Why?
That’s my reaction to federal allegations that Chauncey Billups participated in rigged high-stakes poker games.
Why would Denver’s most decorated homegrown basketball star—one who topped $100 million in pro career earnings—involve himself in a scheme operated by some of the biggest crime families in America?
Why would the federal government arrest him and accuse him as they have unless they have the goods?
Billups played 17 seasons in the National Basketball Association, for seven teams, including Detroit and the Nuggets twice each.
Drafted third overall by the Boston Celtics in 1997, he has played on an NBA champion—Detroit in 2004, when he was named the Finals most valuable player and earned the nickname “Mr. Big Shot” for his clutch play—scored 15,802 points in his illustrious career, and is in the Basketball Hall of Fame.
At George Washington High School, he was a four-time first-team all-state player and three-time Colorado Mr. Basketball.
He chose the University of Colorado over storied Kansas and several other Division One programs, and in his second and final season in Boulder led the Buffs to their first NCAA Tournament appearance in 28 years. They upset Indiana, 80-62, with Billups scoring 24 points in 32 minutes, before losing to North Carolina.
He’s had not one, but two uniform numbers retired at two levels, No. 4 at CU and No. 1 in Detroit.
His net worth is estimated be at least $35 million and likely is more, including an opulent 15,000-square-foot residence in Greenwood Village which he used as collateral for his $5 million bail in the pending federal case.
He was among 30 former pro athletes and nefarious associates of the Lucchese, Gambino, Genovese and Bonanno mob families arrested last October. He has been charged with money laundering and wire fraud.
Investigators claim the group organized rigged high-stakes poker games in Las Vegas, Miami and New York locations, enticing victims with the prospect of playing alongside former elite athletes, such as Billups.
They allege that the games were rigged using hidden technology, such as contact lenses and glasses designed to read marked cards, altered shuffling machines and an X-ray table.
(One of those indicted was a central figure in the earlier gambling scandal that resulted in former University of Denver and Toronto Raptors player Jontay Porter, brother of former Nugget Michael Porter Jr., being barred for life from the NBA in 2004.)
A second, 23-page indictment refers to a party whose anonymous description seems to refer to Billups, accusing him of feeding gamblers inside information about a Portland Trailblazers game on which an informed bettor, allegedly relying on that information, won a $100,000 wager.
“Let’s not mince words,” FBI Director Kash Patel said last October when the charges were announced, “this is the insider trading saga of the NBA. That’s what this is.”
Billups and all other defendants in the government’s case appeared before federal judge Ramon Reyes in a Brooklyn federal court last week to learn that the judge was setting a November 2 trial date.
Prosecutors told the court they were anticipating extending plea offers to 12 defendants and were negotiating possible deals with nine others. But they did not name any.
In the meantime, Billups is free on that $5 million bond, though his travel is limited to Colorado, California, Maryland, Minnesota, Oregon, New York City and Washington, DC.
Head coach of the Portland Trailblazers since 2021, he’s been suspended without pay by the NBA since charges were filed.
So, I ask again, why?
Why would someone with a net worth in the millions and an NBA coaching gig that pays additional millions yearly, be attracted to a rigged card game as the “celebrity” whose role was to attract high-rollers to the game?
Do the competitive juices continue flowing in elite athletes after retirement to such an extent that they can’t resist new challenges?
Is no amount of money irresistible, regardless of how it’s gained and how much you already have?
Or is it a horrible mistake?
Longtime NBA player and coach Tyronn Lue, who is Billups’ closest friend, finds it unbelievable.
“It’s hard to process,” Lue has told ESPN. “I believe in Chauncey’s character. I know who he is as a person. I’ve been with him since I was 17 years old.”
Larry Brown, who preceded Doug Moe as head coach of the Nuggets (when Billups was an infant) and later coached Billups in Detroit, including that NBA championship, also is vocally in his former star’s corner.
“He would be one of the last people I would think about involving himself with bad people,” Brown has said.
“If you talked to anybody that was involved with Chauncey, that spent time with him and knew him, knew his kids, I think they’d say the same thing.”
Billups has pled not guilty and hasn’t been convicted of anything yet.
The feds could be making a huge mistake, yet the evidence they’ve presented to support a 22-page indictment looks compelling.
In a brief submitted at the most recent hearing before judge Reyes, prosecutors said their evidence—to mention only some—includes more than 100,000 pages of financial records, and telephone records, more than 800 pages of photographs, and body-worn camera footage.
They refer to Billups as “a member of the cheating team” and produced text messages involving Billups that discussed intentionally losing occasionally to avoid suspicion of cheating.
Prosecutors contend that Billups knew the signals the “cheating team” used to cheat and followed them.
Billups’ attorney, Chris Heywood, has defiantly challenged the government’s allegations.
“Anyone who knows Chauncey Billups knows he is a man of integrity,” he said in a statement to ESPN. “Men of integrity do not cheat and defraud others.
“To believe that Chauncey Billups did what the federal government is accusing him of is to believe that he would risk his Hall-of-Fame legacy, his reputation and his freedom.
“He would not jeopardize those things for anything, let alone a card game.”
And, in fact, there does not appear to be a smoking gun with Billups’ name literally on it among the thousands of text messages the government has amassed in support of its charges.
All the more reason that, until Billups’ fate is resolved, the question remains—larger than ever:
Why?
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Denny Dressman writes a weekly sports column for The Villager. You can write to Denny at dennydressman@comcast.net.