1-900-RIPOFFS (continued...)

Still, sports touts are in incredibly gracious and generous group. Just about every weekend they hear about fixes that are going down and are more than willing to share this precious information with you-for a small charge. Sales men for now-defunct Metro Sports, and New York-based service, actually had a fix written into a typed script that salesmen would use on the phone. It read: "I'm glad I got ahold of you in time! We are releasing our biggest information game of the ____ (month/season) going off ___ (day of week)ÉNow, ___ (name), listen carefully. Our inside sources have tipped us off to this game. We know exactly what's going to happen. We know the winner. (Lower voice) It's the kind of game I can't even talk about over the phone-you follow me, right? (Response) OK GoodÉAll you gotta do is cover me with $___ How do you do it, Visa or MasterCard?"

The fix scam is essential to a tout's repertoire. "You'd lower your voice way down," says one employee who worked for Duffy for four years, "and you'd say, 'Is this line clean? No taps on it, right? OK Listen, we've got information on this game. you know what I'm saying? The winner of this game was already decided in a hotel room.'"

Although SI paid $275 to sign up anonymously with Linemasters, whose figurehead is the Coach, Ron Bash, we found out very quickly that the $275 didn't cover every game the Coach had "information" on. The day after we signed up, our so-called personal representative, Mike Vela, called to say Linemasters had paid $300,000 for information from "people like you read aboutÉThis game is a lock. An absolute lock." Vela said he was putting the Coach himself on the line.

Bash: Look, this is not a game that might win. This is a game that should win. This is a game that is going to win. I know something, between you and me, that I shouldn't know. I don't even like to say over the phone what I know. Even the alums of this school are going to be pounding the other side.

SI: I don't know.

Bash: Look, you're crazy if you don't bet five dimes [$5,000] on this game. It's like stepping over an envelope full of money with your name on it. Send us a nickel [$500]. I have people putting 20, 30 dimes for this game. Milton Berle put six dimes on this game. Hey, you don't get many of these games in life."

SI: You had one of these last week.

After we didn't buy in, Linemasters didn't like us as much. Vela would make us call at least twice to get our picks, sometimes three times. One day he made us hold for 10 minutes. We finally hung up. We called back and left a message. No callback. Called again. Held 10 more minutes. Hung up. Called again. Vela: Hello.

SI: Geez, it's not easy getting ahold of you.

Vela: Excuse me? I called you and your line was busy. I don't have time to call busy numbers.

SI: Hey, I don't have time to sit on hold for 20 minutes either.

Vela: Call back with a better attitude. Click.

We called back. Our collar was starting to shrink.

Vela: Hello.

SI: Hey, let's get one thing straight. You work for me. I paid you.

Vela: Excuse me?

SI: I paid you.

Vela: Call me with a better attitude.

SI: No, don't hang up. Just give me the picks.

Click.

We called back again.

Vela: Hello.

SI: Just give me my picks.

Vela: Maybe if you get lucky today, you'll fall and you'll trip, hit your head and open your ___ eyes and realize someone's trying to help you. You're too ___ stupid to realize that now.

SI: Thanks a lot.

Vela: Take Syracuse, plus nine. Somebody's got to make you see reality. So maybe I got to abuse you a little to make you open your eyes.

SI: I don't need abuse.

Vela: Call me back at 6:30.

Click.

Linemasters went a respectable 11-8 (58%) on pro and college football for us and threw in all the abuse at no additional charge. Not that the abuse we got from Linemasters was at all uncommon. Abusing customers is SOP among sports advisers. "Gamblers are desperate people," says Arnie Wexler, executive director of the Council on Compulsive Gambling of New Jersey. In investigating Feiner's tactics, an inspector for the Consumer Affairs Department called one of Feiner's 800 numbers to take him up on an offer of a free line on a game during the '89 football season. The investigator spoke with a man known as Sonny Greco, also known as Phil Bonvino, a salesman for Stu Mitchell's Locker Room Report, still another service owned by Feiner. After a breathless, oath-laden pause-free speech, Greco went for the close. His pace was furious. The detective, posing as a customer named Stan, balked. Greco screamed louder.

Stan: I'm being bombarded here. Lemme think on it. I got a lot of guarantees here.

Sonny: I'm not interested in anybody else you're call., Stan! The difference here is this, OK? We own this game tonight on over-under! We own this information. Now go get your credit card, and let's start making money! You don't need to deal with anybody but me!

Stan: WaitÉ

Sonny: I own this game in over-under! I have the winner! Tonight! No what's your credit-card number?

Stan: OK, lemme get back to you.

