Are Commissioner Adam Silver and the NBA looking into limiting player prop bets?

During the 2022-24 regular season, the NBA had a betting scandal going on in the league. It involved a player from the Toronto Raptors. That was the two-way center, Jontay Porter. The 24-year-old violated the league's betting policy and received a lifetime ban from the NBA. It was a challenging decision for NBA Commissioner Adam Silver. However, he had to make it for the integrity of the league. 

Now, there are rumors that the NBA could be working to limit certain prop bets for players that had previously been available. Silver believes there needs to be an improvement in how sports betting is regulated by states and by the sportsbooks proving the betting lines. If they can find a way to do that, the entire sports betting market could be safer as a whole.

What are the major concerns the NBA sees in prop bets offered?

The NBA will continue to work with major sportsbooks ahead of the 2024-25 season to get the new framework in place. It could limit customers from betting on players on 10-day contracts, two-way deals, minimum deals, and rookie-scale contracts. If those limitations were already in place, the NBA could have avoided the entire Jontay Porter scandal in the first place. 

Porter was on a two-way contract with the Raptors when he was placing wagers on himself. Ideally, his player props would have never been offered to the public with a new set of frameworks for the NBA and legal sportsbooks. ESPN’s David Purdum reported this week that the league has discussed prohibiting player props available for two-way players like Jontay Porter. They argued that these players do not need betting lines.

If sportsbooks still wanted to offer player props for two-way players, what would the NBA do?

Bills passed by lawmakers in their respective legalized sports-gambling states often have clauses. It allows professional leagues like the NBA to allow betting lines to be taken down if there are real concerns. Ohio is one state that has that type of legislation in place. Ideally, that’s what the NBA would have done for the Jontay Porter situation. However, it would have been trickier since the Raptors play in Canada and are not under state laws. 

The one argument that arises from banning certain player props is losing revenue to illegal offshore markets. Betting on a two-way player like Jontay Porter is not common. That’s a very niche player to choose and Porter was able to exploit major US sportsbooks like FanDuel. Moving forward, bettors should expect the NBA and sportsbooks to actively monitor the markets and look for irregularities. Changes are coming and it’s only a matter of time until we see prop betting markets shift.