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Jontay Porter ( ; born November 15, 1999) is an American professional basketball player who last played for the Toronto Raptors of the National Basketball Association (NBA), on a two-way contract with the Raptors 905 of the NBA G League. He played college basketball for the Missouri Tigers where he played alongside his older brother, Michael Porter Jr. He was awarded as the Southeastern Conference Sixth Man of the Year during his freshman season. He was an early entrant in the 2019 NBA draft but went unselected.
Porter started his professional career in 2020 on a two-way contract with the Memphis Grizzlies and spent time with their NBA G League affiliate Memphis Hustle. He sat out the 2021β22 season after he was waived by Memphis. Porter joined the Wisconsin Herd of the G League for the 2022β23 season. After starting the 2023β24 season with the G League's Motor City Cruise, Porter was signed by the Toronto Raptors on a two-way contract with the Raptors 905.
In 2024, Porter was banned for life by the NBA for violating their gambling policies while playing for the Toronto Raptors. The scandal resulted in him facing criminal charges.
Porter was previously a recruit under the Class of 2018, with him being ranked as high as 11th overall by ESPN at one point. However, after his father was hired as an assistant coach for the University of Missouri, his older brother changed his commitment from the University of Washington to his hometown University of Missouri, and Brandon Roy changed coaching positions from Nathan Hale to Garfield High School, Jontay reclassified himself into the Class of 2017 alongside his brother, joining his family out at the University of Missouri. Between his time preparing for his transfer from high school into college, Porter grew two more inches, thus allowing him to play as a power forward, with center being a viable possibility as well.
On October 21, 2018, it was announced that Porter would miss his sophomore season after tearing both the ACL and MCL in his right knee during a scrimmage. While rehabilitating, Porter tore his ACL again on March 23, 2019. Despite the injury and Porter's stock plummeting, Porter entered his name for the 2019 NBA draft as one of 233 early-entrant participants. Porter was also one of 66 original participants included in the 2019 NBA Draft Combine. 89 players removed their names from draft consideration at the May 30 deadline, but Porter chose to remain eligible in the 2019 NBA draft's entry pool. After his injuries, Porter was seen as a late first round or second round pick.
It subsequently emerged that Porter was finding it difficult to service significant gambling debts. His right knee had never fully recovered from the severe injury he'd suffered at Missouri, making it harder for him to catch on in the NBA. Soon after arriving in Toronto, he used a friend's phone to secretly bet on NBA games; while he netted modest profits, they were still not enough to pay off his earlier debts. By the winter of 2024, he had amassed a particularly large debt to Brooklyn gambler Ammar Awawdeh; according to a post-mortem by Toronto Life, the debt was large enough that Awawdeh could potentially "end (Porter's) career in an instant." Using this leverage, Awadeh pressed Porter into performing a number of "specials" for Awawdeh and four of his friendsβLong Phi "Bruce" Pham, Shane Hennen, Timothy McCormack, and Mahmoud Mollah. Porter took part in a scheme to help Awawdeh and his friends win proposition bets tied to Porter's performance. Awawdeh and his co-conspirators would bet that Porter would fall short of certain benchmarks. Porter then feigned injury to leave games early, ensuring the bets would hit.
The scheme came unraveled during the Raptors' March 20 game against the Sacramento Kings. Porter actually bet that his own team would lose that game. In furtherance of this scheme, according to the NBA, Porter gave confidential information about his health before the game to someone he knew to be a gambler. Specifically, he told Awawdeh, Pham, and Mollah in a secret Telegram channel that he intended to feign illness again. He'd laid the groundwork for doing so the previous week by complaining about food poisoning. While at the Resorts Casino Hotel in Atlantic City with Awawdeh, McCormack, and Pham, Mollah then used his account with DraftKings' sportsbook at the casino to wager $80,000 on a Parlay that Porter would not meet certain player statistics β an under bet β which would have won $1.1 million. Porter, Awawdeh, Pham, and Mollah would have each received 24 percent of the proceeds had the bet hit, while McCormack would have gotten the rest. Porter's behavior drew notice once he removed himself from the game due to illness. The size of the bet was highly irregular given Porter's relatively low stature. The low odds also helped raise suspicion. After an independent monitor flagged the bet, DraftKings not only refused to pay out, but froze Mollah's account. Internal investigations by FanDuel and DraftKings revealed other suspicious bets Mollah placed on Porter's performance, including a January 26 game against the Los Angeles Clippers in which Porter feigned an eye injury. It was the largest payout of the night, as was the March 20 game. DraftKings and FanDuel reported their findings to the NBA and the International Betting Integrity Association. The Federal Bureau of Investigation was called in as well. In its investigation, the NBA also found that between January and March 2024 Porter had placed 13 bets on NBA games using another person's account. Some of the wagers included parlay bets involving the Raptors losing. His wagers totaled $54,000 over that period, netting over $22,000 in winnings. The NBA accused him of "disclosing confidential information to sports bettors, limiting his own participation in one or more games for betting purposes, and betting on NBA games".
