The Scuttlebutt

A NBA basketball player is banned for life from the league for gambling. 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
This is the down Beam ninety sevenone the Freak all right, thank you
j J tam to whipping everybody withsome fish today. Well, what's not
to like here? I don't understand. It's a mellow, smooth groove bro
all like that. I'm gonna runwith me across the I mean, it's

(00:26):
because it's all like puff the MagicDragon. Like if this came out in
nineteen seventy four, yes, legend, it would be a legendary AM Gold
radio hit. But people just thiswould be right up there with like anything
by Cat Stevens or Gordon lightfoot rightor Crosby Stills in Nash. But because

(00:50):
they're connected to the jam band scene, you say jam band, if that
label gets tagged to you, thereis a big part of society that just
dismisses it. One yeah, Imean, and they get in aligned unnecessary.
I do it more as a joke. I don't but you don't like

(01:11):
or listen there. I've never reallylistened to them, but everything that I've
heard, for the most part,you know, the studio recordings are I
don't hate this, this is cool. Yeah, it's very very nice.
My morning jacket somehow gets labeled alittle bit or gets kind of thrown onto
that that that I don't know,imaginary heap, and they're kind of known

(01:34):
for not necessarily having the most kickass albums, but if you go see
them, that's what it's all about. I think Fish, I think a
lot of the bands, Dave Matthewsmaybe that way. Dave Matthews has had
substantial success with radio and album sales, but most people are like, yeah,

(01:56):
my Morning Jackets albums, they're fine, but you got to see them
live. I heard that a milliontimes, and I'd listen to their albums.
I'm like, yeah, some ofthis is pretty good. But I
did it. I bit the bulletand I went and saw him live,
and they are, in fact,one of the best live acts I've ever
seen in my life. I wasblown away at what a great concert that
was, and I didn't know ninetyfive percent of the songs they played.

(02:19):
Yeah, I have a little tensionin my head because Christine is making a
first trip to Vegas. You knowthere's going to be I don't know,
stress, you know, but youknow, pe'l be amped up. But
it's also her first Fish show,and I hope she doesn't hate it,
you know, you won't. Idon't think there's a possibility that she won't.
And I'm telling you if I went, if I were going on this

(02:40):
trip and not knowing, I can'tname one name of their songs. If
you, I can't sing a hook. I know nothing about this band and
their history of recorded music. Nothing. If I went and saw this show,
I guarantee you I walk out ofit being absolutely blown away. Yeah,

(03:01):
by the live experience of seeing them. And that's what the allure is
for their legions of fans that haveseen them forty and fifty times. And
that's why you have middle aged baldingguys and Travis Matthews hoodies that are just
lined up to hand over their thousanddollars to get in here because they love
that experience. Yeah. I can'timagine she's going to walk into the sphere

(03:25):
too. That's like the trump card, you know, like, no matter
who's playing, that's going to bea sensory overload experience. But then I
know when you couple it with whatFish is gonna do, it's gonna be
so next level. We have acaller that says they might be able to
help me. They have some sphereadvice. Yeah, hello caller, Hey
guys, good morning. It's howare y'all? Hi? Ose? What's

(03:46):
going on? Not a lot?Hey? So I went to see you
too at the Sphere. Yeah,and have a little tip for you,
man. Do you know where yourseats are? Uh? Yeah, I'm
in general admission in the pit fortomorrow, so I know I'm good on
the overhang. Is that what we'retalking about. Yeah, that that's one
of it. So are you goingto vote shows? And are you not

(04:06):
sitting on the in the pit onthe next one? Uh no, Saturday
night, we have regular good seats. I just know they're not under the
overhang. That's all we made sureof. And we got a few different
tickets, so I know we're goodsomewhere, maybe a little off to the
side on Saturday night because I knowthe pit tickets are a little more pricey.
So that was gonna be my tipbecause when I went to see U

