rcsm475blogposts-blog

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Crashgate

The driver, Nelson Piquet Jr., crashed on the race's 14th, lap. necessitating the safety car. Piquet's teammate, Fernando Alonso, eventually won the race.

After Piquet was released from the team in 2009, he told the Federation Internationale de l'Automobile he had been directed to crash intentionally. Two Renault executives, managing director Flavio Briatore and executive director of engineering Pat Symonds, were disciplined, and Renault was suspended from F1 for two years.

https://www.gpupdate.net/en/videos/2594/crashgate-scandal-unfolds-singapore-2008/

By Kelvin Cook 

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Gambling in Japanese Baseball

In October, news emerged of a gambling scandal in Japanese baseball. Investigations conducted by Nippon Professional Baseball concluded three pitchers for the Yomiuri Giants had wagered on professional games: Satoshi Fukuda, Shoki Kasahara and Ryuya Matsumoto.

It is illegal to bet on professional sports in Japan, and though Kasahara and Matsumoto admitted to gambling, they denied fixing games. Fukuda didn't play in high-level games so that means that he could not be one of the ones who was match fixing. He was just placing bets on games. 

All three players were suspended for a indefinite period of time. 

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Turkish Football Match Fixing

Turkish games were suspected in the 2009 match-fixing scandal that spanned European football. In 2011, the country had its own problem dealing with Turkish football match fixing. 

The widespread match-fixing scandal allegedly involved players, officials and executives throughout Turkish football. According to the Hurriyet Daily News a total of 93 people were charged with crimes ranging from influencing matches to bribery and forming a criminal gang.

Two clubs, Fenerbahce and Besiktas, received season long bans from competition. Fenerbahce president Aziz Yildirim was sentenced to over six years in prison for his involvement, but he was eventually released on appeal. In October, Yildririm and 35 other defendants acquired charges after a retrial.  

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2140668/Turkish-match-fixing-scandal-Two-players-banned-Fenerbahce-cleared.html

By Kelvin Cook 

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Pakistan Cricket spot fixing

All three cricketers were found guilty by the International Cricket Council, and all three received a ban from the sport. In addition, Majeed and the athletes were criminally charged, convicted and served time in jail. 

Undercover reporters from News Of The Wolrd secretly videotaped Mazhar Majeed accepting money and informing the reporters that fast bowlers Asif and Amir would deliberately bowl No Balls at specific points in an over. This information could be used by gamblers to place bets with inside information. In all it messes up the sport so that there is massive money being circulated to individuals who are a part of the match fixing. 

While reading and watching the videos of the Pakistan cricket scandal I tried to think of ways to stop the corruption of this sport. People are now starting to use signals to corrupt sports and it may be the hardest thing ever to decipher. In our day and age we can use our technology to record things and find hints and clues that may lead us to the discovery of even more corruption.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pakistan_cricket_spot-fixing_scandal

http://www.bbc.com/sport/cricket/41709059

By: Kelvin Cook 

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2009 Heineken Cup

In April 2009, Harlequins and Leinster met in the quarterfinal of rugby's Heineken Cup. Nick Evans of Harlequins left the game due to injury but was able to return when Tom Williams later suffered an injury as well.

Tom Williams was not actually injured. He used a fake pill capsule filled with blood to pretend a cut lip, thereby forcing  Evans' return to the match.

Williams received a one-year ban from the European Rugby Cup, and coach Dean Richards eventually resigned. After further investigation, Williams' penalty was reduced to four months, and Richards was banned for three years.

After reading the articles and watching the videos, I think that the players and the coaches just made a bad decision to try and match fix. There are many trainers and other people out there who can potentially spot out a fake blood capsule. There is no need to try and fix games if you are going to do it in the most obvious ways. There are so many spectators, cameras, replays and more that can tell what is really going on in situations when it comes to sports in our society. 

