Random Biggest Sports-Related Conspiracy Theories (21 items)

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  (#15) Jimmy Hoffa Is Buried Under The Old Giants Stadium

  More of an old fashioned urban legend than a rumor, this theory holds that the famously disappeared union boss was killed by the mob and buried somewhere under Giants Stadium in New Jersey. It would theoretically be possible to prove this, by digging up every inch of the old stadium.

  But the fact that the police have never bothered should tell you everything you need to know about what they think of the theory.
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  (#13) The NFL Is Run By The Mob

  Organized crime and professional sports went together hand in glove during the early days of pro leagues. The influence of gambling and bookmakers is well known regarding baseball, but the mob also had its immaculately gloved hands all over professional football in the '20s and '30s. Several teams were either financed or outright owned by bookies, including the Chicago Bears, New York Giants, Pittsburgh Steelers, and the original Cleveland Browns.

  Many of these teams are still owned by descendants of these families, and with illegal NFL gambling being a $100 billion industry (yes, billion with a B) it’s not hard to imagine some of these ancient connections still bearing fruit for modern bookies. The NFL works hard to keep the game free of gambling influence, but also doesn’t do anything to discourage people from wagering on games.
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  (#9) Sonny Liston Took A Dive For Muhammad Ali

  It’s long been thought that Sonny Liston took a dive for Muhammad Ali (then still fighting under his birth name of Cassius Clay) when they fought for the second time in 1965. Ali’s “phantom punch” knocked Liston down in the first round, despite barely connecting with the fighter. There were rumors of some kind of mafia involvement, or possibly that Liston was deep in debt and bet against himself.

  No investigation ever proved that anything untoward happened, and everyone involved denied the same. At worst, Liston might have realized Clay was going to beat the stuffing out of him, and wanted no part of it.
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  (#4) Patrick Ewing And The Frozen Envelope

  Long one of the most popular rumors in NBA history, the Patrick Ewing frozen envelope theory has the league rigging their draft lottery (long thought to be crooked) to get the biggest college star to the team in the biggest market, a flailing franchise that desperately needed a superstar.

  Then NBA Commissioner David Stern has always laughed off the rumor that his league fixed the lottery, and New York getting the first pick in 1985 is just one of many longshot draft lottery happenings – all of which are next to impossible to prove.
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  (#11) The NFL Ordered The Super Bowl Blackout

  When the lights went out on Super Bowl XLVII, of course conspiracies followed. One says that the NFL caused the blackout in order to increase their ratings, because people who had turned the game off would go back to it to see what was happening. While it’s true that ratings probably would have eroded if the game was a blowout, television networks don’t get people to turn in by having things not happen.

  And while there might have been more airtime to run ads, it didn’t matter, because CBS had already sold all of the ads they were going to sell, and were forced to repeat spots. Which is exactly the opposite of what they wanted to happen.
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  (#6) Delonte West Hooked Up With LeBron James's Mom

  One of the strangest rumors to hit pro sports in recent years is that former Cleveland Cavaliers player Delonte West was carrying on affair with LeBron James’s mother – and that when it came to light, it destroyed the team and ended West’s NBA career. The source of the rumor was an email that started going around the day after the Cavs were eliminated from the 2010 NBA playoffs by Boston.

  As with almost all chain emails, its original source is lost to history, with the whistleblower being anyone from a contractor at the Cavs home arena to a relative of James to some guy somebody knew. The fact that it was impossible to attribute also made it impossible to kill, and it went from chain email to national news in a week. Since then James left, and then went back to the Cavs, while West bombed out of the NBA and started playing in China. 

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