Is Anyone Listening?

So Tim Donaghy conducted his first interview last night on 60 Minutes about his time betting on games as an MBA ref. Now the question is, will anyone actually pay attention to what he had to say? ESPN and everyone else have been saying all along that he had fixed games and that he was, in the words of the NBA, "a rogue ref."

That of course is not what he pleaded guilty to nor was it what was actually taking place. (If they had paid attention to the case and not the NBA's spin of the story they would have known this). He placed bets on games simply knowing who the refs were going to be (and if there were any last minute injuries). Let me say that again, he could place bets on games, and win an astounding 75-80% of the time, simply by knowing who was refing the game. The NBA, and the sports reporting world, have not wanted to talk about this because the ramifications are enormous. He also said he could bet based on memos sent from the NBA about certain issues, such as that Kobe was not having fouls against him called enough, and so he knew they were going to crack down and Kobe was going to be going to the line a lot. In other words the NBA office was directly contributing to games being changed in one teams favor. Players and coaches have been complaining about this for a long time and the only people listening was the commissioner who would fine them. Is anyone going to pay attention now?

Now what the NBA, as well as the sports media machine, has said all along is that there is no reason to believe this guy because he is a convicted felon and committed the most heinous crime in professional sports of betting on his own sport. We will disregard the fact that the NBA, NFL and MLB love to host events in Vegas, because of course there is no hypocrisy taking place. We will also disregard the fact that the NBA found that most of their refs were gambling in violation of their contract, but no discipline followed because there were simply too many doing it. Instead they just changed the rules.

The problem with saying that Donaghy is lying is that the FBI and the NBA both did investigations in which they found that he did not throw any games he officiated, and the FBI believes he is telling them the truth. If they didn't he would still be sitting in a prison somewhere. The other problem for the sports media is that they believe Brain McNamee, a convicted felon, is telling the truth and Roger Clemens is not. We need a little consistency here. Convicted felons can of course tell the truth or lie, in this they are no different than anyone else, but how we choose who to believe cannot be simply because we want to or don't want to believe what they are saying.

I've been shouting into the wind that what was being reported about Donaghy was not what was taking place but no one seemed to care. Maybe now people will care because this is potentially damaging to all professional sports not just the NBA. The NBA has to finally wake-up and deal with the reality of the claims not simply dismiss them, and I hope that the media finally holds them accountable for these claims. This is not just the rantings of some "rogue ref" this is about the entire system and needs to be addressed.

8:30 pm Update: I think the answer to my question is a resounding "NO". This interview was not talked about on any of the sports programs I watch, including Sports Center (unless I missed it) nor is it addressed on the sports webpages accept to say that he was interviewed on 60 Minutes. No one wants to touch it. What happened to journalism?