Latest news with #HazanSports
New York Times
03-07-2025
- Business
- New York Times
Malik Beasley facing complaint from former agency amid gambling investigation
By Mike Vorkunov, Jon Krawczynski and James Edwards III On the day Malik Beasley helped the Detroit Pistons shock the New York Knicks to win Game 2 of their first-round series, he also learned about the latest legal issue in his life. A process server found him at the Ritz-Carlton in downtown Manhattan and hand-delivered a lawsuit from his former agency, Hazan Sports, which claimed Beasley had breached a marketing deal with the company and fired it as his representation two months earlier. Hazan Sports had sued him for more than $2.5 million in response. Advertisement Lawsuits and liens have trailed Beasley since he entered the league in 2016, and he has drawn concerns from at least one team about his off-court life. Now, he faces even more scrutiny. Beasley is a person of interest in a gambling investigation out of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York, his attorney, Steve Haney, confirmed to The Athletic over the weekend. No charges or formal allegations have been filed against him. 'This is simply an investigation,' Haney said. 'At this point, Malik has not been charged with any crime and there has been no formal accusation of wrongdoing. Hopefully, everyone will afford him that same presumption of innocence that everyone else deserves.' The investigation into Beasley came at what should have been a moment of triumph for him. After playing for five teams over his last four seasons, he was set to cash in this month following a strong campaign with the Detroit Pistons, where he averaged 16.3 points per game and made a career-high 41.6 percent of his 3s. The Pistons had been in talks with Beasley and his agent leading up to June 30's official start of free agency, and were prepared to offer him a three-year, $42 million contract that included a team option for the last year, according to two sources briefed on the negotiations. But the NBA reached out to the club several days before free agency began and let it know about the federal investigation involving Beasley. The Pistons quickly pivoted away and are now unlikely to sign him. A league spokesman did not respond to a question about whether the NBA had also investigated Beasley. The NBA has previously said it is cooperating with the federal investigation. The contract would have been a windfall, although Beasley has already made nearly $60 million over his nine seasons in the NBA, including $6 million with Detroit this past season. But he has a line of creditors who have taken to courts to try to recoup the money they believe they were owed. He has been sued at least five times over the last eight years, according to available public records, and has more than a dozen different liens filed against him. The Detroit News previously reported on some of the lawsuits and liens. Advertisement Hazan Sports sued him to recover the $625,000 it said it paid him in November 2023, when Beasley signed on as a client. In 2018, he was sued for $1,990 in past due rent. In 2021, he was sued for $2,000 for not paying homeowners association fees for a home he owned in Georgia. Beasley was sued last September in Milwaukee civil court by a dental company for $34,389.70 and for $26,826.76 by a barber. He played the 2023-24 season for the Milwaukee Bucks. Both cases appear to have been resolved after a default judgement against him in January, according to court records, with Beasley paying both in full. Those lawsuits were just some of the off-court issues Beasley faced even before he arrived in Minnesota. In September 2020, before his first training camp with the Timberwolves following being traded by the Denver Nuggets, Beasley was arrested in suburban Minneapolis after pointing a gun at a family that parked their car outside his house while on a tour of homes in the neighborhood. When police arrived to arrest him, they found marijuana in his home. Beasley was charged with marijuana possession and making threats of violence. Despite the serious, unresolved legal issues, Beasley signed a four-year, $60 million contract extension with the Wolves in November 2020. There were concerns inside the organization, a source who worked for the team at the time told The Athletic, about what that kind of wealth would mean for a player who, they believed, had a volatile life off the court. Gersson Rosas, the then president of basketball operations, felt that the Wolves could provide Beasley with the support and stability to help him work through his issues, team sources said. Beasley had a 1-year-old son at the time, and there were hopes that Beasley would mature with the show of faith from the organization. Advertisement 'We want to understand what's going on, and we want Malik to be not only the best player but the best person he can be,' Rosas said at the time. 