NBA strikes agreement with gambling partners to remove under prop bets on lowest-paid players, per report

The NBA has reached an agreement with its gambling partners to remove proposition bets on players who are, according to the report from The Athletic’s Joe Vardon, “making the least amount of money,” which is to say players on either two-way deals or 10-day contracts. 

Specifically, sports books and the NBA’s betting partners — FanDuel, DraftKings and BetMGM — will no longer offer “under” bets on these players, which is clearly a response to the Jontay Porter situation. 

Porter, who was signed to a two-way contract by the Toronto Raptors in December of 2023, received a lifetime ban after the league found Porter guilty of “disclosing confidential information to sports bettors, limiting his own participation in one or more games for betting purposes, and betting on NBA games.”

The reason for taking these prop bets off the board for players who don’t make a lot of money is simple: They are the ones who would be incentivized to manipulate their production as a means to winning bets, whereas players making millions of dollars in salary have no reason to jeopardize their handsomely paid careers for a wager. 

Porter was making roughly $56K while splitting time between the Raptors and their G League affiliate. 

From The Athletic: 

According to an investigation by the NBA that led to Porter’s expulsion, Porter gave a confidential tip about his health to a person he knew to be a sports bettor before the Raptors’ game on March 20 against the Sacramento Kings. A third individual, connected to both Porter and the original recipient of Porter’s health information, placed an $80,000 parlay bet to win $1.1 million, a wager that hinged on the prediction that Porter would underperform against the Kings.

To make sure that the bet hit, the league found, Porter pulled himself out of that Kings game after just three minutes, claiming he was ill.

The investigation also showed that from January through March, while splitting games between Toronto and its G League affiliate, Raptors 905, Porter placed at least 13 bets on NBA games using an associate’s online betting account. Although none of those bets were on games in which Porter played, he did bet on the Raptors to lose as part of a parlay bet. The wagers ranged in size from $15 to $22,000, totaling $54,000.

He netted nearly $22,000 in winnings on the bets, the league said.

You can see the problem here, and how this could continue to happen if the league and its betting partners didn’t come to this agreement to remove these bets that are, to be frank, completely at the mercy of the performance of these players incentivized to tank their own numbers. 

Let say your over/under for rebounds is two. Easy, you just grab one rebound and then stay away from the ball for the few minutes you’re on the floor. Bet any amount you want, through whoever you want, on your under, and you can double or triple your entire year’s salary in one night. 

It’s too easy to manipulate, and the league is right to get ahead of another potential Porter situation as gambling takes on a central role within the league and its audience.