NBA commissioner Adam Silver during the 2026 NBA draft at Barclays Center.
Brad Penner-Imagn Images
In a world where sports gambling has grown year after year, the NBA is now stepping in to remove certain prop bets from companies. There are several props that are expected to be prohibited this season, according to ESPN's Adam Schefter.
“The NBA and prominent sportsbooks have agreed to ban multiple types of bets, per me and [David Purdum], such as:
– Parlay bets involving the under on the same player's statistics
– ‘First of” market; examples: winner of opening tip, an individual's specific shot, rebound, assist, steal
– Under bets on players expected to play less than 12 minutes a game,” Charania wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
The league has the right to restrict what partner sportsbooks can offer through their websites.
“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. “And where we landed right now, we think, is the right balance of those two objectives.”
Gambling has been the topic of discussion over the past few years, and it's because actual players have gotten punished for it. As far as bets involving the under on players' stats, they've been in federal cases that included Jontay Porter and Terry Rozier.
Porter intentionally exited a game so bettors could win when he was on the Toronto Raptors, and he has since been banned from the NBA. The same thing happened with Rozier, as he exited a game while he was with the Charlotte Hornets, and bettors won after taking the under on his stats.