The New York State Gaming Commission (NYSGC) sent a letter to NBA commissioner Adam Silver in the wake of a gambling scandal that led to player and coach arrests.
Key Takeaways
- Silver said he wanted increased federal regulation for betting markets.
- The New York regulator told Silver the NYSGC can help by limiting and restricting different markets.
- New York has the largest sports betting market in America.
Just one day before Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups, Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier, former NBA assistant coach Damon Jones, and others were arrested by the FBI for their involvement in illegal gambling, Silver petitioned for sportsbooks to remove certain bets from their catalogs.
“We accept betting is legal. ... It’s unlikely to go away,” Silver said on "The Pat McAfee Show" in late October. “I think, probably, there should be more regulation, frankly. That may be surprising to hear from me.”
The NYSGC’s letter, signed by chairman Brian O’Dwyer, said Silver’s comments “certainly” caught attention.
The chairman went on to share that New York allows sportsbooks to use independent integrity monitoring agencies, but the state has the authority to limit sports and leagues that are approved for betting odds.
“Accordingly, New York State law and our regulations specifically provide sports leagues the ability to seek restriction, limitation or exclusion of certain wagers,” the letter reads. “While we have not received any such request from the NBA, should we receive a request we would act with utmost alacrity - despite the 60-day regulatory timeframe referenced.”
Finding a solution
The full reaches of the NBA gambling scandal are still being determined.
Rozier was alleged to have limited his availability in games and allowed prop bettors to cash his unders without risk. Billups was said to have been involved in an illegal poker circuit involving the Italian mafia and also shared privileged information about his team, while Jones, a friend of LeBron James, shared with a colleague news that former Los Angeles Lakers player Anthony Davis would miss a game due to injury before the information was known publicly.
Silver is a longstanding proponent of legal sports betting. He penned an op-ed published in the New York Times in 2014, the year he took charge of the NBA, titled “Legalize and Regulate Sports Betting.”
“I think you got to monitor promotion, the amount of advertising around it,” Silver added on "The Pat McAfee Show" recently. “You know, it’s not completely in our control, but we’ve asked some of our partners to pull back some of the prop bets. Especially when they are two-way players, guys who don’t have the same stake in the competition. It’s too easy to manipulate something which seems otherwise small and inconsequential to the overall score.”
NBA, sports world deal with scandals
Gambling scandals are becoming increasingly prevalent in sports. While there’s an ongoing investigation into suspicious betting patterns involving small-conference college basketball teams, Silver has already banned ex-Toronto Raptors center Jontay Porter for the same actions that Rozier is accused of committing.
“We’re trying to put in place and learning as we go, and working with the betting companies, some additional control, to prevent some of that manipulation,” said Silver.
New York is not only the home of the NBA headquarters, it has the largest sports betting market in America. Legal sportsbooks accepted $22.7 billion in wagers during 2024, an 18.3% year-over-year increase and the highest annual figure of all time for any state.
