Ship it to Matt and Jamie Staples! The brothers earned $150,000 for winning a wild proposition wager with Bill Perkins. A year ago, Perkins offered the Staples brothers 50-1 odds on a $3,000 bet that Matt and Jamie could not weigh within a single pound of each other. The oversized Jamie and undersized Matt were 170+ pounds apart and accepted the wager. The brothers worked on their bodies for a full year. Matt added 50+ pounds, while Jamie dropped 117 pounds. At the weigh in on Sunday in Reno, bother brothers weighed the same... 188.3 pounds.
What a difference a year makes. The Staples brothers shipped a dual prop bet in the most unusual way with one brother gaining weight while the other dropping it. The Staples brothers, Matt and Jamie, had a specific goal to weigh within a single pound of each other. If they could achieve that feat, which was considered a 50 to 1 shot by professional prop bet monger Bill Perkins, then they would walk away $150,000 richer. The Staples brothers only had to lay $1,500 each on the line to win the wager, but they had one crazy year trying to win it. The only problem was the massive differential between the brothers, with one seriously overweight and the other seriously underweight.
Last year, poker pro Jamie Staples topped 300 pounds, while his brother Matt was barely 135 pounds soaking wet. They were 170 pounds apart when they accepted the ager, which seemed insane, but they figured out a target weight and went for it. Both brothers adhered to a detailed food and workout regime with experts in nutrition and exercise. However, it all came down to discipline and execution. There's one thing I've learned... if a poker pro is determined to win a prop bet, they'll legit risk their lives to win a buck. Shedding pounds is a good thing, but extreme weight loss can put you at a health risk if you're not getting the proper diet.
On Sunday, the Staples brothers had their weigh in live via Jamie's popular Twitch channel. The finale was hosted at Peppermill Casino in Reno, Nevada during the popular Run It Up Reno event. Special guest judge Jeff Gross supervised the weigh in. Jamie dropped 117 pounds overall, while Matt added 53 pounds. They had only one pound of wiggle room, but it was not necessary. Both brothers weighed in the same amount of 188.3 pounds. Perkins coughed up $150,000, but it was money well spent.
Bill Perkins likes to make people squirm. He's not afraid to put his money where his mouth is. The energy trader and crypto sage turned high-stakes poker pro has been giving and getting insane action in the poker community for the last few years. As the adage goes, "You gotta give action to get action." And boy of boy, that Bill Perkins loves to give action. He'll gladly get involved in redonkulous wagers and pay out extreme amounts almost put of personal amusement. Perkins only lost money, while his opponents often torture themselves. Just ask Dan Bilzerian and Brian Rast. And of course, the Staples brothers will also back that up.
If you're not familiar with the name Bill Perkins, I'm sure you're heard of some of the crazy wagers he bankrolled. Remember when Dan Bilzerian tried to ride a bicycle thru the desert from Las Vegas to Los Angeles for $300K? Yeah, Bilzerian won that dangerous, hellacious prop bet against Bill Perkins. To prove it was no fluke, Brian Rast took a shot as well while jacked up on Vicodin to dull the excruciating pain.
Exactly one year and a day ago, Bill Perkins and Jamie Staples agreed upon a weight loss wager. Staples admittedly struggled with his weight over the years. The famous Twitch personality sought a financial incentive to force him to shed the pounds. But this one wager had a caveat... his brother, a much leaner member of the Staples clan, had to add pounds. Over 50. Yikes. It's one thing to go on a crash diet and shed 100 pounds in a year, but it's difficult to put on tons of weight. That's the sort of craziness only Hollywood stars and method actors undertake for a role of a lifetime.
Everyone knows the story behind Robert DeNiro's rollercoaster weight during the filming of Raging Bull in 1980. It's the most notable because DeNiro was the first one to do it and achieve a bunch of fanfare about his commitment to the role. DeNiro portrayed Jake LaMotta at constasting time in his career and needed to add/drop weight for those specific timelines in Martin Scorsese's classic film. DeNiro needed to look lean and mean for the ring scenes, but also needed to add 60 pounds to portray a self-destructive man whose physical appearance had been weathered through the decades during a post-fighting life of sloth and gluttony. As the legend goes, Scorsese shut down production of the film for a couple of months while DeNiro went to Italy and crushed nonstop pasta.
Since Raging Bull, there's no shortage of thespians who starved themselves and pigged out including Charlize Theron, Rene Zellweger, George Clooney, Hillary Swank, Matt Damon, Matthew McConaughey, and Jared Leto. Oh and how could we forget about Batman?! Christian Bale, who has been notorious about his contrasting physical choices in roles. But it's not all donuts, pizza, and milkshakes. In some instances, they're gaining weight and muscle to play athletes or superheroes so a lot of their off-screen regime also included twice-a-day workouts.
Poker pros have been gambling about their weight since the first degens gathered to roll the bones in ancient times. At the 2007 WSOP, Mike Matusow and Ted Forrest settled up their first weight loss wager. Matusow had to drop 54 pounds in a year to win $100,000... and he pulled it off with vinegar and cayenne pepper. Barely. Matusow looked like a tweaker version of himself. He sounded as loud and boisterous as ever, but he was 54 pounds lighter and go from 235 to 181. And yes, the two had to have a provision in which they could not amputate any limbs, nor could he get special surgery.
A couple years later, the two were at it again for $2 million. That time, Forrest had 2.5 months to lose 45 pounds... and he pulled it off. Of course, there's still an issue whether or not the pro bet was paid out. Degens being degens.
And here's some Phish with appropriate music...
