Malik Beasley’s Career Went From Buckets To Bankruptcy And Watching It Happen Is Just Sad

I don’t know if there is a further cliff for NBA veteran Malik Beasley to have fallen from. At one point, he was looking at a three-year contract for $42 million, and now, after a gambling scandal, he’s begun selling signed jerseys on TikTok, and he has no one to blame but himself. 

But it doesn’t make it any less sad. 

I don’t care if an athlete wants to sell their memorabilia. Plenty of former athletes make money off their playing careers long after the final buzzer sounds. But there is something depressing about watching a man who was recently one of the most coveted shooters in the NBA reduced to hawking the physical evidence of a career he may never get to enjoy again. It’s like watching somebody’s personal tragedy become everybody else’s entertainment.

And I know, I know. He did this to himself.

But damn.

Beasley, 29, was supposed to be getting paid. Not just getting paid, but getting PAID. After a breakout 2024-25 season with the Detroit Pistons, in which he averaged 16.3 points per game and knocked down an NBA-record 319 three-pointers, Beasley was positioned to cash in during free agency.

He finished second in Sixth Man of the Year voting and established himself as exactly the kind of player NBA teams spend millions trying to find: a reliable shooter who could change an offense’s dynamics without having the ball in his hands every possession. And that career was only going up. Shooters have long lives in the NBA. 

It’s gone from a dunking league to a shooter’s paradise, and Beasley was a shooting star. Detroit reportedly offered him a three-year, $42 million contract, but that deal disappeared as the federal gambling investigation surrounding him intensified. He has not played in the NBA since the 2024-25 season.

Instead of preparing for another NBA season, Beasley is preparing to enter a guilty plea in a federal gambling case. Prosecutors allege that Beasley was drowning in gambling debt and that he participated in a scheme to manipulate his stats during Milwaukee Bucks games in 2024 so that associates could profit from wagers on his player props. 

The allegation is that Beasley would underperform or overperform based on the bet that was placed. So if the line was for Beasley to score 15 points, Beasley’s associates could place large amounts of money on the shooting guard to underperform, and Beasley would subsequently have an off-night. 

Beasley initially pleaded not guilty, but he probably watched the same footage that we all saw; the compiled game tape by Twitter users that showed Beasley going wild to get four rebounds when the line was set at 3.5, and he has since agreed to a plea deal. His hearing is scheduled for December 9. And while no one knows what his ultimate sentence will be, the possibility of prison is very real.

If he did what they say he did, then he’s got to be punished, but watching Beasley’s downfall unfold has become something beyond accountability. It is beginning to feel like a humiliation ritual. The latest installment came when Beasley appeared on TikTok Live selling, or offering to sell, his autographed, game-worn jerseys. Let that sit with you. At one point, an excited Beasley can be heard telling the chat, “that’s two galaxies,” which in TikTok-speak is about $30 bucks.

A man who reportedly earned nearly $60 million playing professional basketball is now on social media trying to move jerseys from the very career that he seemingly gambled away. And he’s excited about $30 bucks. 

And the internet, naturally, had jokes.

There were comments about how broke he must be, how stupid he was to throw away millions and how he should have known better. Some people seemed genuinely entertained by the spectacle.

But what exactly are we enjoying here?

Beasley is not some 65-year-old former athlete who has had decades to adjust to life after basketball. He is 29 years old. Twenty-nine! He should be entering what would ordinarily be the prime of his professional career, not trying to figure out how to monetize its remnants.

There is a larger conversation here about gambling addiction, the explosion of sports betting and the industry that has made wagering on virtually every movement an athlete makes a normal part of watching basketball.

None of that makes anything right. But it is worth remembering that prosecutors have alleged he accumulated millions in gambling losses before becoming involved in the alleged scheme. There is a human being underneath the indictment, and whatever accountability looks like, it should not require us to pretend that his circumstances aren’t tragic.

We have become so accustomed to watching athletes make millions that we sometimes forget how quickly a career, a reputation and a life can unravel. One minute you’re draining threes in front of thousands of screaming fans, and the next you’re signing jerseys on TikTok while strangers debate whether you have enough money left to feed yourself.

There is a lesson in Beasley’s story, certainly. There are consequences to decisions, and being exceptionally talented does not make you exceptionally immune to them. But there is also something deeply uncomfortable about the public’s appetite for watching somebody fall from grace. We don’t just want people held accountable anymore. Sometimes we want them embarrassed. We want the mugshot, the court appearance, the bankruptcy rumors, and apparently the TikTok Live.

We want to see the fall, and then we want to make sure the person falling knows we’re watching. Malik Beasley may have squandered an extraordinary opportunity. He may have to answer for it in a federal courtroom. He may never play another NBA game.

Maybe Beasley deserves every consequence coming his way. But watching a 29-year-old former NBA player get excited about making $30 selling pieces of the career he threw away isn’t a victory for anybody. 

It’s just sad.

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