- On Oct. 16, the NBA told partner sportsbooks to pull several bet types, including the same-player under parlays used in the Jontay Porter scheme.
- Ten days later, it named Kalshi and Polymarket its preferred prediction markets, even though New York is suing prediction markets for offering illegal sports betting.
- Legal sportsbooks flagged the Porter bets, but bettors are the ones losing markets.
NEW YORK – In 10 days, the NBA went from pulling bets off legal sportsbooks in the name of integrity to signing on as a business partner with two companies its home state calls illegal sportsbooks.
The league is headquartered in New York, where legal sports betting runs through state-licensed operators. New York is also among the states suing prediction markets, alleging they offer illegal sports betting.
On Oct. 16, a league memo obtained by ESPN ordered the league’s sportsbook partners, DraftKings and FanDuel among them, to pull these markets:
- Parlays that stack one player’s unders
- Who wins the opening tip
- Whether a player misses a specific shot
- Unders for anyone projected to log less than 12 minutes
- Alt unders that pay more
Then on Monday, the NBA named Kalshi and Polymarket its “Preferred Prediction Market Exchanges.” The league’s announcement gives both official NBA data, logos and marketing rights.
So which is it? Is the NBA protecting the game, or selling the protection?
Integrity Has a Price Tag
To be fair, the under parlay ban makes sense. According to federal prosecutors, one bettor in the Porter scheme risked $80,000 that Porter would stay under in six stat categories, a parlay that would have paid roughly $1.1 million. Porter left the game after three minutes.
But the system that caught Porter was the legal sportsbooks. At least one U.S. book detected unusual betting on his props, with accounts trying to bet $10,000 to $20,000 on his unders.
Player prop limits usually run around $1,000 to $2,000 and the regulated market did its job.
The league’s answer was to shrink the menu for everyone else and that menu now comes from a private memo. The NBA estimates its partner books take upward of 99% of U.S. bets, so a league document most bettors will never read decides what you can bet on every NBA game. No hearing, no public comment, no state gaming commission vote.
Even the NBA admitted that pushing too hard could backfire:
“There’s a balance between ensuring that we are removing problematic bet types but also ensuring that we don’t just move activity into the illegal market,” NBA executive vice president Scott Kaufman-Ross told ESPN.
Ten days later, his league partnered with a market its home state calls illegal. When asked about the legal fight over who regulates prediction markets, Kaufman-Ross was blunt:
“We’ll let the courts decide,” he told ESPN. “The jurisdictional issue is not our issue.”
Follow the Money
Kaufman-Ross also admitted on Oct. 16 that enforcing the new restrictions on prediction markets would be challenging without agreements in place.
The NBA’s release says its partners will face market restrictions “aligned with the NBA’s latest sports betting restrictions.” That’s the integrity sticker. The data, logos and marketing rights are the business.
And look at who got the sticker.
The CFTC has confirmed it is investigating Polymarket’s business and social media practices. The New York Post reported on Oct. 22 that Polymarket fired its marketing chief after an internal review of paid videos showing fake winning trades. Four days later, it became the NBA’s preferred exchange.
The NBA also expanded its DraftKings deal to cover the operator’s prediction market product, with nationwide promotion. Kalshi argues its federal license lets it offer sports contracts across the country, including in states that never legalized sports betting.
Meanwhile, the NFL, still without a prediction market partner, filed a brief supporting New Jersey’s request for Supreme Court review of the industry. The NBA says it won’t weigh in.
The NFL picked a side. The NBA picked a payday.