By Kelvin Cook 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/european-rugby/11276718/Bloodgate-How-the-scandal-unfolded-when-Harlequins-met-Leinster-in-April-2009.html

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Chinese Olympic Gymnast- Age Conspiracy

Leading up to the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, the announcement of the host nation's women's team created suspicion about the age of several members. At that time, it was thought some athletes might be under the required minimum age of 16. The allegations ended up being false and every girl on the team was either 16 or wold be 16 in the year of competition, which was legal. 

Chinese Olympic officials have forcefully defended He’s eligibility, maintaining that when asked, they submitted proper passport documentation to the IOC. He’s passport says her date of birth is January 1, 1992, making her 16 and old enough to compete. I dont think the age difference should be such a bad thing. If youre in the olympics its because you are the best from your country. Even if you are younger, I think that you should still be able to compete if you are considered the best at your craft. 

By Kelvin Cook 

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/SPORT/10/01/gymnasts.age/

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Doping in Russia 2011-15

Doping in Russia was big just a couple years ago. Russia, in total, had 49 Olympic medals stripped for doping violations. This is the most a country has ever had according to records. Over a thousand Russian competitors have benefited from the doping scandal. The scandal was caught through blood samples of athletes. The blood samples from Russian athletes "recorded some of the highest values ever seen since the IAAF started testing" and that tests from the 2009 World Championships "strongly suggest a systematic abuse of blood doping or EPO-related products (Balakhnichev). 

Some Russians described the allegations as an anti-Russian plot while others stated that Russia was "just doing what the rest of the world does“ when it comes to sporting competitions. The outlier is that the blood samples from Russian athletes were doped up to where they stood out more than any other country. Vladimir Putin has decided to not prevent Russia from preventing in the 2018 Olympics. He also says that there was no proof that the Russian government was involved in the doping conspiracy. 

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/russia-doping-scandal

By Kelvin Cook

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Ben Johnson  - Olympics Doping

In the 1988 Seoul Olympics, Ben Johnson beat his own world record with a stunning 9.79. After the race Ben Johnson was known as the fastest man in the world according to records. Just 24 hours after the race Mr. Ben Johnson had to give a urine test that changed his life. He tested positive for anabolic steroids. Within three days of testing positive, Mr. Ben Johnson was stripped of his gold medal. American 100m runner Carl Lewis, who was awarded the 100-meter gold in place of Johnson, British silver medalist Linford Christie and fourth-place finisher Dennis Mitchell all tested positive for one substance or another that year, but were not disqualified as they did not test positive during the Olympic games. Only two out of the eight athletes in the heat remained clean for the remainder of their careers; the other six athletes all tested positive for banned substances at one point or another in their careers.

Since there has been so much doping in the olympics, they have started requiring drug test a to assure that there has been no illegal activity taking place. We have seen a decline in the doping in the olympics over the past few years. Athletes are receiving massive fines and get the shame of knowing that they are considered a failure to the country that they are representing. So many people are let down if a olympic athlete doest represent their country. 

http://home.bt.com/news/on-this-day/september-27-1988-ben-johnson-is-stripped-of-his-olympic-gold-medal-after-failing-drugs-test-11364007354384

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Lu Jun - China football scandal

Lu Jun was a Chinese football ref who was sought out to be one of the greatest of all time. Lu Jun was awarded referee of the year twice and also was the first Chinese ref to officiate the world cup. in 2002 he was convicted of match fixing. Rumors were brought out and Lu Jun admitted to match fixing and making 6 figures off of the games that he fixed. According to people in on the investigation, there are still pending cases going.  It is said that there is a total of millions used to bribe some of the games. The match fixing usually consist of millions invested sometimes. 

Since Lu Jun has admitted to the cases, he has been serving 5 and a half years in prison. At worse, Lu Jun could’ve experienced the death penalty instead of the five and a half years since he is considered a “state worker”. In order to alleviate the problem, the referees for soccer games are not announced until moments just before the game just like the NBA. There are more cases of corruption in football but since Lu Jun was the biggest referee it gave to whole sport a bad look. 