(04:29):
two, I got the general admissionand you know, and it was cool
or whatever. But then when Iwas at the Sphere, I went to
sit geek and then I bought floortickets for about fifty bucks. Oh wow,
really, And that was like twoI mean I was almost touching the
bone over there, so it waspretty bad. Buddy, did your uh,

(04:50):
I mean it's not a concern,but did your neck hurt? Because
GA is up there pretty close?So you're gonna be full looking straight up
a good amount, are you?And no, it's not too bad at
all. No, it's it's uhand you're a total guy too, So
it's like the stage is about,you know, to your neck maybe mm

(05:11):
hm, so yeah, all right, lead the one that YouTube played in
it was like it it went upto my neck. So how big or
small is the GA pit? Becauseagain we have I have Christina and Mary,
and Mary's been to Fish shows withcash and she kind of hates it,
but she hates she's a gamer,she's a gamer, but she hates
being in like the packed pit withcrazy fish fans touching and all over,

(05:32):
you know. I mean, soI want to stand toward the back of
the pit where it loosens up alittle bit, but we still have a
good view. How big is thethe GA pit? I will say probably
the side of a football field maybe. Okay, that's big? All right?
Goods, So it should loosen uptoward the bag, Yeah it should.
Yeah, it was it backwards.They're selling beer and stuff. It's

(05:53):
I mean, I was like rightup to the front and not gonna even
move. But yeah, you mightwant to stay stay back a little.
What's this accident you got working?Bro? Oh? This one's a regular
one. This this is the onethat lived with, is the one you
live with? This is not messyor okay yeah no, no, this
one is the standard. This oneis stuck. Not Seppi, the Italian

(06:14):
version that okay, yeah right rightright? Oh you know that could that
could explain why Massy sometimes sounds Italiansometimes Argentinian, because he lives in the
what do you call that a soundpoint, the surround sound whatever, like
the bear has. Yeah you're doing. Yeah, that's the most of the

(06:36):
left, A little bit of hesounds like messy and then Seppi sometimes all
right, hose the other man thatyou're one of our favorites. All right,
cool? Guys, see you stayhard? Oh are you still there?
Yeah? I'm still here with that? What I am so happy about
something? You know, I'm aLobbankta Dork. It's like my favorite taco

(06:58):
place in town. They opened up, they didn't but a taco establishment opened
up in a gas station that Ican walk to in my neighborhood. Yeah,
and they're kind of a chain.It's tax Goo. Oh dude,
I have Taxico maybe once a week. Yeah, my girlfriend will good lunch.
Yeah, dude, man, I'vebeen to a couple of them before

(07:21):
that are away from where I live, and I was like, yeah,
they're fine, but didn't hold thecandle. I felt like to Lobanketta.
But this new one that's on Fergusonand Highland kind of it's in a mobile
station. I drove by and itsaid now serving Taxco Tacos and I said,
I know what Dingu's having for dinnertonight. I was floored at how

(07:45):
good it was as a twenty fourhours too, because the one I got
yea when we go through is twentyfour hours. Yeah, it's twenty four
yeah, twenty four hours. Iwent at like six o'clock. It was
amazing. It was. It wasraining yesterday and the day before yesterday I
went. I made my monthly tripto Taco's l C. I hell yeah,
because I go when it's raining,so there's not a giant line,

(08:05):
you know, And apparently they don'tdo barbacoa. It like ten forty five
in the morning. It's not readyyet, yes, closely. Yeah,
I mean if it's raining, thatmeans that we're not we're not working right,
or not working they're working slower,all right, hos that thanks Tommy
later Homie tax whoa boy, itwas good all right. I'd made the

(08:26):
mistake of eating the complimentary Serrano pepperthat came with it and had to down
about a half a gallon of oatmilk. Really, yes, just car
Oh my god, I felt likeConan. You know, here's my gringo
taco thought of the day. I'veall these places in Oak Cliffs that I

