Shaquille O'Neal Blasts NBA Coach and Players for Alleged Involvement in Gambling Scheme: 'I'm Ashamed' Anna Lazarus CaplanOctober 25, 2025 at 12:28 AM 3 Ayisha Collins/Getty; Steph Chambers/Getty; Issac Baldizon/NBAE via Getty Shaquille O'Neal, Chauncey Billups, Terry Rozier Shaq is speaking out ab...
- - Shaquille O'Neal Blasts NBA Coach and Players for Alleged Involvement in Gambling Scheme: 'I'm Ashamed'
Anna Lazarus CaplanOctober 25, 2025 at 12:28 AM
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Ayisha Collins/Getty; Steph Chambers/Getty; Issac Baldizon/NBAE via Getty
Shaquille O'Neal, Chauncey Billups, Terry Rozier -
Shaq is speaking out about the arrests of Portland Trail Blazers coach Chauncey Billups, Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier and former NBA player and coach Damon Jones
The Inside the NBA star said he was "ashamed that those guys would put their families and their careers in jeopardy"
Shaq said he knew Billups and Jones "very well," and that he once played with Jones, an NBA journeyman who was in the league for 11 seasons
Shaquille O'Neal is speaking out following the arrests of NBA head coach Chauncey Billups, Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier and former NBA player and coach Damon Jones — and he says he's "ashamed" of what they've allegedly done.
While on ESPN's Inside the NBA on Thursday, Oct. 23, the retired NBA great, 53, didn't hold back about the shocking arrests of the trio, who were among 31 defendants indicted in a massive sports gambling and betting ring with ties to the Mafia.
"We all know the letter of the law when it comes to gambling and sports gambling and I don't want to sit up here like I'm some perfect guy," O'Neal said told host Ernie Johnson and analysts Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley. "Every now and then, when I go to Vegas, I'll play some craps and I'll play some roulette but I never gambled at anyone's house. Don't know anything about poker."
O'Neal continued that he knew Billups and Jones — the latter of whom he played with — "very" well, and that he is "ashamed that those guys would put their families and their careers in jeopardy."
"There's an old saying in the 'hood: 'All money ain't good money,' " the former Los Angeles Lakers star said. "So if you're making $9 million … like, how much more do you need? Especially if you know you get caught, you could do jail time, lose your career, put a bad image on yourself, your family or on the NBA."
Rocky Widner/NBAE via Getty; Melissa Tamez/Icon Sportswire via Getty
Chauncey Billups, Terry Rozier
O'Neal concluded: "They dropped the ball."
Billups, 49, was arrested early Thursday, hours after his team, the Portland Trail Blazers, took on the Minnesota Timberwolves in the season-opener. Rozier, a reserve guard on the Heat, was arrested at his hotel in Orlando, where he was in town for the season-opener against the Magic.
The indictments against 31 defendants in two major cases, announced on Thursday morning, involve fraud, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York Joseph Nocella Jr. said.
"One involves sports betting and the other involves illegal gambling," Nocella Jr. said. "The first indictment involves six defendants who are alleged to have participated, one of the most brazen sports corruption schemes since online sports betting became widely legalized in the United States. This scheme is an insider sports betting conspiracy that exploited confidential information about National Basketball Association athletes and teams."
Jones, 49, and Rozier, 31, were indicted for alleged charges related to sports betting, while Billups and Jones were alleged to have participated in "a nationwide scheme to rig illegal poker games," Nocella Jr. said.
Defendants "used high-tech cheating technology to steal millions of dollars from victims in underground poker games that were secretly fixed," and the games were backed by at least three New York Mafia families, he claimed.
Meanwhile, the Trail Blazers are set to play for the first time since Billups' arrest on Friday night against the Golden State Warriors. Assistant coach Tiago Splitter has been named interim coach.
League officials suspended Billups and Rozier, a reserve guard not in the Heat's rotation, late on Thursday.
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Source: "AOL Sports"
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