'And we're all working through this together.' Beasley eventually pleaded guilty to threats of violence. The drug charges were dropped and he had to spend much of the summer of 2021 in the Hennepin County Workhouse as punishment. He was traded to Utah the next summer as part of a deal for Rudy Gobert, but the Wolves also continued to have reservations about trusting him to keep his life off the court on the straight and narrow, a team source said. The pattern of legal concerns for Beasley, both significant and small, unfortunately continued. When he signed a contract with Aliya Capital Partners to borrow money from its sports finance fund in August 2024, he pledged his current and future NBA contracts, as well as the money he would make as part of the NBA and NBPA's group licensing deal with NBA2K, among his pieces of collateral, according to a financing statement form filed in Florida. That was not the first time Beasley seems to have put himself in debt. According to a filing with the California Secretary of State, a June 2023 financing agreement with the Aliya Sports Finance Fund gave the company a 'second position lien on all of Debtor's future interest in the National Basketball Association or any other professional basketball league, Uniform Player Contract between Malik Beasley and Minnesota Timberwolves Basketball Limited Partnership or any other club following the current contract signed with the Minnesota Timberwolves Basketball Limited Partnership on November 25th, 2020.' In 2021, Beasley had taken on a $4.53 million loan with South River Capital that charged him 12 percent interest per year on the amount and a 10 percent late charge on the amount due if he did not pay on time, according to a copy of the promissory note obtained by The Athletic. Eleven months later, South River Capital filed a lawsuit in a Baltimore County court to recoup the money and asked for another $1.3 million in attorney's fees, late fees and interest payments. The court ruled Beasley owed South River Capital that amount. The company then sued him in a Minnesota county court, while he was still with the Minnesota Timberwolves, to try to retrieve its payment. Beasley, according to a court filing, paid $1.13 million of it in next year, the prior judgement was vacated following a request by South River Capital 'per agreement of the parties.' Advertisement Aliya Capital Partners and South River Capital did not respond to emails for this story. Beasley is currently being sued for $7,355 by the owners of an apartment building in downtown Detroit. The suit was filed last month after a previous lawsuit for $14,150 was dropped in March. It is set for a hearing later this month. Hazan Sports' lawsuit against Beasley is also now in flux. A lawyer for the agency told a federal judge last month that he was holding off on filing for default judgment because the agents and Beasley were now in negotiations, but needed to get through the NBA's offseason. 'The timing of when a settlement can be executed amongst the parties is predicated upon the defendant's financial liquidity,' the lawyer wrote in a letter to the judge. 'Which is directly related to the commencement of the National Basketball Association's free agency period which does not begin until July 6th.'
Daily Mail
03-07-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
NBA free agent Malik Beasley faced lawsuits over alleged debt before federal gambling probe, court docs reveal
Already under federal investigation over gambling allegations, NBA free agent Malik Beasley is also being sued by his former agency, a landlord, a lender and a celebrity barber, according to court documents and a new report by The Detroit News. In what The News described Tuesday as '$8 million worth of financial problems,' alleged financial mismanagement has reportedly left Beasley in serious debt despite signing $59 million worth of NBA contracts over his career. Beasley was considering a three-year $42 million deal to return to the Detroit Pistons when the team pulled the offer amid the federal probe, according to the Detroit News. Daily Mail has reached out to team spokespeople for confirmation. He was sued on April 18 by his former agency, Hazan Sports Management Group, for allegedly breaching a marketing contract, according to court files obtained by Daily Mail. The agency claims it negotiated a $6 million deal for Beasley with the Pistons in the summer of 2024 before being fired and replaced with Seros Partners despite a four-year exclusive marketing agreement. Neither Hazan Sports nor Seros Partners responded to Daily Mail's request for comment on Wednesday evening. The lawsuit was previously reported by The Athletic but has resurfaced this week amid reports of the federal gambling probe into Beasley, who has not been charged in the case. He does face other lawsuits, however. As first reported by The News, Beasley lost a $5.8 million judgement to a lender in 2022. It remains unclear why Beasley needed the money. The News also uncovered a financing statement in which Beasley pledged his current and future NBA earnings to a Florida Firm in order to obtain a loan. Previously, he was sued by his downtown Detroit landlord for allegedly failing to pay $7,355 in back rent, according to The News, which also reports that a Milwaukee barber won $26,827 judgment against Beasley in January. That same month, Beasley lost a $34,390 default judgment to a Minnesota dentist. Court records from February show Beasley was having some paychecks garnished to pay the dentist. The debt remains outstanding, according to court records reviewed by Daily Mail. Beasley does not have an attorney listed for each case. However, he is represented in the gambling probe by criminal defense lawyer Steve Haney, who did speak with The News. 