Pete Hamill Quotes

Boxing is systemically corrupt.

The black market poses a greater risk to the integrity of sports than open, visible, and regulated betting.

The boxing world is full of all kinds of corruption.

There's a lot of politics in boxing and it's destroying the game.

I'm aware that the World Cup is probably the greatest spectacle in the world of sport, and that's despite the referees that have been found to have fixed games specifically.

A lot of my friends are gangsters. Not like gangsters - well, yeah, all sorts of levels of criminality - but not the types that are preying on innocent people. I have no interest in the type of criminality that has no respect for collateral damage.

The bridge to Coronado Island off San Diego was built because the mob had a hotel there and needed a way to get people out there.

Unfortunately, the horse racing industry is often penetrated by organized crime.

Bookmaking is the most menacing racket in the entire field of organized crime.

The lifeblood of organized crime is gambling, and although I have no scruples about a couple of fellows making a wager, the fact of the matter is that organized crime thrives on illicit income from gambling.

It did not take me long to discover that Al Capone ran the city. His hand reached into every department of the city and county government.

People frequently say that it is human nature to want to gamble and, therefore, you cannot prevent it. It seems to me there are ways of satisfying this enjoyment in gambling without encouraging widespread crime organizations. Much of what we read about could not possibly go on without the connivance of government officials in cities and states and even at the Federal level.

Long Island has a great boxing tradition.

I don't like the sleaziness, the corruption. I don't like the fraud that college basketball has become.

Everybody owned stock in the Capone mob; in a way, he was a public benefactor. I remember one time when he arrived at his box seat in Dyche Stadium for a Northwestern football game on Boy Scout Day, and 8,000 scouts got up in the stands and screamed in cadence, 'Yea, yea, Big Al. Yea, yea, Big Al.'

Obviously you know match-fixing is out there but you don't really associate it with the English game.

I love cricket and am the last person who would get involved in something like spot-fixing. Anyone who knows me will think twice before coming to me with such an offer. Because I don't even listen to the captain before I play a match. I wouldn't agree to do it even for Rs 100 crore.

In the 1930s, in boxing, to be the heavyweight champion of the world was really, really big, people wanted to see the toughest guys. But what I've figured out now, in the '50s, '60s, boxing started to become more entertainment than sport.

Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao was one of the worst boxing matches I've ever seen, but millions of people watched it because of the personalities involved.

Betting by insiders has a corrosive effect. It breeds suspicion, adds to the appearance of corruption, invites more corruption, and, in a sport like boxing, puts lives at risk.

One can construct a strong legal and ethical argument for minimizing the fees that are paid to world sanctioning organizations in conjunction with championship bouts. It's not uncommon for skilled fighters to be denied championship opportunities while less-talented but better-connected boxers fight for belts.

They put everything that's wrong with boxing in one room, did everything that's wrong with boxing in that room, and gave birth to Adrien Broner.

Looking out the window and seeing the MGM and Floyd Mayweather takes me back to when I was a kid. Those were the places you'd hear about, the ones that staged big fights and top fighters. You always want to one day fight there yourself.

I don't even know what it means to fix a matchI, wouldn't know where to start.

Every year, you hope that boxing can provide some of the best fights possible. I think 2018 was one of the better years for boxing. A lot of good matchups were made, and a lot of tickets were sold.