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-17054150

By Kelvin Cook 

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Beijing 2008 Weightlifting Doping

By Ja’Quan Keys

According to the articles below three China Olympic gold medalist and eight other medalist were stripped of there medals due to testing positive from illegal drugs. The eleven medalists raised flags which they became more strict on testing and made it easy to catch medalist and the international Weightlifting foundation stripped numerous medals from 2008-2012. The International weightlifting foundation has had many issues with doping even those who don’t win medals. The article named numerous individuals from the China team which were Cao Lei, Liu Chunhong, Chen Xiexia and the other individuals apart of china’s team that failed the test were Kazakhstana’s Maiya Maneza and Belarusa Iryna Kulesha. This is way to many individuals on one team to be failing and doing the wrong thing. The other individuals that were also involved in the doping incident in 2008 was Anastasia Novikova of Belarus, Kazakhstana’s Maria Grabovetskaya and Irina Nekrasova, Russiaa’s Khadzhimurat Akkaev and Dmitry Lapikov, and Ukraine's Natalya Davydova and Olha Korobka. 

I believe that International Weightlifting foundation needs to take more precautions on doping because it is a huge issue throughout international sports. China had almost their whole team doping. This goes to show that the organizations are influencing the players to do this and the organizations should be punished more rather then just be suspended for a little time. The foundation needs to eliminate this issue because doping is a casual thing throughout the weightlifting playing field.

https://www.thestar.com/sports/olympics/2016/08/24/11-olympic-weightlifting-medal-winners-face-doping-penalties.html

http://www.nation.co.ke/sports/othersports/Five-sports-scandals-to-watch-in-2017/1951306-3492466-tmkg6oz/index.html

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Stephen Lee: Snooker scandal

By Ja’Quan Keys

Stephen Lee was one of the most prestigious snooker players who got caught up in a match fixing scandal which ruined his career. (Snooker is a cue sport which originated among British Army officers in Etawah, India in the latter half of the 19th century. It is played on a rectangular table covered with a green cloth, or baize, with pockets at each of the four corners and in the middle of each long side). The articles below explains that Lee was a winner of five ranking titles  because of the match fixing incident in 2008-2009 in which he was found guilty in an independent sports tribunal of match fixing involving seven games. He would either agree to lose a match he thought he would lose anyway but by a certain score, or agree to lose the first frame of a match he thought he could win. Lee would rack up an abundant amount of money and ended up getting banned from the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association for 12 years and would have to pay an overwhelming amount of 40,000 dollars to ever be able to go back and join the association again. 

Stephen Lee took on a ton of risks and was punished for a long time and still has fees to pay in order to join the association he once dominated. I believe that the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association did a great job in handling this particular case and that other governing bodies should be as strict as this particular one.  

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2013/sep/25/stephen-lee-match-fixing-guilty

http://www.bbc.com/sport/snooker/24114861

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Ankeet Chavan: Spot Fixing

By Ja’Quan Keys

Ankeet Chavan who is apart of the Rajasthan Royals was convicted of spot fixing along with two of his other team mates which was Sreesanth, and Ajit Chandila. This particular case Ankeet Chavan teammates were exhonerated from the match fixing incident but Ankeet was not. According the articles below states that Ankeet was banned for life during the spot fixing  and betting scandal in the Indian Premier League in 2013. Along with those players being arrested also 11 bookies got arrested which is what brought red flags up about a potential spot fixing incident. The Delhi police did the arresting of the three players and also the 11 bookies. The end result in the BCCI banning Sreesanth and Chavan both being banned from the cricket league. Sreesanth and Chavan both got reinstated recently and are planning on getting back into the game of cricket. 

