Reset the 'Days Without a Gambling Scandal' counter to zero
It's white-knuckle time for North American sports leagues, as they hope that a full embrace of legal sports wagering doesn't blow up in their faces
In Monday’s missive about Shohei Ohtani, I wrote that it was surprising that the details of that particular scandal were so old-fashioned: an illegal bookmaker, wire transfers, possible organized crime connections, all the stuff of gambling controversies of yore.
Mere hours later, news broke of a different gambling scandal, as the NBA investigates wagering activity relating to Toronto Raptors part-timer Jontay Porter. Now that right there is the kind of gambling-related problem that seemed inevitable in the era of a sports-wagering ad on every stanchion and a betting promotion on every smartphone.
Porter, to be clear, should at least be granted the presumption of innocence while the investigation is ongoing. In breaking the story on Monday, ESPN reported that the NBA was looking at two games in particular, one of which Porter left early with an eye injury, and the other of which he left early with an illness. In both cases, bettors made considerable money by taking the under on Porter prop bets — bets where you take over or under a player’s stats for the game, pegged to a particular line. In one of the games, ESPN reports, Porter’s prop lines were 5.5 points, 4.5 rebounds, 1.5 assists and 0.5 three-pointers made. Having left after less than five minutes of playing time, he had zero points, three rebounds and one assist. The popular sportsbook DraftKings reported at the time, in a routine distribution to media, that the Porter three-pointer under was one of the most profitable in the NBA that night.
Which, right away, should have been followed with a number of siren emojis. The leagues, and the books, all use “integrity” services that surveil betting activity for suspicious patterns, but you wouldn’t need a AI-powered supercomputer to note that it’s awfully weird that a Jontay Porter under-0.5-three-pointers-made prop bet was a significant winner. First, it’s Jontay Porter. At the time of that January game against the Los Angeles Clippers, he was playing in just his 12th game for the Raptors and 23rd of his NBA career, which began in the 2020-21 season with Memphis. Bettors are highly unlikely to place a large volume of prop bets on a fringe player. Prop bets also do not have long odds — the whole idea is that the line is set at a number that will encourage a similar amount of wagering on both sides, so the sportsbook balances out its risk and takes a small cut from everyone. That means that the per-dollar profit on a prop bet is low, which further means the only way it could be highly profitable is if someone bet large amounts on it. Or several someones. Indeed, ESPN says there were multiple five-figure bets on the Porter props in question. Again, that three-pointer one sticks out: all it took was one made 3PA, something Porter has done in about half his games with the Raptors, for the bet to lose.
So, yes: AWHOOGA, AWHOOGA. You can see why the league would have questions.
I’ll repeat myself here by noting that none of this is proof of Porter’s complicity. Other explanations are available. But it’s players like him, those on the fringes of their professional careers, who are much more likely to be caught up in gambling-related problems than the guys with guaranteed bazillion-dollar contracts. The ease with which significant amounts can now be wagered legally on in-game events means that entry-level pros could easily have a friend or relative who spots what seems like an easy way to make some quick cash. (Porter would actually seem to be less likely than a typical fringe player to be involved in such a scheme because he has an older brother, Michael Porter, Jr., who is the middle of a US$180-million contract with the Denver Nuggets.)
DraftKings, while declining to comment on the Porter case specifically, reportedly said that one of the benefits of a legal and regulated gambling market is that suspicious activity is more likely to be detected. And that’s true. Placing large sums on unlikely events through a smartphone, or a series of smartphones, is going to be noticed a lot more easily than those same bets being made with wads of cash stuffed in brown envelopes.
But that also means this isn’t going to be the last of these types of investigations. Between this and the Ohtani news, this feels like a hold-on-to-your-butts kind of moment for North American sports, as they witness in real time the results of a complete reversal of a long-held aversion to even publicly acknowledging that sports betting is a thing that happens. By embracing the gambling industry so fully, at a pace that I don’t think even its proponents imagined happening, the leagues are now hoping that they can keep players and staff from being tempted into the kinds of scandals that could threaten competitive integrity.
I’m more agnostic on all this than many of my colleagues. The degree to which gambling advertising has overwhelmed sports (and sports media) since betting legalization is definitely a little alarming, but it’s also a new industry with big players trying to snap up market share with aggressive promotions. A cooling off period seems likely at some point. North America is also one of the last regions to introduce legal wagering; in places where it has been around longer there have already been rollbacks on its visibility. England’s Premier League banned in-game broadcast advertisements for betting companies and in coming seasons they will be phased out as main shirt sponsors. There are calls that advertising restrictions should go further to include in-stadium signage and other high-visibility areas.
I wouldn’t be at all surprised if that’s where we are headed, too. The sports-betting market on these shores feels a bit like the kid who avoided alcohol growing up, went away to university, and learned some hard and fast lessons about the inherent risks of tacos and tequila.
Moderation should come eventually, in other words. But there will be some more rough patches first.