Watch any professional sports broadcast for long enough, and you’ll be treated to ads promoting a variety of sports betting apps and services. Many come with attractive promo bonuses or offers to new players, and it can be a way for fans to increase their engagement level with the sport.
Millions of fans around the country bet on sports every day, but some of the darker elements of betting have showed throughout various leagues. Players have reported verbal abuse from fans on social media and in person, and other players have been implicated in gambling scandals.
Former NBA player Johntay Porter is among one of the latter. Porter was banned from the NBA in 2024 after admitting to removing himself from games in order to help his friends have prop bets hit.
Porter’s older brother recently discussed the impacts of betting on professional sports, and he gave a bleak outcome for the future.
“The enjoyment of the game isn’t for the game anymore,” said Brooklyn Nets forward Michael Porter Jr. on the “One Night with Steiny” podcast this week.
“It’s so that people can make money. In reality, way more people are losing money than making money.”
Porter Jr., who won an NBA championship in 2023 with the Denver Nuggets, said that he understands why it’s hard for players who come from modest backgrounds to resist the allure of betting.
“Think about it, if you could get all your homies rich by telling them, ‘Yo, bet $10,000 on my under this one game. I’m going to act like I’ve got an injury, and I’m going to sit out. I’m going to come out after three minutes,'” Porter said, referencing a similar situation to his brother’s.
“That is so not OK, but some people probably think like that. They come from nothing, and all their homies have nothing.”
Porter predicted that as sports betting continues to expand, “it’s only going to get worse.”
He said that players are in a no-win situation with fans who bet. If they play too well, those who bet on the under are upset. If they don’t play well, it’s the other way around for the over.
“We really do get death threats,” he said. Porter also added that he doesn’t think betting should be allowed online, and that bets should only be placed in-person in Las Vegas.
As the sports betting industry continues to expand, we’ll see what happens to the relationship between player and athlete.