On April 17, Porter was banned for life from further play or any other involvement in the NBA and its associated leagues. He became the first active player to be banned for gambling since Jack Molinas in 1954, as well as the first active player to be permanently banned from the NBA without any means to return since Richard Dumas in 1996. On June 4, 2024, Pham was arrested at JFK International Airport while attempting to flee the country. McCormack, Mollad, and Awawdeh were subsequently taken into custody as well. On July 3, Porter was also charged with a federal felony in relation to the case involving those four men. On July 3, 2024, court papers were made public revealing Porter's imminent criminal charges in the United States at the federal level for his role in the sports betting scandal. Porter is also undergoing a criminal investigation in Canada. In the federal case on July 10, Porter would plead guilty to a charge of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, which could impose a range of no time in prison to up to 20 years in prison for what he did, but faces a most likely time of 41 to 51 months in prison. One of the conditions related to his guilty plea was to forfeit his passport for a pre-sentence release, which forbade him to play overseas for the Promitheas Patras B.C. of the Greek Basketball League. The NBA would also implement what is called the "Jontay Porter Rule" following his ban, which forbade sportsbooks from including unders on player props who are on either or 10-day contracts.
Porter and his wife had their first child in November 2024.
| align="left" | 905
| 5 || 5 || 27.0 || .607 || .682 || 1.000 || 9.2 || 4.0 || 1.4 || 2.4 || 18.8
|-
| style="text-align:center;" colspan="2"| Career
| 30 || 23 || 29.2 || .475 || .395 || .727 || 9.5 || 2.7 || .7 || 2.1 || 15.5
Personal life
In addition to his older brother Michael Porter Jr. with the Brooklyn Nets, Jontay has two older sisters, Bri and Cierra, both of whom were deemed medically retired from playing sports, both due to multiple leg injuries. Cierra Porter later returned for her senior year at the University of Missouri. Two of Porter's younger brothers, Coban and Jevon, played collegiate basketball as well, with Coban previously playing for the University of Denver and Jevon currently playing for Loyola Marymount University after previously going to Pepperdine University until early 2024.
Career statistics
NBA
|-
| style="text-align:left;"|2020β21
| style="text-align:left;"|Memphis
| 11 || 0 || 4.9 || .533 || .375 || .600 || 1.3 || .1 || .3 || .1 || 2.0
|-
| style="text-align:left;"|2023β24
| style="text-align:left;"|Toronto
| 26 || 5 || 13.8 || .385 || .333 || .833 || 3.2 || 2.3 || .8 || .8 || 4.4
|- class="sortbottom"
| style="text-align:center;" colspan="2"|Career
| 37 || 5 || 11.2 || .403 || .338 || .783 || 2.6 || 1.6 || .6 || .6 || 3.7
NBA G League
Source
Showcase Cup
|-
| align="left" | 2022β23
| align="left" | Wisconsin Herd
| 15 || 8 || 27.0 || .442 || .411 || .714 || 8.5 || 2.4 || .5 || 1.5 || 13.5
|-
| align="left" rowspan=2| 2023β24
| align="left" | Motor City
| 10 || 10 || 33.7 || .456 || .277 || .667 || 11.1 || 2.5 || .8 || 2.8 || 16.8
|-
Regular season
|-
| align="left" | 2020β21
| align="left" | Memphis Hustle
| 9 || 0 || 16.8 || .342 || .184 || .556 || 4.7 || 1.2 || .9 || 1.2 || 7.4
|-
| align="left" | 2022β23
| align="left" | Wisconsin Herd
| 17 || 13 || 29.4 || .353 || .287 || .600 || 11.4 || 3.4 || .9 || 2.6 || 11.5
|-
| align="left" | 2023β24
| align="left" | 905
| 7 || 7 || 30.3 || .344 || .298 || .636 || 10.9 || 6.0 || 1.4 || 2.6 || 13.1
|-
| style="text-align:center;" colspan="2"| Career
| 33 || 20 || 26.1 || .348 || .270 || .600 || 9.5 || 3.5 || 1.0 || 2.3 || 10.7
College
|-
| style="text-align:left;"|2017β18
| style="text-align:left;"|Missouri
| 33 || 7 || 24.5 || .437 || .364 || .750 || 6.8 || 2.2 || .8 || 1.7 || 9.9
See also
External links
Categories: 1999 Births, Living People, 21st-century African-american Sportsmen, 21st-century American Sportsmen, American Expatriate Basketball People In Canada, American Men's Basketball Players, Banned Nba Players, Basketball Players From Missouri, Basketball Players From Seattle, Centers, Memphis Grizzlies Players, Memphis Hustle Players, Missouri Tigers Men's Basketball Players, Motor City Cruise Players, Nba Controversies, Power Forwards, Raptors 905 Players, Sports Betting Scandals, Sportspeople Banned For Life, Sportspeople From Columbia, Missouri, Sportspeople Involved In Betting Scandals, Toronto Raptors Players, Undrafted Nba Players, Wisconsin Herd Players
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