While North America’s major professional sports leagues made a habit of avoiding even tenuous connections to gambling for decades, that’s changed in recent years. As a sign of how much things have changed, the NBA’s Houston Rockets used the team’s official Twitter/X account on Friday to promote a potential in-game prop bet.
“Jalen Green will attempt 5 threes this game,” the Rockets tweeted ahead of Friday’s game against the Denver Nuggets. The tweet was not a statement, but a poll question with two possible answers — “Over” and “Under.” And as if asking a question about an over/under didn’t make it clear enough that it was a reference to gambling, the tweet mentioned Draft Kings.
The team would later delete the tweet, but not before it got a lot of interaction on the social media platform.
In a since-deleted tweet from the team's official Twitter/X account, the Houston Rockets asked whether Jalen Green would attempt more or less than five three-pointers in Saturday's game, mentioning Draft Kings in the tweet. pic.twitter.com/zbJPqpP2el
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) November 25, 2023
To be clear, this tweet alone is not evidence of something nefarious. In fact, it would be absolutely stunning if this was anything more than a tweet that incorporated a business partner, something teams and leagues do a lot of.
The problem, though, is that the optics are bad. It would be a little more justifiable if the over/under was on how many three-pointers Green would make. But how many he’d just attempt is something that can easily be manipulated. Even if there’s nothing shady going on, someone who bet the over/under couldn’t exactly be blamed for thinking otherwise, especially if Green ended up with four, five or six attempts (he ultimately finished with eight).
