Oops.
Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier and Chauncey Billups, a former NBA star and head coach of the Portland Trail Blazers, were arrested on Thursday in connection with a federal gambling-related investigation, two senior law enforcement officials told NBC News.
What the hell? that’s nuts.
Looks like the Billups arrest isn’t directly tied to sports gambling but poker. Obviously, this isn’t your typical Friday night poker game with the boys.
The question I always have about these types of situations is “Why”?? These guys have made/are making $millions. Why the hell would you imperil that for any reason?
Gambling is a disease. It doesn’t spare rich people.
yes, but they got in trouble for illegal gambling. There are ways to gamble legally that would not have presented any issues to them.
They weren’t actually gambling, they were cheating at gambling, which turns out to be a lot more profitable.
This is accurate as far as his arrest. But the gambling indictment refers to “co-conspirator 8” described as an NBA player from 1997-2014, a coach since 2021, and a current resident of Oregon. This co-conspirator passed on information about what starters would be on the bench for a Blazers game at the end of the 2023 season.
It might be the feds didn’t feel there’s enough evidence to indict Billups for that, or an indictment might be coming. Either way, his involvement is a lot worse than some poker games.
And letting their faces be bait for people to get involved in the crooked games. Billups et al should be barred from the sport, regardless of their involvement. For what it’s worth, I am not the least bit surprised that sports figures have been faking injuries and the like in order to shave points or falsify their stats for heavy bettors to cash in on, and then taking a kickback for it.
Yes, agree completely. This was an entirely predictable result of normalizing sports gambling.
Well, hopefully they’re barred only if they actually had some involvement.
I’m surprised a star player with a multimillion-dollar contract would do that. Terry Rozier’s annual is about $24M/year. Throwing a game for $100K seems odd, unless the mob had some other leverage on him.
I’m not at all surprised lower-level employees like trainers are doing this.
There is no doubt. It’s the classic mob way of doing business. Rope you in, then threaten you with exposure if you won’t cooperate.
It’s why I refuse to subscribe to Fanduel Network. I’d rather not be able to watch games than to add to their profits. And I really object to sports arenas being named after casinos.
I’m sure that there will be no lingering cloud of tainted gambling hanging over the National Bettors Association. (Really lucked out it wasn’t football or hockey).
Only if you are good at it.
Not even just “entirely predictable”; it’s kind of the point. Get people so engaged to the easy access of an addiction and then cheat them in full knowledge that they’ll always come back for more, “… ’cause a fiend, he gonna chase that shit no matter what.”
Stranger
I guess the ultimate question here is:
How suspect does the “reality” of sport have to be before the added profits due to gambling revenue don’t compensate for the loss of fan attention. Will folks still flock to the NBA if they have significant questions about the validity of the results? How much is it entertainment v. sport?
And, conversely, how rigged does the betting market have to get before casual folks won’t bet on sports any more? My guess on that one is “pretty damn rigged” due to the strong addiction factor in gambling.
If the NBA is seriously tainted by this, will fans, regulators, lawmakers, etc want to take a closer look at other sports as well? With the rise of big-money betting operations, the whole environment just seems skeevy.
Are we surprised?! Organized sports is now ENCOURAGING sports gambling because it is a big source of income. Did they actually expect everything would be okay?
Given the fact that there was immediate questioning of Rozier’s ‘injury’ during one of the games in question, ISTM that such actions will be very noticeable in the future, particularly after this story broke. Thus, I think that there will be very few, if any, of these incidents in the future, and fan interest will remain at its current level.
One X account suggested his short-lived appearance on court was suspicious. “This is fishy,” the sports betting account posted on 23 March. “No notice of an injury, or anything wrong all day long. Then, he only plays in [first quarter] and exits with an ‘injury’… This one doesn’t feel right.”
That same day, another X account asked a betting company to void bets placed on Rozier for that game and suggested betting companies were in on the act. “What a scam,” the post said.
particularly prop betting, some of which, depending on the bet, a single player can have complete control over. As opposed to over/under and other “final outcome” bets that will depend on the actions of entire teams. As we’ve seen in MLB, it’s much easier for example, to influence a single pitcher to throw a ball on a “first pitch ball” bet to ensure a win on such a bet than it is to get an entire team to throw a game.
The Billups poker thing is fascinating. The Mob ran illegal high roller games which is no new thing. They would stake a famous person who legitimately wasn’t very good to sit in. This isn’t new either and the regular players knew that. They loved those games because they thought that they would win against them.
They problem is that the games were manipulated with very sophisticated marked cards and rigged decks and fake players who were in on it. The hypothesis is that Billups didn’t have the outside information but he did know that the organizers were cheating. He name brought people in so he is part of the conspiracy.