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February 1, 2004
PERSONAL: Putting down a bet provides a connection to the game
THE DENVER POST
You don't have to be a member of the New England Patriots or Carolina Panthers to become a part of Super Bowl XXXVIII. You don't have to be from New England or the Carolinas, have a relative playing on either team or profess an abiding passion for the teams.
You don't even have to be a football fan.
The United States' second biggest day in food consumption (trailing only Thanksgiving) is the absolute zenith for the nation when it comes to gambling. According to the American Gaming Council, Americans wager between $5 billion and $6 billion each year on the Super Bowl. Others estimate the number at four times that amount.
The exact numbers are hard to find because, whatever the figure, experts say, just one to 10 percent of it is bet legally in Nevada, the only state that allows gambling on pro sports. The rest stems not from people trying to make a living at it, but from regular people hoping to capture a little bit of the excitement, be it through an office pool or friendly wager at a Super Bowl party.
"Maybe I was naive when I played, but now I can really see just how big all of this is," said Jamal Anderson, a former running back with the Atlanta Falcons who played in Super Bowl XXXIII. "It's just a huge, huge thing, a big-time thing."
And nowadays, it's becoming even bigger as more people turn to the Internet, where the number of online betting services has exploded. Many of these firms are based in the Caribbean and Central America, where they avoid U.S. laws.
According to a December report by the U.S. General Accounting Office, Internet gambling operators have established 1,800 Web sites. These computer casinos will generate an estimated $5 billion in revenues this year. More than half of all bets will come from U.S. customers.
Those sites are beginning to supplant one of those mythical, shadowy figures in American society - the neighborhood bookie.
"A lot of times you get better deals," said Pete Sheppard, who works as a gambling expert for radio station WEEI in Boston. "You can tinker with the line (the amount one team is favored to win by over another) for a smaller price. You can bet on how many times (CBS announcer) Greg Gumbel says a certain word or how many times (analyst) Phil Simms uses the telestrator.
"There are a lot of people who don't know what they're doing, they just want to be part of the action. And going online seems more legitimate than going ... to see a bookie."
Three players have been suspended from the NFL for their gambling activity - Paul Horning, Alex Karras and Art Schlichter - and Leonard Tose, the former owner of the Philadelphia Eagles, lost his team after running up some $50 million in debts, mainly at Atlantic City casinos. But the league says there have been only two instances of game-fixing involving players. One was in 1946. The other was 25 years later, when Jerry Sturm, a former center for the Houston Oilers, said that a former teammate offered him $10,000 to throw a game.
Sturm, who now runs a restaurant in suburban Denver, told the Houston Chronicle that he was only making $30,000 at the time but still turned the former player in to the league. The difference between salaries then and now makes it hard for players to believe a current member of the league would be involved in any sort of gambling.
"It would really surprise me," running back Jamal Lewis of the Baltimore Ravens said. "I don't think anybody's that desperate or hungry for money. It's also kind of hard to do that. It's not basketball or baseball. It's too hard to skim points or anything like that."
But that doesn't stop professional gamblers from trying to gain an edge. Warren Moon, a 17-year veteran and former quarterback, said he was approached by someone seeking information about 10 years ago.
"He gave me an envelope full of money - $3,000 in $100 bills," Moon said. "Just for information. I never talked back to the guy.... I freaked out. I didn't know who was watching or what. I just said, 'Let me get rid of this.' I turned it in to our security people and they took it from there."
Anderson, who retired in 2001, said he "never realized the significance" when people would ask about injuries and point spreads.
"I never really thought about what that was all about and what it led to," he said. "Now I see why people would come up to me and go, 'Oh, you lost by six points.' I'd be saying, 'Well, what does it matter, we still lost.' And they'd say, 'No, you were only supposed to lose by four."'
Calls to the NFL for comments on the league and gambling were not returned Thursday. One NFL spokesman, Greg Aiello, told the Chronicle, "We have very strict policies that separate our game from the influence of gambling."
The NFL conducts seminars and visits each team every season warning them of the dangers of getting involved with gambling. But when it comes to the general public, Moon wonders if the league at least tacitly approves all the wagering.
"It's like fantasy football - that's just another form of gambling," Moon said. "(The NFL) always told us to stay away from it, but now, because it is a money maker, the NFL sponsors it - they have teams and shows committed to it.
"It's amazing what they accept now. And all that information they give out, who is it really for? They're not fooling anybody. Why do you think there's so much information on injuries? It's for the sports books, it's for the oddsmakers. The public doesn't care, they just want to watch whoever shows up to play on Sunday afternoon."
And, at least on Super Bowl Sunday, feel as if they're really a part of the game.