Three current and former NBA players were arrested for ties to fraud and illegal sports betting crimes, but what are the leagues going to do about it?
Three current and former NBA players were arrested for ties to fraud and illegal sports betting crimes, but what are the leagues going to do about it?
The National Basketball Association (NBA) season tipped off Oct. 21. Only two days later, the league was caught in its first scandal of the season.
On the morning of Oct. 23, the FBI conducted a raid, arresting over 30 individuals. Among those arrests were current Miami Heat guard and 10-year NBA veteran Terry Rozier, retired 11-year veteran Damon Jones and Portland Trailblazers head coach and NBA Hall of Famer Chauncey Billups.
The trio was caught up in two separate cases which rocked the sports world. The first involved Billups and Jones working in rigged poker games with the Bonanno, Gambino, Genovese and Lucchese crime families, according to The New York Times.
In a press conference, the FBI said the former players acted as “face cards” for the games, attracting wealthy victims to participate in the poker games. The rigging was done in a multitude of ways — card-shuffling machines which relayed the dealt cards to an off-site messenger, x-ray tables, hidden cameras and even special contact lenses and glasses to read marked cards.
In those games, court documents confirmed over $7.15 million was defrauded from players, including one victim losing $1.8 million over games in June and July 2023.
That is only the first half of the scandal — the second case is tied to an illegal sports betting scandal using insider information. In the accusations against Rozier, Jones and four others, federal agents have accused the group of placing illegal bets based on non-public information.
Rozier, a current NBA player, faces accusations dating back to a game March 23, 2023, between his former team, the Charlotte Hornets, and the New Orleans Pelicans. Rozier left the game after only playing 10 minutes due to “foot discomfort.” The injury turned out to be part of a scheme where Rozier texted his longtime friend Deniro Laster to place under bets on Rozier early in the game before he removed himself from play.
Jones’ accusations come from ties to the current Los Angeles Laker, LeBron James. Jones, who was a teammate with James from 2005-2008 on the Cleveland Cavaliers, maintained his relationship with James, allowing him to have complete access to the Lakers in 2023, and who an anonymous Lakers official described to The Athletic as “a vibes guy.”
His ties to James and the Lakers gave him access to the team doctor, where he would relay unreleased injury information to co-conspirators to place bets against the Lakers and bet on under props on the players injured. One listed case relates to a February 2023 game where the Lakers played the Milwaukee Bucks. Jones received information confirming James wouldn’t be playing and texted a co-conspirator, “Get a big bet on Milwaukee tonight before the information is out!”
This isn’t the only professional league to have a gambling scandal in the last four months. July 3, Cleveland Guardians pitchers Luis Ortiz and Emmanuel Clase were suspended while a gambling investigation went underway after a sportsbook recognized “suspicious betting” on bets on first pitches being a ball or hit batsman, according to ESPN.
Clase’s suspension comes not even a year after he won American League Reliever of the Year. Videos have emerged of wild first pitches from both pitchers, as two pitches from Ortiz posted by Fox Sports are under investigation.
As integrity arguments intensify, many fans will ask what professional sports organizations will do to ensure the integrity of their sports games.
The short answer? They’ll do nothing.
NBA commissioner Adam Silver has maintained his stance as pro sports betting, an opinion he highlighted in a 2014 opinion piece for the New York Times during his first year as commissioner, arguing that underground betting was so mainstream it needed to be legalized so it could be regulated and done safely.
His opinion changed the sports betting landscape, as it came just 24 days after the NCAA, NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB sued New Jersey governor Chris Christie after he attempted to legalize sports betting at casinos and racetracks in the state.
“One of my important responsibilities as commissioner of the NBA is to protect the integrity of professional basketball and preserve public confidence in the league and our sport,” Silver said.
In recent years, Silver has done anything but ensure the public’s confidence in the integrity of the NBA.
Before his arrest, Rozier was under league investigation for the game in March 2023, where he illegally encouraged bets against himself, according to the FBI press release.
In January 2025, NBA Executive Vice President of Communications Mike Bass told USA Today Sports he was aware of the betting and the NBA’s investigation.
“In March 2023, the NBA was alerted to unusual betting activity related to Terry Rozier’s performance in a game between Charlotte and New Orleans.” Bass said. “The league conducted an investigation and did not find a violation of NBA rules. We are now aware of an investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York related to this matter and have been cooperating with that investigation.”
Despite the NBA’s lack of findings, the FBI found enough evidence to conduct an arrest, making the league look complicit. Explicitly saying the organization didn’t find a violation of NBA rules only 10 months before being disproven creates a clear lack of trust in the NBA’s integrity.
There should be doubts about the NBA’s integrity in the sports betting world, as there should be in all professional sports organizations. The NBA is co-sponsored by FanDuel and DraftKings, with their partnership with FanDuel dating back to 2014 before sports gambling was legal. DraftKings now runs NBABet Stream, which is a betting-focused stream available as part of NBA League Pass, the league’s all-access streaming plan.
The NFL in 2021 announced a partnership with Caesars Entertainment, DraftKings and FanDuel to become Official Sports Betting Partners of the NFL. MLB is partnered with BetMGM, ESPN Bet, DraftKings and FanDuel, which also partnered in 2024 with the MLB Players’ Association. The NHL launched its partnership with BetMGM in 2023 as its betting and gaming partner. While the NCAA doesn’t have a betting partner, it did approve a rule change on Oct. 22 allowing collegiate athletes to gamble on professional sports.
While the information isn’t public, College of the Holy Cross economics professor Victor Matheson estimates these deals to be over $1 billion annually from sponsorships.
Even if it threatens the integrity of the game, with that much profit, it’s hard to believe any league will truly crack down on sports gambling.
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