You’re a young man, in need of adventure, bored of the drudgery of everyday life in
your small town.
You need a change, but you don’t have the cash to put change into effect.
You know what you have to do, and that’s take a huge risk.
You sell everything you own, your car, your electronic goods, your beloved bicycle, even
your clothes.
You then empty your bank accounts and buy a ticket to the gambling mecca of Las Vegas.
In your pocket is the cash equivalent to everything you own: $135,300.
You head to the roulette wheel and stack your cash on red.
The wheel turns, the ball is put into action, and for a few seconds you consider the future,
your hands trembling, your heart skipping beats.
The ball stops with a clunk.
It’s red…
And what we’ve just told you is a true story.
The English Risk Taker That story is the tale of a man called Ashley
Revell, a man from Maidstone in England who sold all his possessions when he was 32 to
make that bet in the U.S.
It’s said he also raised cash from auctions and sales, so he wasn’t exactly rolling
in dough when he made that life-changing bet in 2004.
In fact, when a UK online gambling company heard about what he was going to do they even
gave him some cash.
Because of this the man legally changed his name to “Ashley Blue Square Revell.”
Before his bet he said, “I really want to put that bet on, and just get that rush and
see how I’m going to feel and how I’m going to handle it, and if I lose how I’m
going to handle that.”
It’s said he walked out of the casino with his $270,600, and afterwards he told the media,
“That was the most amazing experience I have ever had in my entire life.”
With his cash he decided to buy a motorbike and travel across Europe, and on that trip
he met his wife-to-be.
They had two kids together and Revell later started a company.
His win has inspired game shows and has become a legendary story among gamblers.
This is a feelgood story, but you’ll see gambling has a very dark side.
The Eternal Gambler This man may not have laid down the biggest
bet but his name has gone down in gambling history and he claims to have bet more money
in casinos than anyone else in history.
His name is Archie Karas and he has a pretty wild story.
In 1992 he drove to Las Vegas with just $50 in his pocket.
There’s not much you can do with that, but he managed to get $10,000 from a friend as
a loan.
He made good on his word to pay the money back, beating 15 of the best poker players
in the world in a competition.
We should say here that he had made a lot of money in the past and was well known in
the poker community, but he really was down to his last $50 before he borrowed that cash.
It’s a long story, but he kept on gambling over the coming days and weeks.
He kept on winning, playing various casino games, and this now is known as “The Run.”
At the end of this run he had a whopping $40 million.
That’s $50 to $10,000 to 40 mil.
But as often happens with the eternal gambler, he lost it all.
Then he made a few million back again, and then lost it all again.
This is what he once said about his chosen way of life:
“You've got to understand something.
Money means nothing to me.
I don't value it.
I've had all the material things I could ever want.
Everything.
The things I want, money can't buy: health, freedom, love, happiness.
I don't care about money, so I have no fear.
I don't care if I lose it.”
The Coin Toss This is the story of a man called Kerry Packer,
who was before his death at one point the richest man in Australia.
He was well known for his gambling proclivities and would at times lose many millions or win
many millions in a matter of days in UK and US casinos.
In 1999 he lost around $20 million in casinos in London in a matter of weeks, and also in
the 90s he walked into a London casino with $20 million and played four roulette wheels.
He lost everything that day.
But his biggest bet, if you can call it that, was going up against another man.
As the story goes, Packer was playing poker in the Stratosphere Casino in Las Vegas with
a well known Texan player.
Packer was said to have an explosive temper, and the Texan didn’t much like him.
It’s said the Texan was also miffed that Packer didn’t know who he was after he had
asked him to get into a poker match with him.
That Texan guy apparently said, “I'm worth $60,000,000!” Packer’s response was, “Heads
or tails, I’ll toss you for it.”
As the legend goes, the Texan man wasn’t willing to bet his fortune on a coin toss.
Money Mayweather We all know that one of the best boxers that
ever lived Floyd Mayweather is not shy about showing how much cash he has earned throughout
his career.
It was reported in 2013 that the boxer made a huge bet in $5.9 million on the basketball
game between the Miami Heat and the Indiana Pacers.
He bet on the Heat.
His team won by 99-76.
The odds were in his favor, but he still made around 500,000 in profit from the bet.
He’s never admitted to making the bet, but one Vegas gambling man who knows what goes
on in Vegas tweeted, “Good source from my HeavyHitters Vegas crew alerted me that Floyd
Mayweather has laid over $5,900,000 on Heat -7 tonight in Vegas.”
Better X Now we have a sports fan who goes by the name
of Better X.
It seems no one knows his real name.
It’s said this guy, or girl, made $25 million in recent years after betting on the Houston
Astros and Philadelphia Eagles.
But early in 2019 he took a hit after putting millions on the Los Angeles Rams.
