Along with their respective players’ associations, the five biggest professional sports leagues in North America issued a joint statement Tuesday morning calling for significant repercussions for bettors who step out of line.
Specifically, the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB and MLS want permanent betting bans on anyone who is verified to have harassed or threatened a player, coach, official or their families. They also want to see a streamlined reporting system for such abuse, and they’d like the betting companies to be proactive in seeking out individuals who do these things.
“The safety and well-being of players, coaches, officials and their families must always come before a wager,” the statement reads. “As game participants do their utmost to protect integrity, abusive and violent threats should not serve as a deterrence from performing to their fullest.”
Several states, including Ohio, West Virginia, Louisiana and Wyoming, already have laws in place to permanently ban those who engage in this type of behavior from ever betting on sports again. The leagues call on all state gambling commissions to adopt similar policies.
The proposed streamlined reporting system would allow players, teams, leagues and players’ associations to file complaints and submit evidence of harassment directly to the applicable gambling commission, at which point the offender could presumably be banned from all betting platforms at once.
Examples of sports betting-related harassment
In 2024, Indiana Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton spoke out about prop bets — wagers that hinge on an individual player’s stat line.
“To half the world, I’m just helping them make money on DraftKings or whatever,” he said. “… I’m the prop, you know what I mean? That’s what my social media mostly consists of.”
Shortly thereafter, then-Cleveland Cavaliers head coach JB Bickerstaff told reporters about a time when he received hate from gamblers.
“They got my telephone number and were sending me crazy messages about where I live and my kids,” he said. “It is a dangerous game and a fine line that we’re walking, for sure. It brings added pressure. It brings distraction to the game that can be difficult for players, coaches, referees, everybody that’s involved in it.
“We really have to be careful of how close we let it get to the game and the security of the people who are involved in it.”
Bickerstaff noted that in many cases, people are betting with money that would otherwise pay their bills, so the emotions of losing become even stronger.
NFL kicker Graham Gano said he frequently experiences similar things.
“Ever since sports betting started happening, I get people telling me to kill myself every week,” Gano said. “’Cause I’ll hit a kick that loses them money. I’ll miss a kick and it loses them money. It was the other day that someone told me to get cancer and die. I mean, that stuff is part of it.”
