It turns out that being a gambling degenerate, as like most of us, is becoming a very popular trend in the last year, especially with the legalization of many states being more lenient in their laws. After Shohei Ohtani's former interpreter, Ippei Mizuhara, went down with bank fraud for allegedly stealing 16 million dollars from Ohtani to pay off previous gambling debts, it looks as if more people have been lingering with this idea in the shadows. San Diego Padres player Tucupita Marcano has just been banned for life from the MLB for betting on baseball games. It seems no matter how rich, or how luxurious of a lifestyle you have, nothing can scratch that good old gaming itch, and it honestly may be worse than crabs at this point.

According to the investigation, 387 baseball bets were placed during the process, with 231 of those being related to the MLB. This gambling spree went on over two seasons in 2022 and 2023 while he was a member of the Pittsburgh Pirates, and also when injured. Over the course of his Wagers, over $150,000 was spent, which is honestly hilarious after he signed a 1 year, $570,500 contract with the San Diego Padres, most likely to obtain a lot of these losses back. Oh, did I not mention? It was later discovered Tucupita Marcano won an outstanding 4.3% of all of his MLB-related bets. To be fair, showcasing his win/loss record is punishment enough in this situation, it's utterly embarrassing, and I've had a higher percentage air betting Russian table tennis as of 3AM.

According to the investigation, there is no evidence to suggest that the outcomes of these games were manipulated in any way, and if you look at his batting average those two seasons, he certainly wasn't betting on the over. It seems as this has slowly become a running trend in the MLB recently, which begs the question, is this happening in other sports? Jontay Porter, brother of Michael Porter Jr. was recently banned from the NBA for having a gambling addiction, and with more and more athletes getting caught, it'll be interesting to see how leagues move forward with how hard the advertisement for sports betting has been pushed lately. Look, even Michael Jordan liked to gamble, but he accomplished this the right way, high-stakes golf games to late-night casino visits. I'm not against professional athletes wanting some skin on a sports game, but it shouldn't be placed in their current league. I can't imagine the hell storm people will be tweeting towards athletes if we start finding out our prop bets were compromised due to illegitimacy.

At the end of the day, all the numbers on a roulette table add to 666 for a reason, we're playing the devil's game. Betting through friends/family, secret bank accounts, we've seen it all lately, and I'm sure we'll see more of it in the near future. Whether these men are possessed by the anti-Christ, or just plain addicted, we have to shout them out for staying on the grind, even if you have a 4.3% betting average. Cheers to your next bet, and may the gambling gods forever be in your favour!