For decades, professional sports gambling scandals were few and far between. Accessibility made the illicit activity challenging to access. But on May 14, 2018, in a 6-3 decision following a six-year legal battle, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act of 1992. The Act was the federal statute that had restricted state-authorized sports gambling to primarily Nevada for 26 years, clearing the way for widespread access to gambling.
Over the past six years, the legal and financial unraveling at the intersection of professional sports and sports gambling has been profound. Dozens of professional athletes, coaches, officials and team personnel have been indicted and convicted of gambling-related offenses.
Most recently, Cleveland Guardians pitchers Emmanuel Clase and Luis Ortiz have been charged with sharing inside information about their pitches with bettors. This hit comes just weeks after the NBA’s biggest scandal in years. Federal prosecutors allege that Clase and Ortiz received thousands of dollars in bribes from bettors in return for tips on the variety and speed of certain pitches. Sportsbooks have options for bettors to wager on individual pitches at specified points in games. In July, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred told reporters that certain bets were “unnecessary and particularly vulnerable.” These were the exact vulnerable bets that were exploited by the two pitchers in a scheme to “misle[a]d the public, and betray America’s pastime,” according to the federal indictment unsealed by federal prosecutors on Sunday, Nov. 9.
Prosecutors allege that between May 2023 and June 2025, Clase agreed with bettors to throw specific pitches in specific games so that the bettors and Clase would profit from successful wagers. Around June 2025, Ortiz joined the scheme. Before a June 15 game against the Seattle Mariners, Ortiz agreed to throw a ball for his first pitch of the second inning in exchange for a $10,000 split between him and Clase. Bettors won at least $450,000 from betting platforms on pitches thrown by Clase and Ortiz, according to the indictment, with the majority coming from Clase’s throws. The two were charged with wire fraud conspiracy, honest services wire fraud conspiracy, money laundering conspiracy and conspiracy to influence sporting contests by bribery.
In July, the two players were placed on leave after the MLB initiated an investigation into suspicious wagering activity on individual pitches in their games.
Ortiz was arrested in Boston on Sunday, Nov. 9 and appeared in federal court there on Monday, Nov. 10. Clase was not in custody as of Sunday afternoon. Ortiz’s lawyer said his client was innocent of the charges, as did Clase’s lawyer.
This indictment is the third involving gambling on professional sports brought by federal prosecutors in the Eastern District in the past month. Professional sports and legalized gambling find themselves increasingly at odds, begging the question: what now?
In a time when gambling is becoming more accessible by the day, with futures gambling platforms like Polymarket and Kalshi growing exponentially in popularity, it seems unlikely that regulation is anywhere on the horizon. Polymarket and Kalshi allow individuals to wager on anything from professional sports game outcomes, to Grammy nominations, to the length of the government shutdown and way, way more. Professional sports may be just the tip of the iceberg in an oncoming saga of gambling conspiracies.
While the expansion of legal sports betting markets has illuminated the wrongdoings of these athletes, proponents of legalization argue that the transparency and structure of the platforms enable monitoring and oversight. Without the record-keeping and cooperation of sportsbooks, federal prosecutors would be unable to identify the illicitelicit behavior in the first place.
It is perplexing to comprehend why Clase and Ortiz would engage in such a scheme, collectively earning millions of dollars annually for legally playing baseball. The athletes each now face up to 65 years in prison if convicted on all charges. Hopefully, the preceding weeks will serve as a warning to professional athletes, coaches, officials and all other individuals involved in the outcome of sporting events. All indicators point to an ongoing expansion of gambling accessibility, but the question remains as to whether this growth will lead to better oversight or decreased guardrails.