- - Poll: Americans fear sports betting is threatening the integrity of games

David K. LiDecember 19, 2025 at 5:00 AM

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A strong majority of Americans fear that the proliferation of sports betting is damaging the integrity of games and could even lead to contests being rigged, according to a new NBC News Decision Desk Poll powered by SurveyMonkey.

When asked if sports gambling "lessens the integrity of the game," 70% agreed, with 34% saying they "strongly agree" and another 36% saying they "somewhat agree," according to the poll.

And when asked if the increasing availability of sports gambling "will lead to games being fixed or rigged," 29% said they were "very concerned" and another 34% called themselves "somewhat concerned."

The poll was conducted Nov. 20 to Dec. 8 — within weeks of major sports gambling scandals that have rocked professional basketball and baseball.

NBA journeyman Terry Rozier was arrested on Oct. 23 and accused of conspiring with gamblers to provide inside information for bets on his individual performance.

In at least once instance, authorities said Rozier feigned injury to exit a game early, helping bettors who wagered on him failing to make various statistical benchmarks in that contest.

Then, Cleveland Guardians pitchers Emmanuel Clase and Luis Ortiz were arrested in November and accused of conspiring with gamblers who wagered on individual pitches they threw during games.

Gambling, once completely forbidden in professional and college sports, has exploded into mainstream acceptance since the U.S. Supreme Court in 2018 struck down a federal law that required states to ban sports wagering.

Now there’s some form of legalized sports betting in 40 states and the District of Columbia, after years in which legal sports betting was limited to Nevada.

Old school brick-and-mortar sportsbooks and their legal, online descendants raked in $13.71 billion in revenue in 2024, up from $11.04 billion in revenue in 2023, according to the American Gaming Association.

A small slice of the American public is responsible for the large sums at play. In an NBC News Decision Desk Poll conducted in August, 88% of adults said they had not participated in online sports betting in the last 12 months.

Men and younger adults were more likely to say they had placed online bets on sports.

Meanwhile, 66% of respondents said in August that they agreed more with the statement, "People should be able to spend their money how they like, including gambling on sports," than with the idea, "We should restrict sports betting because it can lead to addiction and bankruptcy," which got 34% support.

In the recent survey, when asking about the integrity of sports in the new betting landscape, the worries over sports betting fell along levels of education.

Among respondents with graduate degrees, 82% said sports betting lessens integrity. That declined to 77% among those with bachelor's degrees, 71% among those with some college experience, and 60% among those with no more than a high school education.

There was a similar pattern on the question of the potential for rigged games, with 72% of graduate-degree holders expressing such worries, compared to 67% of college graduates, 63% of those with some college experience, and 57% with no more than a high school education.

Men in the August poll reported being more likely to place bets on sports, while the recent survey also showed men are more likely to worry about the potential dangers of sports betting.

Men were 10 points more likely than women, 75% to 65%, to say they're concerned on some level about the integrity of games when gambling is involved.

And men were 9 points more likely, 67% to 58%, to express a degree of concern about games possibly being fixed in this age of expanded sports betting.

The NBC News Decision Desk Poll powered by SurveyMonkey surveyed 20,252 adults online from Nov. 20 to Dec. 8 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 1.9 percentage points. Percentages may not add up to 100 due to rounding.

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Source: “AOL Sports”