Cornhole con: Players accused of using non-regulation bags
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(NewsNation) — A sudden influx of cheating accusations has brought several low-profile competitions to the forefront of the sports world.
Cornhole is the latest competition to have its dirty underbelly exposed.
Player Devon Harbaugh complained that rivals Mark Richards and Philip Lopez were using bags that were smaller than regulation during the finals of the American Cornhole League World Championships in August.
He was right.
That’s not where it ended, either. Richards and Lopez’s competitors were also found to be noncompliant.
Cornhole bags, according to American Cornhole Organization regulations, must be 6 inches by 6 inches when laid flat, and weigh 16 ounces—with slight specified variations tolerated.
According to Axios, there have been at least five cheating investigations launched across many different competitive endeavors in the last month. including in chess, poker, cycling, fishing and Irish dancing.
The allegations range from fishermen allegedly stuffing their prize-winning catches, a chess grandmaster accused of cheating in hundreds of matches, and a poker pro accused of cheating to win nearly $270,000.
“If there is a culture of cheating, if cheating is seen as widespread, if it’s becoming a norm, then more people are going to do it,” Southwest Minnesota State University psychology professor Corey Butler said in an interview with NewsNation last month.
A couple of crackdowns have been introduced into the world of championship cornhole to ensure the league’s $15,000 world grand prize isn’t stained with controversy. Those crackdowns include random bag checks at tournaments and what the president of the cornhole association calls “infrastructure changes.”
In 2016, the American Cornhole Organization’s world championships had their ESPN premiere and earned a bigger audience that week than Major League Baseball.
The sport’s origins date back much further.
Legend has it that cornhole was invented in the 14th century by Matthias Kuepermann in Germany after watching children toss rocks into groundhogs’ holes.
Then about 15 ago the sport spread like wildfire, from college campuses to backyard barbecues.
Top cornhole players now can earn $250,000 per year from sponsors.
