Anyone who wagers large amounts of money of the outcome of a sporting event is clearly foolish. This is because humans are involved ... and, has been repeatedly shown, humans can be influenced through rewards or threats to alter ... sometimes ever so subtly ... their performance to change the outcome of a game. If anyone has ever watched a jai alai "game," one can easily understand this indictment. Perhaps this is why fontons are rapidly disappearing in America. Now a game similar to jai alai, that previously had been unsullied, tennis, has been implicated ... see: BBC News.
One can readily extend this warning to the sport of kings, horse racing. Over the years numerous clever ways have been revealed as to how these animals have been tweaked to improve or degrade their performance ... see: Vice Story.
So we see that trying to make major money from how humans or even animals perform in the sports arena is a fool's errand ... no matter how many safeguards are in place. That is, of course, unless you are one of the fixers.
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