Once upon a time, the thought of gambling on a pro football game brought gasps of indignation from the NFL offices. And swift action if it was a player who actually placed a bet.
Paul Hornung and Alex Karras each were suspended for the 1963 season for gambling on NFL games. When the league suspended Art Schlichter in 1983, then-commissioner Pete Rozelle said the quarterback would not be reinstated "until the league can be solidly assured that the serious violations of cardinal NFL rules he has committed will not be repeated."
But slowly over the decades, the league has pulled back on how far it will go to enforce those "cardinal NFL rules.