'I have been with Malik for a long time, I have seen a lot of people around him come and go, but I have stayed away from any of his financial management or mismanagement or decisions he would make with money,' Haney told The News. 'I'm his lawyer. I don't get involved in his finances,' he continued. 'You hope to get them around the best business people and planners and management people. Sometimes they do and sometimes they don't.' As for Beasley's borrowing history, Haney did not see it as unusual. 'It is very common for professional athletes to go to third-party lenders and get advances on contracts,' he said. 'It's a part of the business of professional sports. Many of these lenders are predatory and charge extremely high interest rates and outrageous fees that border on usury.' News of the investigation into Beasley comes just four months after his model wife Montana Yao filed for separation, and is just the latest in a series of off-field scandals. The split from his wife came four years after he was caught having an affair with Scottie Pippen's ex-wife, Larsa. Beasley and Yao ultimately reunited after he publicly apologized on social media, but she has since filed for separation, citing 'irreconcilable differences,' according to court documents obtained by The couple shares two children, but Daily Mail learned he moved on to a new lover: Instagram model and gamer Natalia Garibotto. The Pistons guard appeared to confirm as much on X earlier this year, describing a bikini-clad Garibotto as 'La mine' on the social media platform. He's also had other legal issues in the past, including an arrest on firearm and drug charges that resulted in a 78-day stint in a Minnesota jail. The incident took place in September of 2020, when Beasley was still playing for the Timberwolves. During a 'Parade of Homes' tour through his Plymouth, Minnesota neighborhood, an unidentified couple and their 13-year-old child inadvertently pulled up to a roped-off property being rented by Beasley. As they decided to look for another home to view, a man matching Beasley's description allegedly tapped a gun against their car window and told them to get off his property. As they drove off, the couple claimed, they could see Beasley pointing his gun at them. The couple then called 9-1-1. If Beasley is having financial issues, he's not showing it on Instagram, where he and his rumored girlfriend Natalia Garibotto have been seen galivanting on pristine beaches Police arrived at Beasley's rental, where they found 835 grams (1.8 pounds) of marijuana, a 12-gauge shotgun, a handgun, and an automatic rifle, which matched the description of the one he allegedly pointed at the family as they drove away. The search warrant for the surveillance cameras revealed that Beasley was seen retrieving the gun from the garage and returning it to a mudroom closet around the time of the alleged incident. Furthermore, the couple was able to identify both Beasley and the gun, according to police. A 28-year-old from Atlanta, Beasley is a nine-year NBA veteran who has just finished his first season with the Pistons. The former Florida State guard made $6 million this year and has career earnings approaching $60 million. He could still attract NBA teams despite his legal and financial issues. Beasley is coming off his best season as a pro after hitting an impressive 41.6 percent of his 3-point attempts as one of the premiere sixth men in the league.
Yahoo
02-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
NBA's Malik Beasley sued for $2.25M by sports agency for breach of contract, alleged unpaid loan amid federal gambling probe
Free agent NBA guard Malik Beasley, who is the subject of a federal gambling investigation, has also been sued by a sports agency he employed for alleged breach of contract. The lawsuit was filed by Hazan Sports Management Group. Per the lawsuit obtained by Michigan Live and ESPN, Beasley has failed to repay Hazan Sports in full a cash advance of $650,000. The lawsuit seeks $2.25 million in damages and legal fees from Beasley. Advertisement Hazan Sports claims that it has tried to recoup the $650,000 since Beasley terminated his contract with the agency on Feb. 27. Per the lawsuit, the agency has seen "little more than drips and drabs of sporadic payments and vague promises to repay the balance over time." The lawsuit claims that in signing Beasley, Hazan Sports "elected to take a chance and make a substantial investment of time, effort, and resources in a player with known issues (including and especially financial issues)." The lawsuit was filed in April but has resurfaced in the wake of a federal gambling probe into Beasley