ESPN wrote that he made three big bets and in total lost $3.8 million.
Still, with his recent winning streak he’s got $20 million in the bank that he didn’t
have.
The questions is, how long can he keep that?
Nick the Greek The man known as Nick the Greek, real name
Nicholas Andreas Dandolos, was another high roller that has gone down in gambling history.
From January 1949 to May 1949 he played a two-man poker match against another legend
called Johnny Moss.
At the end of the match the Greek man was down severely and it’s said he uttered the
words, “Mr. Moss, I have to let you go.”
We don’t know exactly how much he lost going against Moss, but some reports state it was
as much as four million dollars.
In 1949 that was a lot of money, and if you convert that into today’s money it’s over
$21 million.
That’s some loss.
The Underdog This was by no means the biggest bet ever
made but we are including it because it’s such a cool story.
It’s about a British soccer team (football to the Brits) called Leicester City.
This team was a massive underdog and no one in the world thought they could win the Premier
League.
It’s difficult to explain if you don’t know your soccer, but just imagine a lower
rung team from any sport, that you know certainly don’t have a chance of beating the big teams.
In British soccer, the good teams almost always seem to win the league.
But not this year.
At the start of the season the odds for Leicester winning the title were 5000/1.
That’s how bad the team was.
But some people did make a small bet, and we are talking about a fistful of pounds.
The thing was, as the team were on their winning streak, betting companies gave the gamblers
the option to cash out.
Some took that option and took home a handsome $100,000 from a very small bet.
But others stayed in, believing their team would win the title.
It’s said one gambler won $250,000, but he put his money on when the odds were 2000/1.
With Leister winning, the bookmakers took a huge loss that year to the tune of around
$30 million.
Go Dodgers This is said to be one of the biggest sporting
bets in history.
The gambler became known as the “Let it Ride” better.
All we know about the man is that he was younger than 30 at the time he made the bet and of
Eastern European decent.
USA Today reported in 2017 that this man started betting on World Series games in baseball,
but he let the bet ride, which meant when he won game one he put all the money on game
two.
If he won game two, he put all his cash on game three.
He kept winning, and by the time he had won game 6 he had amassed a massive $14 million.
But to get that he had to risk $8 million, on which he bet that the Dodgers would win.
Think about if he had bet wrong on that last game!
USA Today writes that the man was even thinking about betting his 14 million on game 7, but
he backed out.
According to some sources, he is known in Las Vegas for betting heavily and has placed
very large bets on UFC fights in the past.
Some people think he doesn’t even exist and is actually a betting syndicate.
The Phantom Gambler The man known as the Phantom Gambler, sometimes
“The Suitcase Man” was really called William Lee Bergstrom.
He died in 1985, but before his death he became known as the biggest gambler that ever lived.
As the story goes, he made some cash in real estate and then in 1980 he turned up in Las
Vegas ready to bet a lot of money.
He went to Binion's Horseshoe Casino with a suitcase full of cash to the amount of $777,000.
That’s almost $2.5 million in today’s money.
He was also carrying a second suitcase which was empty, so he obviously thought he was
going to win.
What most people don’t know is he had borrowed half the cash and told the casino owner that
if he didn’t win he would take his own life.
This was some bet, a mortal risk.
At the time the casino had a policy to accept any bet, and on this day that policy would
be its ruin.
Bergstrom put all of the cash, and we mean every dollar, on the roll of a dice in a craps
game.
He won and he doubled his cash to around $1.5 million (5 million today) and as the tale
goes he drove off into the sunset.
The next day the LA Times printed the headline, “Mystery Man Wins Fortune.”
The paper interviewed the casino owner who said, “He was cool.
He really had a lot of gamble in him.”
It would be a long time before the Phantom would turn up again.
But he did go back to Vegas and the year was 1984.
Again he had a suitcase full of cash but this time $538,000.
On this occasion the shooter rolled a seven, and that was a loss for Bergstrom.
There was an eerie calm before Bergstrom went and ate some enchiladas.
A few days later he tried to kill himself but failed.
His father tried to counsel his son back to good mental health, but his depression and
addiction were seemingly irrevocable.
Bergstrom went missing one day and his father called the casino bosses and told them not
to take bets from his son.
Bergstrom had actually gone to Vegas with forged cash, but that didn’t work out for
him.
On February 4th, 1985, he was found dead in a hotel room after consuming a large number
of pills.
He was just 33-years old.
What’s the biggest bet you’ve ever made?
Think you have the nerve to bet big and potentially lose everything?
Let us know in the comments!
Also, be sure to check out our other video Why Winning The Lottery Is The Worst Thing
That Can Happen To You.
Thanks for watching, and as always, don’t forget to like, share and subscribe.
See you next time.