(08:46):
go to. I bounce around somany of them, and some of them
give you three different sauces. Yep. But they start at terror level.
Huh, Like is it the pinkone, the habaro? Yes, is
the green and then and then redred? Yeah, you get the rojo,
the verde and then the habbin area. None of them even approach medium

(09:07):
like they're mildless. One is hotas ball. That's the beauty of those
days. Crank it all the wayup to death to the gringo gring But
the thing is that that I hadto do because I walked up and they
were unpacked. It's brand new,so you know what they might have been
on their best behavior. You know, when you want to put your best

(09:28):
foot forward when you're opening a newspot. So everything was perfect. It
was fresh and delicious. It wastwo folks working and they were communicating with
one another, and one of theguys looked pretty American eyes. So I
was like, uh, the Espanolor in glass and he goes Espanol and
I'm like, oh man, SoI had to place my order in Espanol,
and then I apologized at the endof it for my malo Espanol.

(09:52):
He laughed and said, no,it's good, it's good, it's good.
I mean, that's a taco shop. It's you don't need to be
fluent in all language is to getthe transaction down there. Sure, sure,
I mean they understand English when itcomes to the different taco's your order.
And I had specific wants and needs. I wanted to make sure that
I had one extra of the salsaver dae. I always want a little

(10:16):
extra of the green sauce. Iusually give them Miguel as my name,
as my nod to them, andI needed it. Total about everything that's
with Cilantro gold Cilantro is that onionI got no onion. Yeah, it
was so good. I'll see thescuttle butt. No kevo Today someone says

(10:46):
the red one is actually the leasthot. It is. The green one
will kick your bone like the greenones, because a nice tomatillo I love.
I don't know how they get thegreen one that hot. Now the
green one, there's a tomatillo green. But the ones that I find to
be the most authentic, it's likea creamy avocado. I actually like that.
Yeah, and it is hot asballs. You can put so little.

(11:09):
I put so little, and thatdoes add a lot. And the
red is the more of like achili based red chili salsa, so generally
speak rid the Mexican takoia, thered would be the mildest. I believe.
So multiple options they give the onesthat I've been to, and trust
me, it's been my mission tofind the taco as good as Lobbyan Ketta
and I until yesterday, woof,I've had no luck. Dam Taxco was

(11:33):
great. The new location on Fergusonand Island, get it. Love tacos.
I could eat them everywhere, somany boy they go nice with my
air fryer on the reheat. Thereheat for sure, I love them.
We were going to do this asSports of seven, but let's jam it
in here. This dude banned forlife by the NBA. You saw the

(11:56):
story first time? Really? Ohreally? Yep? So this, I
mean, this is pretty damn wild. An active player banned for life by
the National Basketball Association. He's aToronto Raptor, John Tae porter. Me
guess, let me guess why.Okay, gambling, Yes, okay,
theme of the day. Yeah,but it's sort of a can of worms

(12:22):
that I think we should talk about. And if this is I mean,
this is obviously not the first bettingscandal in sport. I mean that's been
going on for most of our lifetimes. Hell longer than our lifetimes with the
Black Sox scandal, you know.I mean, this is maybe a story
as old as time, but Ifeel like it's just gonna keep getting worse.

(12:43):
I mean, hell, it wasa month ago. The Shoheo Tani
thing, which is the most famousbaseball player on the planet, has been
embroiled in this sort of thing.But this is an active player that was
I've sort of proven to throw throwstats, if not throw games. And

(13:03):
it all ties into the daily fantasysports betting applications, which are now legal
in most states in the palm ofour hands in most states. And it's
not just betting the line. Aswe said, We're gonna bet the Mavericks
minus one, add the Clippers.I'm gonna do it legally. I'm going
to Las Vegas, but I couldlegally here bet John Tay Porter to have

(13:26):
over two and a half points inthis game, to have over four and
a half rebounds, to have underpoints, rebounds and assists combined under eleven
and a half. It all dependson what their season averages are. You
can bet almost any player what they'regonna do that night, and you have

