Tim Donaghy, the former NBA referee makes some serious claims in his new book. He claims that refs would purposely tinker with game results, are dishonest, and would even argue about things as small as who should tip the ball boys in the NBA.

The most intriguing parts of the book are when Donaghy names names and points out certain referees and how they took pleasure in manipulating games. Tim discusses Dick Bavetta who was a ref in one of the worst officiated ganmes in history: game six of the 2001 western conference finals between LA and Sacramento. And although it’s arguable, he makes the following claim as well:

I bet the losing team simply because I was certain they would cover the spread, even if they played the game badly. This is when Mr. Bavetta shows up.

From my earliest involvement with Bavetta, I learned that he likes to keep games close, and then when a team gets down by double- digit points, he helps the players save face. He accomplishes this act of mercy by quietly, and frequently, blowing the whistle on the team that’s having the better night. Team fouls suddenly become one-sided between the contestants, and the score begins to tighten up. That’s the way Dick Bavetta referees a game - and everyone in the league knew it.”

If these allegations are true, we can assume that if you bet on the team most likely to lose in the games Bavetta was working, then you should have won some serious cash, sports betting handicapping aside. Of course you couldn’t win every game, but it appears that he made a killing with this wagering theory.

These allegations and stories got me thinking, so I conducted a number of investigations and the results were quite convincing that Donaghy is full of it! If you don’t understand, you have to hit 52.7% of the bets to even earn a profict if you are betting with common ten cent juice this means $110 to get back $100). Mr. Donaghy left from the pressure in 2007, so I looked back over the ten year period before the time we are talking about, and I found a few interesting things.

During the ten year period there were just two seasons that returned a profitable percent when betting on the underdogs in games where Bavetta was working. These two seaons were 1998/1999 when the underdogs came back at 55.7% and 2001/2002 when they made it to 57.1. This isn’t bad, but remember these were the only two seasons that returned at least 52.7%. Actually, if you made bets based on this theory, you would have lost a great deal of money in nearly every other basketball season.

In my opnion, this research blows apart the Bavetta theory put forth by Mr. Donaghy and should make everyone question the truth of other statements he has made. I’m not suggesting that the NBA should not be held responsible, and that the referees do a bad job from time to time, or that you should just disregard sports handicapping and follow foolish betting theories, but we need to question this whether or not the rest of Donaghy’s comments are truthful. If he was dishonest regarding such an important issue, we cannpt take his other claims seriously.

Share This