Sonny: Stan, you're not going to call me back! You know it as well as I do, and if you think I'm going to let you off the phone with that ___, you're crazy! OK? I've got the winner tonight! I own this game in over-under, and I'm going to own your bookmaker's ass! So get your credit card out and let's get going!

Stan: Lemme tell you what we're gonna do. I'm gonna think about it. Sonny (louder still): Stan, there's nothing to think about! Click.

Greco is ruthless, loud and scary. No wonder Feiner has given him his own sports service-Phil Bonvino's Locker Room Report. Says a former phone tout for a large Long Island service, "There were plenty of times when we'd tell a guy, 'Look, if you don't come across, I'm gonna tell your wife you're gambling again.' Or we'd tell high school kids that we were going to tell their parents." Says the ex-salesman for Kevin Duffy, "We'd call up anybody, even guys we knew were going to Gamblers Anonymous. We'd stay on them." Question: How do sports advisers get away with it? Better question: Who are customers supposed to complain to? Gamblers don't want to turn anybody in because most of them are breaking the law themselves. As a result, the touts go unpoliced.

That may explain what happened in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, Fla. A tout service working under the names Seasons Edge and W.D.L. [We Don't Lose] Sports, among others, would promise to repay gamblers any losses they had with their bookies as a result of bad advice. But according to a grand jury indictment handed down in Atlanta, when the gamblers would call for their refunds, the story would change; the salesman would say, "Oh, you just had the partial subscription package. If you just send me the difference between your package and the full-season price, we'll send you out a check." Some customers would actually do that, and the check wouldn't come. Then the touts would say something like, "Oh, we know we owe you $7,000, but we can only make the check out in increments of $5,000. Just send us another $3,000 and we'll send you the $10,000." Big surprise: The $10,000 would never come. One man lost $30,000 on the con.

Soon clients got a clue and stopped paying. That's when the people from the Seasons Edge group "got heavy-handed," says Robert Schroeder of the office of the US Attorney in Atlanta. "They'd threaten to kill members of the family, burn down their homes." One victim was told if he didn't send more money, he'd be "chopped up into little tiny pieces with a chain saw." Gamblers were bilked out of $413,000 before a victim's parents finally called the FBI when their son, a college student, lost his tuition money and resorted to using his father's credit card to try to obtain his "refund." Schroeder nailed conspiracy, wire fraud and extortion convictions on 12 people. They got the full package-sentences ranging up to 87 months in jail.

There are honest sports services. There are honest out-call masseuses, too.

The trick is finding one. Some handicappers have their picks documented by monitoring services that appear to be reliable. Unfortunately, some say, most monitors are as crooked as the touts. Ed Horowitz, the Professor, says he won't use monitors. "I got calls from two monitors who both said the same thing," Horowitz says. "They said I could pay, like $250 to turn in my games Friday, or $1250 to turn 'em in Monday."

Even more convenient is having your own monitor. Enter Mason King. The ad in the Dec. 7, 1990 edition of The National for Mason King Sports of Catonsville, Md., said you could get picks "from The King himself." Low on willpower, we called the King and left our number (standard procedure in the 800-line tout business). The King himself called us back. He boasted that his winning percentage was about 70%.

SI: Could you document that?

King: Sure. Call the Maryland Association of Handicappers. They document me. I think I'm about 33-16, I'm not exactly sure. I only give them my best play of the week."

King gave the number for the Maryland Association of Handicappers. We called the number and a voice answered.

Them: Hello?

SI: Hello, who's this?

Them: Who's this?

SI: Well, we were just trying to get ahold of the Maryland Association of Handicappers.

Them: Oh, uh, yeah, you got 'em.

SI: Do you document a Mason King Sports?

Them: Oh, oh, yeah. Mason King. He's one of the good ones. We've been doing him about two years now. Last year he was 35-16. The year before, he was 29-20. They're pretty decent.

That sounded a little fishy, so two weeks later we tried again. The same voice answered.

Them: Hello?

SI: Is Mason King in?

Them: Who's calling?

SI: Rick.

Them: HI, how you been? Long time since I talked to you. What number did you call?

SI: 301-521-6242.

Them: Yeah, that's a good one.

SI: This is weird, because Mason King said this number was the Maryland Association of Handicappers. But it isn't.

Them: No. It's a strange number. Very strange Mason gave you this number.

SI: When I called this number last time, you said you were the Maryland Association of Handicappers.

Them: Yeah, they use this number, sure.

SI: You mean they document you out of there?

Them: No, but when they're not in, it automatically forwards to my office.

