There was some controversy surrounding the first basket during Game 3 of the NBA Finals between the Golden State Warriors and the Boston Celtics.
The first basket has been a popular prop for bettors in the NBA Finals. Most bettors just bet a certain player to score the first basket. However, other bettors like to get cute and bet the type of basket, or a certain player to score a certain type of basket.
Those are the bettors who might be upset with Wednesday night’s ruling.
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Warriors forward Kevon Looney got the ball under the basket, made a few pivots and then turned toward the hoop and shot the ball one-handed into the basket.
Kevon Looney First Basket (+1300) 💰 pic.twitter.com/IuzhqEeb13
— NBABet (@nbabet) June 9, 2022
NBA officially ruled it as a layup.
A layup, as defined by dictionary.com, is “a shot with one hand from a point close to the basket, in which a player shoots the ball toward the basket, often off the backboard.”
Using that definition, Looney’s shot can be categorized as a layup.
People that bet “other” as the type of shot would make the argument that it is not a layup as a layup would have to go off the backboard. Others might say there has to be momentum going toward the hoop as well.
Looney did neither.
On FanDuel, Looney was +9500 to make the first basket in the “other” category. “Other” would classify as a shot that was not a layup, dunk, three-pointer or jump shot.
Looney by layup was +3200.
In Game 5 of the Western Conference Finals against the Dallas Mavericks, Looney scored a similar first basket that was ruled as “other”. He appears to be facing away from the basket and it looks more like a hook shot.
@nbastats if todays first basket was a layup, how could you possibly have considered this from the other night “Other”. I’ve been on the wrong side of both, and the inconsistency is awful. If my attached video was “Other” how could tonight not be other? Lots of ppl getting screw pic.twitter.com/3j9BT9rE6t
— Snoopy (@Snoopy778177) June 9, 2022
Box scores aren’t finalized until the end of the game and it will be interesting to see if they make any changes to this ruling.
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