Corruption Charges by FIFA

The governing body of soccer FIFA has had numerous claims of corruption over the last few years and finally taking a step forward to clean things up.  Three match officials from Bosnia-Herzegovina and three from Hungary have been banned for life from any soccer related activities at the national and international levels.  They were found guilty of unlawfully influencing match results and passive corruption.  This is a start but soccer has a long way to go at all levels of play.

Boxing Sham - Mares vs. Agbeko

Last Saturday Showtime boxing put up a horrible display of refereeing.  I just got home to see my twitter timeline blowing up with people screaming fixed.  New IBF bantamweight champion Abner Mares was for the most part handed the title by referee Russell Mora.  Abner landed low blow after low blow on his opponent Joseph Agbeko throughout the fight with barely any warnings and no penalties from referee Mora who was consistently out of place.  Even more surprising is the commission who sat cage side and did nothing.  This fight is being called one of the worst in boxing corruption history and I don't blame people for what we saw in this ridiculous refereed match.  Mora had to be in on the fix, completely biased or totally incompetent as a boxing referee.  Check out this article too for more on the fight.

World Cup Suspicions

Everyone loves the underdog and Cinderella stories but something just didn't seem right about the Women's World Cup final between U.S.A. and Japan.  In the weeks after the final many have expressed these same doubts.  No team from the continent of Asia has won the cup and in 25 matches between them Japan has never defeated the U.S.  The shoot out at the end brought up even more suspicion when the first three shots by the U.S. were very uncharacteristic of the team even being mentioned on the live broadcast.  The U.S. had not missed a shoot out shot yet and very good at hiding direction.  Two of the first three in this game were very easy reads and pretty much shot to the goalie while the other was booted well over the goal.  This just seems too easily given away to Japan.  Then we have the storyline of Japan riding emotions for their country in the aftermath of the horrible earthquakes and tsunami's that ravaged the country.  Add it all up and it just seems too good to be true like it was fixed for Japan.  I do think the parity between countries has definitely decreased and will continue to see more competitive games between most countries.  What do you think?

Another Toledo Football Player Convicted in Point Shaving Scheme

Former Toledo running back Harvey McDougle Jr. recently plead guilty to working with a Detroit gambler involved with point shaving at Toledo University.  McDougle was the third Toledo athlete to be convicted in the point shaving scheme and most likely worked in recruiting other players for the scheme.