Point Shaving Can Only Be Limited

Whatever is actually happening in the Toledo point shaving scandal is unclear with charges dropped (for now). It has renewed interest in point shaving and the college games.

Some Las Vegas sports gambling experts are suspicious of the Toledo football team's performance in the '05 season. Lopsided betting to one side or the other of a line changes the point spread - and raises questions in the gambling community.

During that season, the lines moved by two points or more on seven games, says RJ Bell, president of Pregame.com. Each time, the bettors driving the changes won. "The odds of that happening randomly are 128-1 ... which tells me these guys knew something."

The "betting patterns" on Toledo during the 2005 season became so suspicious that Nevada's State Gaming Control Board investigated two games, chief enforcement officer Jerry Markling says. After concluding there were no violations by state casinos, the board closed its investigation in December 2005.

As I wrote before, the suspicions were noticed by legal sportsbooks. They have important interests in stopping any point shaving. They take the financial hit if the money gets too lopsided.

College sports are logically the only reliable target for any sports fix. The money made in professional sports by the athletes (who are in a position to impact the game) is just too huge to be worth the risk of being paid to shave points or throw a game. College "amateurs," though, are more likely to have a price since they don't get paid, or can be put in a compromising situation with greater ease. (Even if collegiate sports paid some stipend, the odds are it wouldn't be enough.)

This is what inevitably leads to the argument of "banning" gambling on college sports. The dupe to suggest that in this article is Justin Wolfers, assistant professor of business and public policy at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School. The idea is stupid, because it would only ban legal gambling on college sports in the country. Forgetting that most of the sports gambling in the US is illegal bookmaking. It also wouldn't shut down all the off-shore or out of the country sports books. The gambler who is (allegedly) involved in the Toledo point shaving scandal was placing the bets in Canada.

Point shaving is going to rear its ugly head in college athletics periodically, simply because there are always people who will try to cheat a system. And there are always those who have a price.

Previously at Fanhouse:
This is Why Legal Gambling Helps
Point Shaving at Toledo