that was reported on June 29. Per ESPN, "at least one prominent US sportsbook noticed unusual betting patterns on Malik Beasley prop bets beginning in January 2024." Beasley's $42M contract talks on hold due to gambling probe The gambling probe was reported on the eve of the start of NBA free agency. Beasley played last season on a one-year, $6 million contract with the Pistons and was set to become a free agent. Advertisement Per ESPN, Beasley was in discussions with the Pistons on a three-year, $42 million contract. Those discussions were placed on hold after news of the gambling probe broke, according to ESPN. Beasley remains without a new contract. On June 11, an attorney for Hazan Sports requested to extend the lawsuit to allow the parties to work on a settlement in anticipation of Beasley signing a new contract, according to ESPN. From ESPN: A potential deal was predicated on Beasley's financial liquidity, "which is directly related to the commencement of the National Basketball Association's ("NBA") free agency period," the attorney wrote. Beasley, who played for the Detroit Pistons last season, was playing for the Milwaukee Bucks at the time that the alleged unusual betting patterns on his performance were flagged. Beasley has not been charged with a crime, per Beasley's attorney Steve Haney. "An investigation is not a charge," Haney told ESPN. "Malik is afforded the same right of the presumption of innocence as anyone else under the U.S. constitution. As of now, he has not been charged with anything.' Advertisement Beasley has not directly addressed the gambling investigation or the lawsuit with media. The NBA addressed the investigation in a statement. 'We are cooperating with the federal prosecutors' investigation," NBA spokesperson Mike Bass said in a statement. Malik Beasley is the subject of a federal gambling probe and a civil lawsuit seeking $2.25 million. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, file) (ASSOCIATED PRESS) The lawsuit also accuses Beasley of breaching exclusivity provisions in his contract with Hazan Sports by hiring a new marketing agent 15 months after it was signed in November 2023. Per Spotrac, Beasley has career earnings of $59.5 million over the course of his nine-season NBA career. Beasley is not the first NBA player to be subject to a gambling investigation. Former Toronto Raptors reserve Jontay Porter received a lifetime ban from the NBA in 2024 after a league investigation determined that he "violated league rules by disclosing confidential information to sports bettors, limiting his own participation in one or more games for betting purposes, and betting on NBA games."
Associated Press
01-07-2025
- Sport
- Associated Press
NBA free agent Malik Beasley sued by former agency along with being under gambling investigation
NEW YORK (AP) — NBA free agent Malik Beasley, who is under a federal investigation regarding gambling allegations, is the defendant in a lawsuit filed by his former agency. New York-based Hazan Sports Management Group sued Beasley in U.S. District Court for breaching a marketing contract on April 18, a day before he and the Detroit Pistons opened a first-round series in New York against the Knicks. ESPN was the first to report Tuesday on the lawsuit. Hazan Sports negotiated a $6 million, one-year contract for Beasley with the Pistons last summer. The shooting guard fired the agency in April and hired Seros Partners, according to the lawsuit, despite a four-year exclusive marketing agreement. The agency is asking for $1 million in damages, plus a $650,000 advance it gave him along with commissions and expenses owed, according to the lawsuit. Both sides are working on a settlement, according to a June 11 filing. A message seeking comment was left with the agency. Beasley's attorney is not mentioned in the filings. His representative, Steve Haney, in the federal investigation said Tuesday he is not a part of the lawsuit. The U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York is investigating Beasley regarding gambling allegations tied to league games. 'In 23 years of practicing law, I've had numerous clients federally investigated who have never been charged,' Haney said. 'Hope people keep that in mind and reserve judgement.' The probe into Beasley comes 14 months after the NBA banned Toronto's Jontay Porter, who was linked to a prop bet investigation and eventually pleaded guilty to committing wire fraud. This past season, The Wall Street Journal was first to report that Terry Rozier — then of the Charlotte Hornets — was under investigation for activity related to unusual betting patterns surrounding him in a March 2023 game. Rozier, now of the Miami Heat, has not been charged with any crime, nor has he faced any sanction from the NBA. Porter's ban came after a similar investigation into his performance and 'prop bets' — wages where bettors can choose whether a player will reach a certain statistical standard or not during a game. The Porter investigation started once the league learned from 'licensed sports betting operators and an organization that monitors legal betting markets' about