If boxing is fixed, what about the NFL? [View All]

[stopbush]

In an earlier thread about yesterday's De la Hoya fight, I related a personal experience story that seemed to confirm to me that some boxing matches are fixed. Relating that stirred my ancient memories à la a similar story about game fixing in the NFL. I recount it here for whatever it's worth:

Back in the 80s, I worked a bar on the Upper West Side of Manhattan - Columbus Ave, to be exact. We were close enough to the ABC studios that we had a few TV types as regulars at the restaurant. Among those was an up-and-coming sportscaster with the initials JN who worked for ABC at the national level in football broadcasting.

Anyway, JN was in one day and the conversation turned to the subject of the NFL and game fixing. JN was of the opinion that possibly 15-20% of NFL games were fixed. His explanation was interesting and ran something like this:

1. The players were never involved. The officials were the ones assisting in the fixing. "They are paid squat and are open to bribery." When I asked him how they'd do such a thing, he repied, "it's easy. You'll see them calling incidental penalties against a particular team, maybe even a particular interior linesman. Things like holding and offsides - penalties that can be called on almost every single play if the ref really wanted to. I've seen it happen - and the team that it's happening to just sort of deflates because they know that there's nothing they can do to stop it...or to win."

2. It never happens on a big game. Too much exposure. JN opined that this would happen during what he called "seemingly meaningless" games played between two teams who had little or no chance of making the playoffs. It happened THERE because

3. The outcome of that game could influence the standings of the big-market teams who did have a chance of making the playoffs. He said that many of these fixed games happened early in the season when the "funny" outcome would be more readily chalked up to the "any given Sunday" meme than "the fix was in" thinking. And,

4. The fixing wasn't for something as mundane as covering a spread. It came down from the NFL ownership itself and was done to encourage - not to insure - that the teams in the big TV markets had a better chance to stay in longer, thus boosting viewership and ad revenues.

"If the sports public ever found out about it, the NFL would be run out of business," JN opined. "They think that football is a clean sport and that the competition field is level. If they only knew..."

Now, I never gave it much thought. Maybe the guy was pulling my leg. Maybe he was trying to impress me with all of his insider knowledge. Truth is, I haven't followed football since my high school days, so I had no interest in whether what he said was true and common knowldge, or simply BS that is easily refuted. But with the "funny" outcome of yesterday's fight - and having lots of unemployed hours available in my schedule to think about such things - I'm now wondering if what he said was true.

Any opinions or evidence (either way) on this one from our sports nuts out there?