Return of the Mack

The Houston Astros host the Philadelphia Phillies in Game 1 of the World Series tonight. And nobody's paying more attention than furniture mogul Jim McIngvale, aka 'Mattress Mack,' who’s on the verge of the largest win in legal sports betting history ($75 million).

🛏️💰 More details… Mattress Mack owns the Gallery Furniture chain in Houston, TX. And just like his favorite team, the Astros, the mattress mogul is known for taking swings – but in the gambling sense. He previously wagered a record $16.2 million on the Cincinnati Bengals to win this year’s Super Bowl (they lost), dropped $6+ million on Alabama to win the 2022 CFB National Championship (they didn’t), and bet $13 million on the Astros to win the World Series in 2019 (they – you guessed it – also lost).

• Over the past five months, Mack has wagered a total of $10 million on the Astros to win the World Series across several bets, with odds ranging from 10-to-1 to 5-to-1, per the Houston Chronicle.

🎰 Behind the bets: Losing $10 million won’t make or break it for Mack – and the $75 million he stands to win wouldn’t be all profit. The businessman is famous for holding generous in-store promotions tied to the results of local sports franchises, which he hedges against with massive sports bets. So regardless of the final result, he always comes out on top (in theory, at least).

• Before the Astros made it to the World Series and the promotion was cut off, Mack had guaranteed that any customer who spent $3,000+ on certain mattresses would receive double their money back if the Astros won the whole shebang – $6,000+ in total.

👀 Looking ahead… Game 1 starts tonight at 8:03 pm ET.

+In the know: A historic bet isn’t the only thing riding on this series. Over the past century, every Phillies World Series victory has been immediately followed by a US economic crisis (1929, 1980, 2008).