Darrell Davis: CFL suspends Shawn Lemon for gambling; more will follow

Article content

Veteran defensive end Shawn Lemon announced two weeks ago he was retiring from the CFL.

He must have known what was coming: An indefinite suspension for wagering on CFL games, including one 2021 contest in which he played for the Calgary Stampeders. The CFL announced its punishment Wednesday with a note indicating “no evidence was found to indicate matches were in any way impacted by his wagering.”

Article content

Article content

We’ll have to take their word for it. The word is “Integrity.”

In the announcement about Lemon’s suspension, commissioner Randy Ambrosie spoke about upholding the “integrity” of his league by issuing a severe suspension to anyone potentially involved in a CFL game’s outcome.

“It is our responsibility to investigate and address such abnormalities,” said Ambrosie. “And it is our collective duty, along with our teams and players, to ensure that sports wagering in no way impacts the quality nor standing of the CFL.”

That seems to be the biggest worry, the way gambling is poised to ruin sports even more badly than video review has ruined sports. It’s the reason why NBA commissioner Adam Silver just suspended Jontay Porter for life. Porter, formerly of the Toronto Raptors, bet on NBA games plus, according to a league-conducted investigation, conspired with a known gambler to turn $80,000 into $1.1 million by betting on the player’s in-game performance.

Referee Tim Donaghy received a lifetime ban for fixing NBA games in the mid-2000s.

The lure is pretty simple: Money. Gambling is addictive and professional sports leagues keep pretending they’re not feeding the addiction, for employees and fans. Maybe that should be the bigger concern.

Article content

Article content

According to a CFL spokesperson, the league conducts “annual training for players, coaches, team personnel (and) league office staff.” Betting on CFL games is not allowed for anyone employed by the CFL.

Rules vary from league to league. Some leagues allow its athletes to wager legally on other sports, some don’t allow any online bets to be placed from team facilities or during team functions, while others strictly forbid gambling.

It’s been an issue since 1919, when eight members of the Chicago White Sox accepted payments from underworld gamblers to throw the World Series and were subsequently issued lifetime bans. Still, all-time hits leader Pete Rose was banned and denied Hall of Fame selection for betting on baseball, including games he expected his team to win while managing the Cincinnati Reds.

The NFL has suspended 10 players for gambling since the 1960s, with five of those suspensions coming in the past two years, basically since wagering on sports was legalized by the Canadian government and most U.S. states.

Los Angeles Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani has been linked to a gambling scandal, although MLB has exonerated him and believed his interpreter was solely responsible for stealing $45 million to pay gambling debts. No charges have yet been laid against Ohtani’s interpreter.

Article content

There are evidently lots of ways to discover if an athlete is wagering illegally. Lemon’s transgressions were, according to the CFL, not witnessed by teammates or team representatives.

The Stampeders issued a statement saying they were “surprised and disappointed by the revelations of the CFL’s investigation into Shawn Lemon’s sports wagering activities.” So did the Montreal Alouettes, who Lemon joined midway through last season en route to winning a Grey Cup. Montreal said it has also suspended Lemon and, like the Stampeders, “fully supports the CFL’s rules on gambling.”

It hasn’t even been three years since Canada legalized single-event sports betting, trying to end black-market betting with the hope the money generated legally could help the CFL and filter down to strengthen other sports and cultural events.

As sports gambling proliferates and continues consuming bettors and athletes alike, Lemon’s suspension is apparently the first punishment involving the CFL. It most certainly won’t be the last.

Article content