Poker players love to make prop bets with each other. Some of these bets are poker related, others, well, not so much. There have been countless prop bets by poker players over the years and the partypoker blog presents some of our favourites to you below.
Antonio Esfandiari’s Lunge Bet
This bet by Antonio Esfandiari hit the headlines for all of the wrong reasons. After agreeing to a $50,000 prop bet with multi-millionaire businessman Bill Perkins that dictated that Esfandiari had to walk everywhere for 48-hours by lunging, Esfandiari made his way to the 2016 PCA where he competed in the $5,300 buy-in Main Event.
During one of the scheduled breaks, Esfandiari needed to visit the toilet, but the lunges had taken their toll on his legs and he was unable to walk. Roping in his father and a towel to shield himself from passers-by, Esfandiari urinated into a container while seated at the table. This was considered to be a “major breach of etiquette” and the two-time World Poker Tour and three-time WSOP bracelet winner was disqualified.
Esfandiari lunged out of the tournament area, later winning his bet and donating his winnings to charity as a form of apology for his shenanigans at the poker table.
Amarillo Slim’s Table Tennis Bets
The late “Amarillo Slim” was known for extravagant prop bets including riding a camel through a casino, taking on a horse in a 100 yard race and winning (he chose a 50 yard track and by the time the horse had slowed and turned around Slim had won!), hitting a golf ball longer than one mile (he used a frozen lake), but among our favourite Slim bets involve ping pong.
Slim bet Bobby Riggs, a former world number one tennis player, that he could beat him at ping-pong so long as Slim could choose what were used as bats. Months of practice later, Slim beat Riggs with them both using iron skillets to play with! A Taiwanese ping-pong champion fell victim to Slim at a later day when Slim opted to use Coca-Cola bottles!
Brian Zembic’s Boobs Bet
We said there were some weird and wonderful prop bets over the years and here is one of them. In 1996, Brian Zembic was offered $100,000 if he underwent surgery and had breast implants and keep them for one year. Zembic eventually had breast augmentation surgery and awoke with 38C breasts, which he still had in 2013 stating he’d grown fond of them, plus Zembic claimed in a television interview that he receives an additional $10,000 per year that he has them, and that he’s afraid of how his chest would look if he removed them.
Don’t forget that the $5.50 buy-in $10,000 Jab, $22 buy-in $20,000 guaranteed Contender, the $109 buy-in $50,000 Uppercut, and the $109 buy-in $150,000 guaranteed Main Event are all freezeout tournaments and not re-entry until January 24!
Phil Ivey Vegetarian Bet; Howard Lederer Burger Bet
During an episode of High Stakes Poker, Phil Ivey accepted a $1 million bet by Tom “durrrr” Dwan that Ivey would become a vegetarian for one year. Initially, Ivey wanted to bet $5 million, but this was too much for Dwan to accept.
Dwan had no need to worry about having to pay Ivey anything because after only 20-days, Ivey bought out of the bet for $150,000!
In another food-related bet, David Grey offered Howard Lederer, a vegetarian, $10,000 to eat a cheeseburger. Lederer ate the burger and took Grey’s money before offering Grey the chance to win his $10,000 back by eating some olives, which Grey hated. Amazingly, Grey turned down the bet and Lederer kept the $10,000.
Ashton Griffin’s 70-Mile Run in 24-hours
One February morning in 2011, Ashton Griffin insisted that he could run 70-miles in 24-hours and began looking for betting action. He eventually found some by laying odds of 5:1 and took almost $300,000 worth of bets.
Griffin inexplicably chose to start the running bet after a long night on the tiles, starting it at 12:30 in the afternoon. He had to maintain a specific running speed, but was allowed to take as many breaks as he wished.
Despite fears for his health and his parents driving to try and end the bet, Griffin powered through and completed the challenge with 45 minutes to spare.
Huck Seed’s Many Bets
Huck Seed is no stranger to prop betting and has been involved in many high-profile bets over the years.
One involved Seed not shaving for one year, which he seemed to be sailing through until there was an unexpected death in his family and he had to shave for the funeral. Another saw Seed win $10,000 from Howard Lederer that he couldn’t perform a standing backflip and learn to do so within 48-hours. Despite being six-feet seven-inches tall, Seed manage to do standing backflip after enrolling the help of his former acrobat uncle!
Other Seed bets include running a marathon with no prior training, running a mile in less than 4:39, but one of our favourites was him betting with Phil Hellmuth that he could stand up to his neck in water for 24-hours for $50,000. Seed put on a wetsuit, headed into the Pacific Ocean, but gave up after three hours and bought out of the bet.
What is your favourite prop bet story?
There are dozens of prop bet stories out there that we’ve not covered, what is your favourite? Let us know in the comments box below.
Keep up to date with all things partypoker!
Get all the latest partypoker updates from your favourite social media outlets. You can Follow us on Twitter and Like us on Facebook
