There’s a difference between a conspiracy theory and jumping to conclusions. At least with a good conspiracy theory, there’s an elaborate plot constructed. It’s given some time to incubate and analyzed rather than something shot hot from the hip—or even worse, rushed to judgment or assumed.
Also, look, there’s reason to pursue some of these conspiracy theories in sports—some of them ended up being proven true! Like the City College of New York point-shaving scandal in the 1950s, or the greed of MLB owners in the 1980s to suppress the price tag for free agents by colluding and not signing one another’s free agents.
So here’s today’s Question of the Day…
What’s your favorite sports conspiracy theory?
There’s plenty to choose from that remain interesting, mostly due to them never being outright disproven.
During the 1985 NBA Draft Lottery, the envelope containing the New York Knicks’ pick was allegedly frozen or bent by the league office to ensure the Knicks would get the top pick: Patrick Ewing. The New York Jets’ victory in Super Bowl III, where Joe Namath famously guaranteed a win against the 18-point favorite Baltimore Colts, was fixed to give legitimacy to the AFL and ensure the success of the merger between the NFL and AFL. Michael Jordan’s famous “Flu Game” during the 1997 NBA Finals was actually caused by food poisoning when a pizza was delivered to his hotel room—or was it because he was shirtless playing poker in Park City during the wee hours of the morning?
Those are all interesting, nonetheless, but the recent one from the NFL that sticks out to me—and still wouldn’t surprise me if it was proven legitimate at some point—is the way NFL owners colluded during Lamar Jackson’s period as a restricted free agent. All in an effort to draw a line in the sand with guaranteed contracts after Jimmy Haslam handed Deshaun Watson a fully-guaranteed $230 million contract in 2022.
What about for the rest of you tin foil hat wearing folks?