Toronto Raptors forward Jontay Porter – with the team on a two-way contract since December – is out of the Raptors and under investigation by the NBA due to “betting irregularities” surrounding prop bets on his score/rebound/assist totals in a couple of games over the past few months, according to a new report.
The league is “looking into the matter,” a spokesperson said. ESPN’s David Purdum, Brian Windhorst and Adrian Wojnarowski, who broke the story. This section of their story explains the concerns.
During the January 26 game against the LA Clippers, unders betting interest increased in Porter’s props, who for the evening were pegged at around 5.5 points, 4.5 rebounds and 1.5 assists . There was also a plus/minus for Porter’s 3-point shots, which was 0.5.
That night, Porter played only four minutes before leaving the game due to what the Raptors said was a reaggravation of an eye injury he suffered four days earlier during a game against the Memphis Grizzlies. He didn’t score against the Clippers, had three rebounds and an assist, and didn’t attempt a 3, meaning an under shot on all props.
The next day, as part of a daily user report on betting results, DraftKings Sportsbook reported that Porter’s sub-3 point score was the biggest money win for bettors of any player prop NBA games that night.
Something similar happened on March 20 when the Raptors played the Kings, when Porter played only a few minutes of a game due to illness, and there were still significant bets on his prop unders. Additional reports revealed that several betting sites have seen bets and received requests to bet more than $10,000 on these prop bets, when the usual limit is $1,000 to $2,000.
It goes without saying, but NBA players and team employees are prohibited from betting on games in any form, including prop bets. The NBA has a team of data analysts who look for irregularities like this in the betting market, and each team has a person whose job it is to look for situations like these odd prop bets.
This is a bad image for the NBA. Especially at a time when the league is strengthening its ties to legal sports betting, bringing more revenue to owners and players from companies offering fans easy betting on sporting events (which has become legal in 38 states, and more ‘others are in progress). The NBA will begin offering a betting overlay that fans can add to games they watch on League Pass, linking them directly to sportsbooks where they can place bets (for fans living in states where this is legal). The NBA has jumped headfirst into sports betting.
If it turns out that Porter was involved, expect the league to come down incredibly harshly – a multi-year ban, if not a lifetime ban. The NBA cannot play on this issue.
The mere allusion to a player fixing his prop bets raises questions about the purity of the product, and it fuels conspiracy theorists online who want to make a big deal about the league being fixed (eliminate that sort of thing and be transparent about it). This is exactly what the league should be doing, but it won’t stop the speculation). This is not going to go away quietly.
Porter has averaged 4.4 points, 3.2 rebounds and 2.3 assists per game played 14 minutes per night in 26 games since joining the team in December. Porter is the brother of Nuggets star Michael Porter Jr.