(13:46):
just multiplied your opportunity for, youknow, to impact it with your decision
making on the court. Right,And this dude was straight up busted for
doing that. How did they findout? And how long have this instigation
been going on? I'll read achunk of this. The league investigation revealed

(14:07):
Porter had placed at least thirteen betson NBA games using an associate's online betting
account. The bets ranged from fifteendollars to twenty two thousand dollars totaling fifty
four grand according to the league.The NBA said the total payout from those
bets was seventy six thousand dollars,with a net winning of just under twenty
two thousand dollars. That's one ofthe angles because he didn't bet on games

(14:35):
that he played in in that particularcase, and he was parlaying things and
they did include a bet that theyhad the Raptors to lose, and all
three bets lost, So in thatportion of this case, that's not him
tanking personally, although there is astory about him telling people and there was
an abnormal number of bets on JohnTay Porter. What are we doing?

(14:56):
The guy averages three point eight pointsper game, and apparently these were popping
up on the daily fantasy sites andit's it's so easily traceable. They're like,
why why is our most bet NBAplayer Jontay Porter. That's a big
red flag. And then he playedin some games and left feeling ill stomach

(15:16):
issue to ensure that his numbers wouldcome in on the under. And it
just seems so easy to do.You wonder if you wanted to do it.
You wonder if there's some type ofI don't know, software developed to
flag an abnormal betting trends, orif it's somebody just you know, at

(15:39):
a computer going hmmm, you meannoticing that? Notice what flags these?
It's got to be some type ofsoftware this, yes, that, yeah,
I mean, hell on, Imean I use prize picks, I
play price picks, and I dobet individual performances in game. By the
way, they can't keep up withLuka daunts. His number will be like
fifty five, five and a halfpoints, rebounds and assists at it together

(16:02):
and he blows out the over almostalways. They're like, we don't know
how high to make it. Wecan't make it high enough. Let me
read you this. This is whatI kind of what I just said.
Sportsbooks reported a spike and betting intereston the under on several of Porter statistics.
Ahead of a January twenty six gameagainst the Clippers. Porter played just
four minutes before leaving the game withissues related to an eye injury suffered earlier
in the week against a Grizzly.He finished the game with no points,

(16:23):
three rebounds, and one assist,all under the line Sportsbook had set for
his statistics, So you don't haveto go and tank the game. You
just have to either leave the game, play poorly, yeah, not hit
the overs that you know are set. Do you have to actually be put
in the game for that to apply? I know Price Picks uses something called

(16:45):
a reboot. Yeah, so ifa player is injured, like one minute
into the game, they will kindof reboot their stats and essentially, if
you have like a five player parlay, they'll just make it a four player
parlay and just eliminate that play orfrom from the betting for that that parlay.
But I don't you know, Idon't think they rebooted that because he

(17:06):
played some I mean he had threerebounds. I bet his over under was
three or four rebounds, so hedid hit the under on those. Yeah.
His average is three point seven points, two point six rebounds, one
point six sists, so you knowhis unders came in for that. Okay,
so did did he Did he fessup to this? I don't think
so, but I think it wasso obvious. Well, they found the

(17:30):
paper trail that connected him to theactual bets being placed. I think that
led them to those actual bets.With a with a sports book that he
was involved with. I mean,for an NBA player, that seems like
a pretty paltry sum to justify,you know, doing going to going to
those links to to do something soshady. I agree. Twenty two.

