Bettor reportedly placed 30 wagers on Terry Rozier prop bet unders for one 2023 game

Yahoo

3 days ago

The game in question was March 23, 2023: Charlotte's Terry Rozier started the game that Thursday night against the Pelicans, but played just 9:34 before leaving the game with a foot issue. Rozier finished with five points, four rebounds and two assists, all well below his season averages. He would not play in any of the Hornets' remaining eight games that season, but a team missing the playoffs being cautious with a player at the end of the season did not raise many eyebrows.
However, what happened that night did raise the eyebrows of federal investigators who saw unusual betting activity on Rozier prop bet unders that game — specifically 30 bets from one person at a Mississippi casino, all of which is detailed in a fantastic story by ESPN's David Purdum on what is being investigated in that case.
On the morning of March 23, 2023, a bettor at a sportsbook in Biloxi, Mississippi, placed $13,759 in bets on the unders on Rozier's statistics in a game that night between the Charlotte Hornets and New Orleans Pelicans, according to the documents, which ESPN acquired through an open records request... In all, at least six sportsbooks in multiple states detected suspicious betting on Rozier props that day, with the bulk of the activity occurring in Louisiana and Mississippi, according to sources familiar with a report issued by U.S. Integrity, a firm that monitors the betting market for abnormalities.
The NBA investigated the situation at the time but determined no league rules were violated in this case. Rozier had not been on the injury report for the game. Rozier is not a target of the investigation, his attorney, Jim Trusty, told ESPN.
Trusty said Rozier met with NBA and FBI officials multiple times in 2023 and that the initial investigation determined that he had done nothing wrong.
"It's unfortunate that he's a big name in sports and is having to endure all this," Trusty told ESPN. "My hope and expectation is that at some point that they'll be done with their investigation and will be professional enough to let us know that it's 100% over and that they reached the same conclusion that was reached in 2023."
This betting investigation is linked to the betting scandal surrounding the Toronto Raptors' Jontay Porter, which led to his banishment from the NBA. According to the report, some of the betting accounts involved in the Porter prop betting case were also involved in betting on prop bet unders in the Rozier situation.
The casino paid out the bettor who placed 30 bets in Mississippi because those were legal bets and nobody, as of yet, has been able to prove any wrongdoing on anyone's part.
This is unrelated to the ongoing betting scandal surrounding Michael Beasley.