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Funny Gambling Stories

March 23, 2017

Casino games enjoy tremendous popularity all around the world and this means that considerable media attention is afforded when people win – or lose – big while playing them. This article will take a look at some of the funniest media stories of gambling wins and losses.

The story of Terrence Watanabe is surely one of the funniest cautionary tales ever to emerge from the casino. Mr Watanabe was playing Blackjack at both the Rio and Caesars Palace back in 2007 – presumably not at the same time, although that might account for what happened. He went on to drop an eye-watering $127 million-plus at the tables, before claiming that it was all the fault of the casinos for filling him up with vodka and painkillers – presumably force fed through a straw. Given that he had already been banned from the Wynn Casino for excessive drunkenness, it is perhaps not surprising that the courts didn’t accept his “but I was drunk” excuse and held him liable for the losses. Watanabe showed us just how badly gambling and drinking go together, but by staying sober one Frederick W Smith actually saved one of the US’s biggest companies at the gambling table. Smith founded FedEx in 1971, but escalating fuel costs had left the delivery company in dire straits by 1974 – which would have caused most CEOs to play it very safe indeed. Not Mr Smith, who promptly took his company’s last $5000, and bet it on the Blackjack tables in Vegas – walking away with $32,000. This was enough to keep the company going a little longer, and the rest is history, with Smith stating that he was past caring if he lost, as the company was on the verge of bankruptcy. His Donald Trump-style chutzpah surely makes this one of the funniest gambling stories.

It is just the men who have given us funny and crazy casino stories though – as outrageous gambling women like Patricia Demauro prove. Otherwise known as the world’s most badass grandma, this lady’s experience was a 156 trillion to one shot. She had been playing the slot machines at the Borgata Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City, only to get bored, and decide to shoot craps instead. This was only her second time playing the game but she rolled the dice a total of 154 times during the next four and a half hours – winning every single time. This represents the longest ever roll in craps and the most dice rolls in a row without ‘sevening out’ – although her total winnings were kept a secret. The idea of a bored granny beating hard-bitten pros makes this easily one of the funniest stories. However, while Demauro’s story is impressive, even she pales in comparison to Ashley Revell, who is surely the fastest big winner in casino history. He quite literally went for broke by flogging all his possessions and draining his bank account, betting it all on a single spin of the roulette wheel. Thankfully for him, he won and walked away with a cool $272,000 – ensuring he now has the swankiest padded cell in the lunatic asylum.

These stories prove that the casino is not only home to excitement and glamour, but also produces the funny and quirky stories that brighten up our lives.