Drake Bets $1M on Israel Adesanya and Lifts Betting Curse

Drake’s curse pertains to a series of losing sporting bets that Drake’s made. It allegedly affects many sporting figures even slightly exposed to Drake’s influence, but it stops now, as Drake’s curse has finally been broken by Israel Adesanya after Drake bet $1 million on him and he actually won his fifth title defense, which was against Jared Cannonier.

Drake’s $1 Million Bet Pays Off

Throughout his storied betting career, Drake has been putting some losing wagers on UFC fights, creating what has been dubbed “Drake’s Curse”. Some of the highlights include a $275,000 bet on Jorge Masvidal, who was the underdog for his March match against Colby Covington. As the Drake curse would have it, Jorge didn’t overcome his odds and lost the match handily, and Covington mocked Drake for betting against him. The curse story was further fueled by a losing $550,000 bet on American fighter Justin Gaethje, who lost his Charles Oliveira match just a couple of months later.

It’s an old tale, though, as Drake cursed Smit Conor McGregor as well after he was posing for a picture with Drake before the 2017 Floyd Mayweather fight. You can imagine that it didn’t go too well for Conor McGregor. Anthony Joshua also thought he would be able to break the curse in 2019, but ended up losing his Andy Ruiz Jr match – again, after posing with the multi-platinum artist.

The curse seems to have been broken, finally, as Drake’s $1 million bets on UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya in his match against Jared Cannonier has paid off. Cannonier lost the match, thus allowing Adesanya, whose moniker is “The Last Stylebender” to also bend the style of the curse to a breaking point. Adesanya has his fifth title defense, and Drake has the curse that has his name, broken. Many fans aren’t happy with how Adesanya’s UFC 276 fight went, though, with many finding it polite to call it boring. It’s the third in a row for Adesanya, who might be facing some pressure to select a spicy opponent for his next big fight. If that happens, and Drake places another bet, we’ll be able to test if lightning can strike twice or if the curse will return.

Drake – Well-Known Gambler

As fun as the wordplay with Drake’s proverbial curse is, Drake is indeed considered a high roller, as the Canadian rapper has a very storied career outside of his singing. The COVID-19 pandemic reflected on that, with Drake often making the headlines not with his singing, but rather – his gambling. He has been placing losing bets on different sports, not just MMA. Drake’s bet on F1’s Charles Leclerc totaled $235 thousand, and Leclerc didn’t even finish the race, so he lost that bet as well. This was back in May, when Drake lost $20 million on roulette, so his bets aren’t exclusively on sports either.

The infamous roulette incident was a part of an entire event, with Drake streaming his bets on Twitch. Playing on Stake.com, Drake would bet $500,000 per spin, with one of the winning spins earning him almost $19 million. At end of the event, Drake had lost almost $20 million, but that didn’t stop him from donating $1 million’s worth of BTC to one of his lucky stream viewers, and his partnership with Stake.com is promising more streams in the future.

Drake’s Stake.com account is named “DeepPockets6” and Drake’s pockets do seem deep, with reports citing a tally north of $1 billion that the singer has wagered in his virtual gambling habit just from last December until now. A habit that some might even consider a form of investment since Drake’s curse is more of a funny story on what appears to be an otherwise very lucrative endeavor for the legendary Canadian rapper.