Malik Beasley moves toward a guilty plea in the federal NBA gambling case

Former NBA guard Malik Beasley is negotiating a plea agreement with federal prosecutors in the gambling case built on his own stat lines, his attorney confirmed to ESPN on Saturday.

What is on the record: an overnight notice on the court docket indicated Beasley intends to plead guilty, and late Friday the judge asked a federal magistrate in Brooklyn to schedule a hearing for him to change his plea. Beasley pleaded not guilty to all counts when he was first charged.

What is still open: attorney Steve Haney told ESPN that Beasley has not signed a deal and that a decision is expected early this week.

The case

Prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York say Beasley, 29, manipulated his statistics in at least four games during the 2023-24 season with the Milwaukee Bucks so gamblers could bet on his performances. According to the indictment, his co-defendants picked games that would not be on national TV, and Beasley decided whether to go over or under on his scoring and rebounding. The indictment also says he had piled up "multimillion-dollar gambling losses" despite earning tens of millions of dollars in his career.

He faces counts of bribery in sporting contests, wire fraud conspiracy, honest services wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy.

The co-defendants are folding too

Beasley is not the only one changing course. The judge filed the same kind of order Friday for co-defendant Ernesto Plascencia, whose attorney said Saturday he will plead guilty. William Brown already pleaded guilty this month, and bettor Robert Gorodetsky is scheduled to formally plead guilty on Nov. 20. Former NBA player Ed Davis and his former agent, Paolo Zamorano, have pleaded not guilty.

The RANT take

Beasley played for six NBA teams over nine seasons. If he pleads guilty, it would mean a player admitting in federal court that he shaded his own box scores for bettors, in games the league never put on national TV. That is the scenario every prop market depends on never happening.

Watch the docket early this week for the hearing date, and for whether Davis and Zamorano are the last two still fighting the charges.