CATCHING HEAT

Veteran NBA Star Under Investigation for Sports Betting Scheme

The investigation comes after bets placed on a 2023 Charlotte Hornets game were flagged as highly unusual.

Veteran NBA player Terry Rozier is under investigation by federal prosecutors looking into whether he participated in an illegal sports betting scheme by throwing a game, NBA officials said.

The 30-year-old Miami Heat player is part of what has now become a government-wide probe into an insidious ring of gamblers and poker players who are alleged to have rigged multiple games across an array of sports, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The very same investigation has already imposed a lifetime ban on former Toronto Raptors forward Jontay Porter, who is believed to have fixed his performances in two games last season and now faces criminal charges.

Law enforcement believe that Porter may have been influenced to throw his games by individuals who had enough inside information to bet considerable sums of money and pursue Rozier a year earlier.

But now authorities are probing whether a far larger amount of money is at play than previously known.

The game under scrutiny was on March 23, 2023, back when Rozier still played for the Charlotte Hornets. The U.S. Integrity, a firm in charge of monitoring the betting market, found that the bets placed on Rozier for the game, which resulted in a 115-96 loss of the Hornets to the New Orleans Pelicans, were highly-unusual, sources told the newspaper.

But suspicions were heightened when the NBA veteran, who averaged 21.1 points and 35.3 minutes per game that season, only played nine minutes and 34 seconds before being substituted out during timeout.

Rozier has not been charged with any crimes or accused of foul play and is still on track to completing his $100 million contract with the league as a decade-long contributor.

“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,” NBA spokesman Mike Bass told the Wall Street Journal. “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.”

One of Rozier’s attorneys, Jim Trusty, also confirmed the investigation into the athlete.

“We are aware of the NBA’s 2023 investigation which determined there was absolutely no wrongdoing by Mr. Rozier and we are confident that the on-going government investigation will arrive at the exact same conclusion,” Trusty told the Wall Street Journal.