Sports

can, at least in the case of the NFL, own the sports books too (there is a percent limit, but the limit is per person and each team can have multiple/many owners, AND the NFL purposely hides who owns any such shares).

You know, it used to be that NFL media employees could not mention gambling/odds/etc. without risking their jobs. Now they MUST do so on air because the owners flipped positions when they saw how much money they could make off of it.

So the team owners employ both the refs and the players and the trainers and the coaches; and write the rules and control their enforcement; and may own the gambling outfits; and also get ad/sponsorship revenue from the gambling outlets. Even if prop bets were outlawed, the appearance of shadiness would remain intact. Every time a player is benched or traded, every bad call, every dumb coaching decision, it is all an appearance of corruption invited by being in bed with the sports books.