One receives, from the estimable — or at least, consistently salaried — Hambry news desk, another missive concerning the peculiarities of American professional sport. This time, the subject is basketball, and the rather belated revelation that its underlying purpose might, just might, be less about athleticism and more about the delicate machinations of the betting slip. To which one can only respond: indeed.

The National Basketball Association — or whatever they are styling themselves this particular fiscal quarter — has apparently launched a “sweeping internal investigation” into whether the entire enterprise is merely an elaborate front for gambling. A 'sweeping internal investigation', they call it. One assumes this involves a good deal of paperwork, the hiring of several earnest young men with freshly pressed suits, and ultimately, a report of several hundred pages confirming that water is, in fact, wet. And rather expensive to investigate. This isn't the first time the custodians of a professional sport have discovered, much to their feigned horror, that money tends to attract those who wish to make rather a lot more of it, by hook or by crook.

The notion that professional basket-tossing — as the sport is rather prosaically named over here — was ever primarily about 'athletic prowess' is a distinctly American conceit, I find. For those of us accustomed to sports where the outcome is not quite so transparently malleable, the constant chatter of 'point spreads' and 'over-unders' has always suggested a certain, shall we say, flexibility of purpose. I recall covering the National Greyhound Racing Board's rather pathetic inquiry into race-fixing back in '87. That was actual grime, involving ill-tempered men and dogs who seemed to understand the fix better than the stewards. This, by comparison, seems... well, sanitised. An American melodrama, rather than a proper British scandal.

The mention of Mr. Chauncey Billups, a chap whose name sounds precisely as one imagines an American sporting figure to sound — robust, uncomplicated, and rather loud — in connection with 'Mafia-affiliated poker games' is hardly a shock. One rather expects it. It adds a certain, shall we say, flavour to the otherwise rather monotonous spectacle of grown men throwing balls through hoops. The real scandal, of course, is that anyone believed it was anything but a vehicle for commercial enterprise and, by extension, the occasional flutter. The league 'questioning if the entire enterprise might be less about athletic prowess and more about point spreads' simply illustrates a rather quaint capacity for self-deception, or perhaps just a very long lunch break in their New York offices. It hardly warrants bothering a correspondent — with actual work to do — on another continent.