those particular baseball players. I live in the Los Angeles area and cannot help but see and hear some sports things -- on televisions in restaurants, from news reports popping up on the radio, from acquaintances who tell me things, and through various other sources. I never deliberately inquire about any of it. Out of that I'm actually surprised I know that much, and I may indeed have some things incorrect about what I've shared about the Dodgers and its players. I should add that I do know the afore-not-mentioned Clayton Kershaw is also on the team, but he came from within the organization, and really the only reason I knew after all these years that he was still on the team was because the news of his retirement announcement this year was everywhere. There are just some things you can't miss.
I should also add, with full disclosure, that I'd already known about people like Freeman and Betts because they each played so well for other teams, the Braves and Red Sox, respectively. Again I'd only known about them for reasons just mentioned, some because they'd both played in, and won, previous World Series. I watched none of any of them, but again it is hard not to pick up the things that get out there about them in those instances. One more note: Obviously in watching Chiefs games and picking up some of the things that do happen with the team, I do know which players were drafted and which were not. I have at times in April peeked in to see who the Chiefs did draft.)
Furthermore it may go without saying that the reason I contrasted the Chiefs and the Dodgers was because recently both teams have been so wildly successful, and this is a Chiefs blog effort with some input about how it'd be nice if these sports efforts, which I do enjoy in and of themselves, would heed the principles elucidated in that 101st Psalm. It is because they don't and things like the gambling thing are so prominent that I do indeed scale back my sports attention to zero as much as it is within me to do so. As I've shared before, I do enjoy watching Chiefs games, but that is pretty much it. I can't help but see other things about them, much like I can't help but catch some things about the Dodgers. Of course I can't stand the patently stupid things that presently occur in the NFL and MLB, so I try my best to abstain. Because I've followed these sports things for so long and so passionately, my mental radar can't help but register some of them no matter how much I very intentionally stay away from most of it.)
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