I wanted to share an interesting story and hear others' thoughts on this topic.
Today, I met a current cameraman who films professional sporting events. This person previously worked in Hollywood (e.g., soap operas, late night shows) and switched to almost exclusively filming pro sports. This person has also been very successful - "won 6 or 7 Emmys," which I confirmed. They are actually working the NBA playoff games right now!
I can't speak much to how I met this person, but I spoke to them for several hours. The person was bright, very mild-mannered, friendly, and appeared to be honest. In talking about the work, they mentioned that they no longer watch many professional sports, especially basketball, despite previously being a huge fan of the Celtics. When I asked why, they described a specific stories (with names) of previous tampering in the NBA.
Specifically, TV camera crews would collude with NBA officials to implement TV breaks in order to affect the outcome of games. Apparently action was taken against one individual in particular, but this person said it was a widespread issue. I'm not sure how long ago this occurred, though, so I can't speak to that.
This story did make me wonder how others view tampering in the league. We all know the Tim Donaghy saga -- apparently Netflix is in the process of filming a documentary about it, which should be cool. Many of us are frustrated with officiating as well, and have expressed the belief that games are fixed. Personally, I still think about Game 6 of the Lakers vs Kings in 2002.
So, do you think there's tampering in the NBA? If so, to what extent? Interested to see the above poll results.