Kevin Garnett Played in Alleged Rigged Poker Games; Not a Suspect
A bombshell indictment unsealed today alleging of a high-stakes poker cheating ring involving NBA players has captivated the sports and gambling worlds, but poker pro Matt Berkey may have blown the lid off the scandal two years ago.
Additionally, PokerNews has learned that NBA legend Kevin Garnett, who hasn't been accused of any wrongdoing, was among those in the game.
Federal officials on Thursday announced that former NBA star and current Portland Trail Blazers head coach Chauncey Billups and former NBA guard Damon Jones took part in a multi-year poker cheating ring that saw victims cheated out of at least $7,150,000.
Shortly after news of the indictment, a clip surfaced from an August 2023 episode of the now-defunct Only Friends Podcast where Berkey spoke about alleged cheating in a Los Angeles private game "built around Chauncey Billups" that made its way to Las Vegas around 2019.
The details of the game described by Berkey line up with those of a rigged game mentioned in the indictment that allegedly took place in Las Vegas around April 2019, where "several of the defendants ... defrauded Victims of at least $50,000."
Billups allegedly organized and participated in these games, according to the indictment, alongside co-defendants Eric Earnest, Jamie Gilet, Robert Stroud and Sophia Wei.
Two sources familiar with the 2019 games in Las Vegas told PokerNews that the games also included Kevin Garnett, who is not named in the indictment and hasn't been accused of any wrongdoing. The sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, did not play in the games themselves.
Garnett, aka "KG," is an NBA Hall of Famer, world champion with the Boston Celtics, and one of the all time greats, both with the Celtics and Minnesota Timberwolves. He was the 2003-2004 NBA Most Valuable Player with the T-Wolves, the team that drafted him out of high school in 1995. Garnett, according to our sources, is not suspected of partaking in any illegal activity, and is presumed to have been nothing more a regular player in the alleged rigged game.
Poker Pro Spoke About NBA Cheating Scandal in 2023
In the podcast, Berkey, a well-known high-stakes cash game pro, revealed he had been invited to the game but declined due to concerns about the game organizers. He said he had friends who played in the game in both LA and Vegas and "it obviously was for sure confirmed to be cheated."
"People who clearly didn't even understand the rules of no-limit Hold'em are just like jamming hundreds of big blinds in with like a gutty and then just drilling it," Berkey explained. "Only the pros are losing."
Berkey did not name the players who believed they had been cheated and didn't provide specifics on the alleged cheating methods.
Berkey quickly made the connection between Thursday's indictment and the game he described on the 2023 podcast episode.
"I've yet to see a home game that was beatable," the Las Vegas poker pro wrote on X alongside a clip of his podcast comments.
There were far bigger losses in the allegedly rigged games mentioned in the indictment, which are said to have involved elaborate cheating methods including rigged shuffling machines, signaling and poker chip tray analyzers that secretly read cards.
One victim, referred to in the indictment as "John Doe #1", is alleged to have been cheated out of $1.8 million in rigged games in New York City in June or July 2023.
According to FBI Director Kash Patel, the "wide-sweeping criminal enterprise," which also included a separate sports betting scheme, involved tens of millions of dollars of fraud, theft, and robbery. The 31 defendants face charges that include wire fraud, money laundering, extortion, robbery, and illegal gambling.
*Photos courtesy Wikimedia Commons
