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David Purdum
It’s easy to say now as the year has passed, but looking ahead to 2025, some of the betting decisions were, perhaps… miscalculated.
some examples:
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Last offseason, DraftKings reported $25,000 in bets las vegas raiders At 100-1 to win the Super Bowl. will attack Fall Very Small To win the Super Bowl.
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102 entries in Circa Survivor, a high-stakes NFL Survivor competition run by Las Vegas casinos, failed to submit their picks by this season’s weekly deadline and were eliminated. The contest had a $1,000 buy-in and a prize pool of $18.7 million.
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Prediction Market Kalshi notes that one of its clients invested $183,954 in social-media-influencer-boxer Jake Paul active, will defeat two-time heavyweight champion Anthony JoshuaPaul was hospitalized with a broken jaw due to Joshua’s devastating right hand in his knockout victory, Live and learn, right?
This year was not at all bad for gamblers. There were few betting success stories, leading sportsbook executives to complain to shareholders about “customer-friendly outcomes” or to appeal to gambling regulators to allow them to outlaw angle-shooting parlays altogether. Despite these setbacks, the betting business is expected to survive in the new year.
As we reflect on the year in betting, we wish you less miscalculations in 2026.
The wildest bets of 2025
9 January: A bettor at DraftKings placed a 50-cent, 19-leg college basketball parlay at odds of +43,473,946. All 19 teams covered the spread; 17 of them were from smaller conferences, including Stetson, Jacksonville and IU Indianapolis.
The 50-cent parlay won $217,370.23.
28 January: A bettor placed a $1,000 bet on DraftKings Indiana Hoosiers quarterback Fernando Mendoza At 100-1 odds to win the Heisman Trophy. Eleven months later in December, Mendoza was awarded the Heisman, resulting in a net $100,000 win.
February 9: philadelphia eagles blew up kansas city chiefs in Super Bowl LIX 40–22. BetMGM customers lost more money on the Super Bowl than any other sport in 2025, the sportsbook reports.
21st April: At the beginning of the MLB season, sportsbooks began to see an unusual increase in home run bets on Wednesday mornings. bets were not on aaron judge Or shohei ohtanithey were on Nick CastellanosA journeyman outfielder for philadelphia phillies and the subject of an Internet meme that gave him a reputation for returning home on big news days.
BetMGM’s Helver Egeland recalled, “We started looking around to see what was happening and we saw that the Pope had died.”
Egeland said BetMGM rarely earns enough leverage on home run props to adjust the odds, but they did that day, reducing Castellanos’ price from +775 to +550. This did not slow down the action. By the end of the day, more bets had been placed on Castellanos to homer than on any other team or any player in all sports.
Castellanos went 0-4-4 with two strikeouts in a 5-4 loss to the Phillies. New York Mets,
June 5: A bookmaker placed a bet with BetMGM in Ohio $8 million bet heavily favored oklahoma city thunder to defeat Indiana Pacers NBA Finals at -700 odds.
The Thunder swept the Pacers in seven games and bettors netted $1.42 million.
June 15: JJ SpawnWon the US Open with a 150-1 long shot. Spawn had the longest winning streak of any player Phil Mickelson (200-1) won the PGA Championship in 2021.
24 June: A bettor with BetMGM in Arizona placed three big bets on the winner of the College Football Playoff:
at $300,000 texas at 5-1
at $200,000 penn state at +750
at $115,000 CLEMSON at 13-1
All three teams missed the CFP.
June 25: dallas mavericks selected cooper flag With the No. 1 pick in the NBA draft. The Mavericks were 500-1 to pick the flag, the longest odds of any single futures bet offered by DraftKings in 2026.
23 August: Entering the college football season, North CarolinaWith first-year coach Bill Belichick, it drew the same amount of money and bets to win the national championship as Indiana at BetMGM sportsbooks. The Hoosiers finished the season undefeated and entered the CFP as the top seed, while the Tar Heels went 4–8.
30 August: A bettor at DraftKings picked the winner of all 15 MLB games that Saturday on a $5, 15-leg parlay to win $125,088.36.
31 August: A bettor with FanDuel stalked beloved college football personality Lee Corso Final selection on College GameDay and won $1,317.18 in a $10 six-leg parlay, with Florida State outright ahead of Alabama. Corso retired from the show this year.
September 7: buffalo bill Made a remarkable comeback to defeat Baltimore Ravens 41-40 in Sunday’s prime-time game in Week 1 of the NFL season. The high-scoring encounter resulted in the biggest win of any game for customers at BetMGM, the sportsbook reports. In an earnings call, DraftKings said that Bills-Ravens produced the largest loss ever for a sportsbook.
September 11: A bettor at Caesars Sportsbook risked $715,000 on +140 underdog Terence Crawford to defeat Canelo Alvarez and netted $985,000 when Crawford won by unanimous decision.
15 October: A bettor in Massachusetts with DraftKings placed 27 parlay bets focused on the number of hits toronto blue jays outfielder Nathan Lukes Will take place in the American League Championship Series against seattle marinersThe bettor risked $12,950 for a chance to win $934,147,83,
DraftKings told the Massachusetts Gaming Commission (MGC) that a technical error allowed bookmakers to include Luke’s five-plus, six-plus, seven-plus and eight-plus hits during the ALCS to increase the odds. Lukes recorded nine hits in the ALCS.
DraftKings told MGC it believed a relative of the bettor was among six New Jersey customers who placed similar bets on Lukes, resulting in a $1.8 million win. Gaming regulators in Massachusetts and New Jersey rejected DraftKings’ request to void the bets.
2 November: A week after National Tight End’s Day, a bettor at Caesars Sportsbook placed five tight ends in a series of parlays to score the first touchdown in their respective games. Four out of five New York Giants, Theo JohnsonThe Los Angeles Rams, tyler higbeeNote’ Dalton Kincaid and this detroit lions, Sam Laporta – Distributed to the bettor, resulting in winnings of approximately $111,000.
Joey Feazell of Caesars Sportsbook said, “Customers bet on every permutation of these five selections and bet $2.50 per leg, resulting in a potential win of just under $2 million.” “Although the bettor did not bet on all five, he won over $111,000 by betting on four of the five. This is a great investment for the bettor.”
7 December: A bettor with Hard Rock BET hit a $1, 20-leg parlay involving all college basketball unders, resulting in a payout of $344,902.81. At +34,490,181, this is the longest odds on a successful par at Hard Rock BET ever, the company said.
8 December: A bettor on Fanatics placed a $1.47 million bet on a four-legged NFL parlay in Week 14 that paid out a total of $1.86 million, the largest winning bet of the year at the sportsbook. Four legs: money line above the ram Arizona Cardinals, green Bay Packers above the money line Chicago BearsAnd denver broncos up and down attackers pittsburgh steelers-Ravens (alternate row).
14 December: A bookmaker successfully predicted a player would score the first touchdown in five NFL games, turning a 10-cent parlay into a $7,356.80 payday.
ESPN’s Doug Greenberg contributed to this story.
