Jim “Mattress Mack” McIngvale, the owner of the Houston furniture store, known for making huge sports bets, placed the highest bet on the Super Bowl LV to date – $ 3.46 million on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers subdog +3 ,5.
McIngvale flew to Colorado Springs on Wednesday, connected to the DraftKings mobile betting app at the airport and placed one of the biggest bets ever on the Super Bowl. After paying a little extra juice (-127) to get Bucs to +3.5, McIngvale would earn $ 2.72 million if Tampa Bay covers the spread.
“Tampa Bay is loaded with talent on both sides of the ball and is led by the greatest football player of all time in Tom Brady, so I bet on the Bucs, who overcame tough games this postseason,” McIngvale said. in a release from DraftKings.
McIngvale routinely uses the betting market to mitigate the risk of sales promotions at his Gallery Furniture store. He had more than $ 11 million at stake in the 2019 World Series between the Houston Astros and the Washington Nationals, including a $ 3.5 million futures bet on the Astros that he placed with DraftKings in Biloxi, Mississippi.
The Astros came up short, losing to the national team in seven games.
“Mack has been an excellent customer and is someone we have a history with, after taking his considerable bet on the World Series a few seasons ago,” Johnny Avello, director of sports books at DraftKings, said in a statement.
This year, customers at Gallery Furniture who spend $ 3,000 or more on a new mattress will get their money back if the buccaneers defeat the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday.
The two biggest bets reported so far in the Super Bowl were both on the Bucs. In addition to McIngvale’s $ 3.46 million bet, a bet with BetMGM in Nevada placed a $ 2.3 million bet on Tampa Bay last week.
The biggest bet ever reported to the Super Bowl, in terms of risk, is believed to be a $ 4.8 million line bet on the Rams to beat the Patriots in Super Bowl XXXVL which was placed at MGM in Las Vegas in 2002. Patriots upset the Aries 20-17.
Despite the two million bucks bets on the Bucs in this year’s Super Bowl, most of the action was on the favored bosses. As of Wednesday at William Hill’s U.S. sports books, 82 percent of the money that had been wagered on the Super Bowl point spread was in Kansas City.