New York Man Arrested in Connection with NBA Player’s Lifetime League Ban

A bizarre situation that unfolded in the NBA has taken another surprising turn, and the latest development involves a man from New York.

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The situation in-question revolves around Jontay Porter, a 24-year old basketball player with 37 career NBA games in his resume. Porter went undrafted after his college career at Missouri, but signed with the Memphis Grizzlies. He played 11 games with the Grizzlies in 2020-21, and was waived by the team after the season.

Porter bounced around lower levels of basketball for a few seasons, before re-surfacing with the Toronto Raptors in December of 2023. He played in 26 games for the Raptors in the 2023-24 season, starting five of them, and averaged 4.4 points per game during that stint.

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Then, on March 25, 2024, it all came crashing down. The NBA announced that it had opened an investigation into Porter for multiple betting irregularities that they had discovered over multiple months, all connected to him in some way.

The investigation specifically targeted bets that were placed on Porter's player props during that time span. It was discovered that Porter placed 13 bets on NBA games, and that the bets were placed through another person's account.

One of his co-conspirators was discovered to be Brooklyn, NY resident Long Phi Pham, 38, who also goes by the alias Bruce. Pham was arrested on Monday at JFK Airport, as he was attempting to board a plane to Australia on a one-way ticket.

Translation: he was trying to flee the country.

Per The New York Post, [he] was collared at JFK with a bag stuffed with $12,000 cash, two cashier checks worth $80,000 and several betting slips, according to the complaint. Pham was arraigned on wire fraud charges Tuesday and faces up to 20 years in prison.

Porter, meanwhile, has been banned from the NBA for life, after the investigation discovered that he not only bet on games through another person's account, but also influenced the results of these bets by playing poorly.

Three additional co-conspirators have not been found by officials.