unusual gambling patterns surrounding Porter's performance in a game on March 20, 2024, against Sacramento. The league determined that Porter gave a bettor information about his own health status prior to that game and said that another individual — known to be an NBA bettor — placed an $80,000 bet that Porter would not hit the numbers set for him in parlays through an online sports book. That bet would have won $1.1 million. Beasley signed last year with the Pistons, taking a one-year contract for $6 million in the hopes of cashing in this summer as a free agent. He made a single-season, franchise-record 319 3-pointers in the regular season. He helped Detroit make the playoffs for the first time since 2019 and end an NBA-record 15-game postseason losing streak in the first round against the New York Knicks. Beasley averaged 16.3 points last season and has averaged 11.7 points over his career with Denver, Minnesota, Utah, the Los Angeles Lakers, Milwaukee and Detroit. He scored a career-high 19.6 points a game during the 2020-21 season with the Timberwolves. The Atlanta native played at Florida State and the Nuggets drafted him No. 19 overall in 2016. ___ AP Basketball Writer Tim Reynolds contributed to this report. ___ AP NBA:
Yahoo
01-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
NBA's Malik Beasley sued for $2.25M by sports agency for breach of contract, alleged unpaid loan amid federal gambling probe
Free-agent NBA guard Malik Beasley, who is the subject of a federal gambling investigation, has also been sued by a sports agency that he employed for alleged breach of contract. The lawsuit was filed by Hazan Sports Management Group. Per the lawsuit obtained by Michigan Live and ESPN, Beasley has failed to repay Hazan Sports in full a cash advance of $650,000. The lawsuit seeks $2.25 million in damages and legal fees from Beasley. Advertisement Hazan Sports claims that it has tried to recoup the $650,000 since Beasley terminated his contract with the agency on Feb. 27. Per the lawsuit, the agency has seen "little more than drips and drabs of sporadic payments and vague promises to repay the balance over time." The lawsuit claims that in signing Beasley, Hazan Sports "elected to take a chance and make a substantial investment of time, effort, and resources in a player with known issues (including and especially financial issues)." The lawsuit was filed in April but has resurfaced in the wake of a federal gambling probe into Beasley that was reported on June 29. Per ESPN, "at least one prominent US sportsbook noticed unusual betting patterns on Malik Beasley prop bets beginning in January 2024." Beasley's $42M contract talks on hold due to gambling probe The gambling probe was reported on the eve of the start of NBA free agency. Beasley played last season on a one-year, $6 million contract with the Pistons and was set to become a free agent. Advertisement Per ESPN, Beasley was in discussions with the Pistons on a three-year, $42 million contract. Those discussions were placed on hold after news of the gambling probe broke, according to ESPN. Beasley remains without a new contract. On June 11, an attorney for Hazan Sports requested to extend the lawsuit to allow the parties to work on a settlement in anticipation of Beasley signing a new contract, according to ESPN. From ESPN: A potential deal was predicated on Beasley's financial liquidity, "which is directly related to the commencement of the National Basketball Association's ("NBA") free agency period," the attorney wrote. Beasley, who played for the Detroit Pistons last season, was playing for the Milwaukee Bucks at the time that the alleged unusual betting patterns on his performance were flagged. Beasley has not been charged with a crime, per Beasley's attorney Steve Haney. "An investigation is not a charge," Haney told ESPN. "Malik is afforded the same right of the presumption of innocence as anyone else under the U.S. constitution. As of now, he has not been charged with anything.' Advertisement Beasley has not directly addressed the gambling investigation or the lawsuit with media. The NBA addressed the investigation in a statement. 'We are cooperating with the federal prosecutors' investigation," NBA spokesperson Mike Bass said in a statement. Malik Beasley is the subject of a federal gambling probe and a civil lawsuit seeking $2.25 million. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, file) (ASSOCIATED PRESS) The lawsuit also accuses Beasley of breaching exclusivity provisions in his contract with Hazan Sports by hiring a new marketing agent 15 months after it was signed in November 2023. Per Spotrac, Beasley has career earnings of $59.5 million over the course of his nine-season NBA career. Beasley is not the first NBA player to be subject to a gambling investigation. Former Toronto Raptors reserve Jontay Porter received a lifetime ban from the NBA in 2024 after a league investigation determined that he "violated league rules by disclosing confidential information to sports bettors, limiting his own participation in one or more games for betting purposes, and betting on NBA games.