SI: But you're not in business together, are you?

Them: Oh, no, it's just like, uh, an answering service for me, and for themÉit's a call-forwarding thing. When the office here at Mason King's is closed, it's forward to them.

Now, that's convenient. Not only is the fox watching the henhouse, but the fox answers the hens' phone.

Then there's the Football Betting Guide. This 34-page booklet, which sells for $4, promises to uncover con artists and ne'er-do-wells in the business. The cover, for instance, reads EXPOSED! SPORTS SERVICE SCAMS! Inside, nearly every sports adviser is denounced as a fraud and a thief. Luckily, at the end, the book lists the top 10 services in the country, ones you can count on, ones that the book promises have no connection to the authors or the publishers. So who do you think owns the top two services listed? Right. People connected to the book.

According to Jack Stewart of Las Vegas, owner of Sports Watch (a well-regarded monitor), Greg Silveira, a San Diego-based phone tout, told him that he wrote the Betting Guide. Silveira also told SI that he thought publishing the book would be a good way to drum up business, especially since it listed his own two services, Blazer Sports and Spot Play, as the best. "Look, the sports handicapping industry needs to be cleaned up," said Silveira (who claims his real name is Gordie Deangelo but who also goes by Gordon Michaels). And if it's worth cleaning up, it's worth cleaning up at a profit."

But two weeks after saying that, Silveira took back most of what he had said, conceding that he had a direct interest in Blazer Sports but insisting that he had no involvement in Spot Play or the Football Betting Guide. That seemed odd, because when SI checked on Oct. 16, the 800 numbers for Blazer and Spot Play were both listed under one address in San Diego and under the name Greg Silveira. One handicapper ripped by the Football Betting Guide, Mike Lett, was so irate at his review that he threatened to "go to the FBI." To calm him down, the Betting Guide agreed to run public-apology ads in betting newspapers for the rest of the 1991 football season. Whom did Lett deal with at the Betting Guide? "Greg Silveira," Lett told SI. This tout business has the craziest coincidences.

One of the craziest is that many of the monitoring services are owned by the very people they're supposedly monitoring. Not surprisingly, independent monitors don't get much business. One is the Handicappers' Report Card of Park Forest, Ill. In the last four years the Report Card document the best legitimate adviser as Randy Radtke Sports, of West Brooklyn, Ill., at 57.7% Radtke also had the best single football season in the Report Card's history-66.2%, including bowls and playoffs, in 1990-91. Somehow he has done it without threatening, abusing or lying to his customers. "I don't want to milk customers out of everything they're worth and go on to the next batch," says Radtke, 37. "I'm friends with every customer I have."

A guy like Radtke would make millions if touts were regulated, but there are those who think the whole business should be eradicated, not controlled. Why does somebody living in Iowa City need advice on a bet when betting isn't legal anywhere within five tanks of gas? "How many people get off the phone with these guys and hop on a plane to Vegas?" says Wexler, of the Council on Compulsive Gambling. Licensing would make touts legitimate, but do they really deserve legitimacy?

"You'd be talking with grown men who were crying on the phone," says one former tout.. "Guys who were losing everything but still betting. And I'd lie awake in the middle of the night hoping the guy would win. So I'd call the sports phone and get a late West Coast game at 4 a.m. and go, 'Damn, he lost again.' "

"It was like feeding drugs to an addict," says the ex-salesman for Duffy. "We'd try to take whoever we got and make them bet more. We'd take college kids who were betting $25 and say, 'Hey, you got to bet $500 on this game. If you don't bet a nickel I'm not gonna give it to you.' If they won, they got a taste for big money. If they lost, they were desperate to get out [of the hole], and so they start chasingÉ How can anyone who works for Kevin and Stu have a conscience? Basically, I was just hurting people." And that, unfortunately, is the only absolute lock we found.

**************************************************** Isn't this sad? We think so. Something must be done, and we are here to do it for the Internet community. With our expanded "Under The Bleachers" features coming soon, we will provide a forum for customers experiences both with SportsChronicles.com and others in the industry to be shared via daily postings. By our customers sharing their experiences with others, we feel we can help many would be targets, from this kind of abuse and deception. In addition to this public assistance, we expect to show a reasonable profit for our efforts paid for by sponsors to our site, as well as League Membership fees.

Our thanks to SuzySports[FrontPage Substitution Component].com,%20our%20intention%20is%20to%20both%20police%20and%20expose%20the%20industry%20andprovide%20to%20thepublic%20a%20group%20of%20HONEST%20handicappers%20who%20have%20the" stones" to have their records documented. Onward!

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