[Stefan S]

Here is a very interesting summary and analysis: The Painted Area: Thoughts on Gaming The Game, New Book Covering The NBA's Tim Donaghy Scandal

M. Haubs begins with establishing the authors credibility. Then goes into a more detailed analyses, starting with this:

I believe that Gaming The Game offers what is not only the fullest depiction of the Tim Donaghy scandal to date, but also the one which is closest to the truth. Griffin demonstrates how the FBI investigation and the NBA's "Pedowitz Report" were both incomplete efforts. More notably, the thorough depictions in Gaming The Game raise doubts about key pillars of the story told by Tim Donaghy himself. Let's examine a couple...

Also, Henry Abbott has a series of stories about the book and Donaghy on True Hoop Blog, e.g., here:
David Stern brushes off new Donaghy book - TrueHoop Blog - ESPN

[tin mad dog]

It should be interesting. You always do have to consider the source. However, everyone poo-pooed Jose Canseco's book and pretty much everyone he named turned out to be using P.E.D.'s.

[Stefan S]

Sure, you got to question the source in such a case. But it works both ways. For example, Donaghy's take is presented in his own book ("Personal Foul"). His claims that mob made him do it and that he did not fix the games but merely relied on the inside info. So, this dictum about questioning the source works both ways.

I've only read bunch of blogs about the book (both of them) and not the books. There is no way I will touch D's book. There is just too much fishy stuff about him and his whole approach. But I may take a closer look at "Gaming the Game". It looks interesting and provides lots of background about big stake gambling. It may be a good read.

Here is what Haubs say about Battista's (the main bookie providing info for the recent book) credibility:

Jimmy Battista comes off as a credible figure within this world, a man who was respected, trusted and well-known within the circles of big-time sports gambling. Further, I interviewed Griffin recently, and asked him if he'd had concerns about Battista's credibility, especially considering that Battista has a history of drug use, which spiraled into addiction during the heart of the Donaghy scandal. The author said:

"Of course, that's why the book took so long to write! As an author, it's the number one question. If Battista had described to me back in March of '08, 'Well, we were in Vegas, and this happened, this happened, this happened, this is what we did, whatever,' well, I went out to Vegas and tracked down the people who used to work with him or for him or against him - those are the people, by the way, who really increased his credibility - I sought out the people to whom he owed money, people who despised him because he either jammed them on deals or was manipulating lines and they were on the other side of the line moves, and even though these people didn't like him, as far as what he had described about his role in the betting underworld, his role in Vegas and all that stuff, he was accurate.

For me, his credibility increased with the months and months and months of research because it was never the case that I had someone come up to me and say, 'He's freaking crazy. He's a liar, he's full of [crap], that didn't happen.' I never had that happen once. I never had a problem with somebody saying, 'Oh, that didn't happen.' And that to me is all I needed to know. There were a million ways that could've happened, with the NBA scandal, or the history of betting he was in, and I never had someone say, 'He's full of it.'"

[tin mad dog]

Oh. I only scanned over the first post and missed that it was a book about Donaghy and not the one he wrote.

[Dwight Schrute]

"Battista referred to Donaghy as "Elvis," "because he was The King." Battista said that Donaghy's betting record on games he officiated was "something like 37-10," while he lost six of seven games when betting on games he wasn't officiating.

According to Griffin, "Battista bet an average of $1 to $2 million on games Tim Donaghy officiated versus an average of $10,000 to $20,000 on other (non-Donaghy) NBA games." Other professional gamblers who were following Battista's picks were focused specifically on games officiated by Donaghy"

Sickening...