In this particular scandal I think that the players are wrong for trying to spot fix and earn money through the bookies. The reinstatement of the Rajasthan Royals players is not ideal for me I think the players should have been banned for life. The fDelhi police did a great job of handling the players and bookies, also the BCCI governing body has a ton of issues with either spot fixing, and match fixing.

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/ipl-spot-fixing-scandal-ankeet-chavan-surrenders-before-court/articleshow/20463802.cms

http://www.deccanchronicle.com/150726/sports-cricket/article/ipl-spot-fixing-scandal-spot-relief-sreesanth-ankeet-chavan-and-ajit

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2000: Paralympic Spanish

By Ja’Quan Keys

Fernando Martin Vicente the boss of a Spanish team led the team to a Paralympic  mentally handicapped championship. According to the article Fernando was head of a mentally handicapped sports, but in the 2000 paralympics Vicente lead a team full of athletes with no disabilities to Sydney to win the paralympics. Numerous sports throughout this Paralympic had players that had no type of intellectual disabilities. Their was a total of about 15 different people ranging from track and field, swimming, basketball and table tennis. The whole organization was bought in on this scandal because numerous coaches and players were bought in on this scandal. 

The Spanish team did something that cost them a reputation and a lot of money. According to the articles below Vicente was fined by Madrid for total of 5,400, then as ordered him to return a whooping amount of 142,355, and also another 120,500 to the governing subsidies which was mainly for the athletes without any disabilities. This particular scandal was unethical and it was rightful for the people to return their medals and also for Visente to resign frombeing the head of Spanish mentally handicapped sports. One major thing that came from this scandal and that was the loss of the Paralympic basketball game Andy that's was because a ton of players from the Spanish team was not actually mentally disabled.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/othersports/article-2459172/Spanish-basketball-team-pretended-disabled-win-Paralympic-gold-guilty-fraud.html

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Sam Chalmers Scandal

By Ja’Quan Keys

Sam Chalmers was a back for Melrose who was the son of a former Scotland and British Lions fly Craig Chalmers. Sam Chalmers was banned from rugby for two years due to the use of doping. Sam Chalmers was only a 19 year old student who got caught using the pill called the Pro-SD. Chalmers tested positive for two anabolic androgenic steroids which were methandienone and standalone and those steroids are heavily prohibited by the World Anti-Doping Authority. Throughout the articles low Sam Chalmers apologized for his incident which is recorded as a great gesture for the young player. The reason the  Sam Chalmers incident was so global was due to the prestigious father.

http://www.bbc.com/sport/rugby-union/32383175

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/article-2419952/Sam-Chalmers-handed-year-doping-ban.html

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2002 Olympic Figure Skating Scandal

By Alex Smith

The 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City, Utah saw a figure skating scandal that saw judges pressuring one another to vote for a specific pair of figure skaters to take home the gold medal, one pair being Russian and the other being Canadian. 

Canadians Jaime Sale and David Pelletier were forced to share the gold medal that they had earned with a Russian duo of Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze, despite the fact that the judges, and NBC announcers alike, had announced that the Canadian pair had won the gold medal outright.  The judgers were initially split on their decision, half voting for the Canadians and the other half for the Russians, leaving only one judge left, Marie-Reine Le Gougne from France.  Le Gounge, after being confronted about the debacle, said that she had originally voted for Sale and Pelletier, but was pressured by the head of the French skating association to vote for the Russians.  

Overall, this situation was a mess. The United States media sided with the Canadians and continued to run the story throughout the remainder of the olympics with a pro-Canada twist.  However, some Americans and most Russians thought that, despite the voting controversy, that the Russians deserved the gold medal regardless.  

Both pairs were eventually awarded gold medals. Sale and Pelletier having their silvers upgraded to gold and the Russians allowed to keep their original golds as there was no suspected wrongdoing on their part.  