(17:52):
I will say he is Johntay Porteris Michael Porter Junior's brother, and Michael
Porter Junior is a very good playerfor the Nuggets. Not implicating him in
any way, but I looked uphis career earnings. Jontay Porter was undrafted,
he played a couple of years forthe Grizzlies, and he was currently
with the the Raptors. Two pointthree million dollar career earnings. I mean,

(18:15):
this is a kind of a journeymanwho was making his way, and
two point three million dollars, Yes, to me, sounds like enough to
live on for the rest of mylife. It's not. It's not,
especially when you cut that in halfdue to tax as an agent. Yep.
Yeah, a million dollars twenty andyou're twenty two, twenty three years
old. You have to live reallycheaply. Yeah, I'm very modest,

(18:40):
I'll put it that way. Right, If you plan on never working again
and living off of a million dollars. A million dollars ain't what it was
hell twenty five years ago. Iagree, it's just not. Doesn't that
also mean that twenty five grand Ican make a little bonus tonight. I
guess that does make sense then.And there's more Johntay Porter's on that salary
front than there are, you know, Luka Dantrich's true, you know,

(19:04):
I mean, Luka Doncris doesn't needto take a game and make twenty grand,
and he wouldn't do it and probablywould report it if I would,
hope, I don't know, butthere's a lot of dudes like that with
very minuscule over under set and it'slike, you know, I can hit
you these under tonight in a gamein late January against the Clippers, and
it is ridiculous. Yeah, it'sinsanely ridiculous to bet on yourself, bet

(19:29):
on the sport at all, especiallyyour own team, and even more insane
as yourself. But you know,look, it's so normalized right now in
professional sports, which it was sotaboo for so long. Yeah, and
now you've got I don't know ifyou have arenas with the title sponsors that
are Draft Kings or Wild bets orwhatever's out there. But I mean,

(19:53):
I see graphics sponsored by them.I see this segment's brought to you by
name fill in the blank of somegambling outfit when they were I told you
when they were breaking the news ofOtani's interpreter and there was like a press
conference going on. The ticker onthe bottom was brought to you by Fan
Duel. It's just mismixed signals.And just like almost everything in our society,

(20:18):
the technology is moving faster than wereally understand how humanity can handle it.
I mean, it feels like ablink of an eye that I can
bet on my phone legally right nowin Texas on a lot of this stuff.
Not legally bet the MAVs minus wonthis Sunday, but I can absolutely
bet Corey Seeger is going to haveyou two and a half total bases and

(20:38):
Jack Lighter is going to have morethan four and a half strikeouts. I
don't know what the over under is. I can absolutely do. And then
we're at the point where you canbet in some places essentially play by play.
I mean you can bet in anNFL the result of this drive will
be a field goal three and ahalf points more over under three and a
half points, you know, andthey're inside the you're on the red zone.

(21:00):
She's like, all right, they'regonna score a touchdown, they're gonna
gike a field goal. Here.It's just so fast and you have young,
impressional people. Imagine if I wasin the NBA. We're friends,
We're not on the air. You'reyou're down on your luck. Yeah,
and you're like, dude, ifyou don't get four rebounds tonight, I
make ten thousand dollars. And I'mlike, man, I'm probably not even

(21:21):
to play tonight. I'll probably playa few minutes. Yeah, that should
work under for sure. And evenif I don't promise you anything and I
go and play, and I'm like, damn it, I could really help.
I got to do the rebounds wherethe fourth quarter I hurt. Remember
earlier in the week, right,I probably should come out or just fumble
a rebound. It's not insane,I know, to think of. You
know, when your buddies are involvedand they're not rich, especially if your

(21:45):
team isn't really relevant or the gamedoesn't matter. It's like, who is
this hurting in? It's late Januaryand you're in the fourth quarter of a
game. That's the Clippers that you'redown twenty five lifetime ban. Huh,
lifetime ban, which is easy toset an example or a player like that
too, Right, it seems likeit's always those guys are the ones that
get the severe punishments handed out.Yeah, yeah, maybe you're right,

(22:07):
and Otania, we're sending a message. Otani was uninvolved, though the interpreter's
cut exactly. Yeah. Yeah,it's a wow wile world we live in.
Boy, it is there you go. We're doing it right, We're
doing this now. Yeah, allright. We don't have our buddy Kevin.
Well, we do have a bunchof audio that you may have never

(22:30):
heard of our buddy Kevin just beingan idiot or being a genius. You
decide, were have some audio Bestof Kevin ninety seven in the Free