In my opinion, this has got to be the most intriguing scandal.  The reason I say that is, the actual skaters themselves had nothing to do with this.  The Russians weren’t doing anything illegal to pressure the judges, as neither were the Canadians. The judge mess came strictly from the French skating association, which is all the more interesting as you being to wonder why the president of the French skating association would want to so heavily favor the Russians in a case of 50/50 split judges.  I am glad to see that both pairs were able to keep their gold medals. Its not ideal, as you always want a 1st and 2nd, but in this case I can see how both parties deserve a gold medal. 

Source: http://www.espn.com/oly/winter02/figure/news?id=1333280

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Fine Cotton / Bold Personality Horse Racing Controversy

By Alex Smith

The Fine Cotton and Bold Personality substitution scandal is one of the more clumsy and poorly executed examples of scandal in global corruption that I've come across.  It involved a lot of Australia’s elite in the thoroughbred community, and is seen as a total debacle. 

In 1984, in a lower tier thoroughbred race in Australia, the horse Fine Cotton was substituted out for the much more talented and overall better racing horse Bold Personality.  The reason behind this was that the line for Fine Cotton to win the race was set at 33-1, making the bets easy to place once those involved knew the scheme had been “pulled off.” Those dealing with this scandal went as far as to paint on the specific telling marks onto Bold Personality that Fine Cotton had.  Personality was disqualified in under an hour after the race was over. 

Personality’s trainer, Hayden Haitana was the main person accused behind the plan’s mastermind John Gillespie in this scandal and after it came to light he immediately went on the run and has been in hiding ever since. Haitana received death threats and felt the need to go into hiding, he said in a secret interview with 60 Minutes. 

Others were involved in this case, as I mentioned, and most if not all received decade-plus long bans from horse racing in Australia. 

This scandal was interesting to read about because, to an American who has no prior interest in horse racing, it goes to show that scandal and corruption will follow the money no matter the sport or country.  This one is almost funny to a degree, as they tried to literally paint the horse to make it look like Fine Cotton whenever it stood in for him.  Overall, this was a very interesting and overall weird scandal in the Australia thoroughbred world. 

Source: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/law-order/the-horse-racing-scams-that-stopped-the-nation/news-story/1b0ab58778b893bb71597b20d02f8a16?sv=51fb36ea01b14d9bc7e585a1d8c15e10

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Ben Johnson

By Alex Smith

Ben Johnson and the 1988 Seoul Olypmics, the subject of the ESPN 30 for 30 documentary *9.79 is considered one of the biggest olympic scandals of all time, as it stripped one man of a gold medal and knocked an entire country down a peg after they were sitting on top of the world. 

Ben Johnson claimed the bronze medal at the 1984 Olympics, finishing behind American legend Carl Lewis.  Johnson and Lewis went into the 1987 World Championships and 1988 Seoul Olympics as one another biggest rivals.  In Seoul, Johnson absolutely shocked the world by winning the gold medal in the 100 meter dash, while subsequently lowering his own world record to 9.79 seconds. Unfortunately, Johnson would eventually test positive for steroids and he was stripped of his ‘87 World Title and the ‘88 gold medal. 

Perhaps the biggest part of this entire scandal is that he let down an entire nation.  Johnson’s scandal, called the “Black Sox scandal of Canada” took Johnson from the most popular person in Canada to a complete zero.  Being Canadian, beating Carl Lewis, setting a world record, winning gold. Those were all gigantic achievements in the track world, and now we know it was done illegally. 

This scandal itself is a little more sad than others, as I really feel for Ben Johnson.  He was a fantastic runner who was running at the same time as Carl Lewis, unfortunately for him.  He wanted to win and he wanted to put Canada on the map athletically.  Sadly, he had to cheat to do it.  The worst part is that he got the hope up for an entire nation, just to let them down.  While this is still technically foreign to the US since he’s Canadian, it still somehow hits a little close to home for me.  

Source: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1365158-ben-johnson-is-1988-olympics-scandal-biggest-of-all-time