If you thought Doug Polk and Daniel Negrenau were the only winners and losers in their recently-finished Grudge Match, then think again! Casino boss Rob Yong reportedly lost $1.25million and there were plenty of others in a similar boat.
Rob Yong’s huge bet
The highstakes feud, the finale of which you can watch here if you missed it, saw Upswing Poker boss Polk win $1.2million from Negreanu from 25,000 hands of $200/$400 HUNL.
Rob Yong, the owner of the Dusk Till Dawn Casino in England, and himself a highstakes cash game player didn’t mention how much he’d lost on his bet when he congratulated the players…
Its finally over, but massive thanks to @RealKidPoker @DougPolkVids for giving us free* entertainment 3 times a week + all the twitter drama/bantor & thx to streams @Joeingram1 @UpswingPoker @GGPoker @SolveForWhyTV Been great over lockdown✌️Rob
* unless your bet went sideways pic.twitter.com/45pWybstnG
— Rob Yong (@rob_yong_) February 4, 2021
However, a bit of simple arithmetic on his widely-publicised sidebet on the match does the trick – and it proved to be an expensive last week of the challenge for Rob Yong.
Yong had agreed to pay (or be paid) 2.5 x whatever sum Polk won or lost, starting from $700,000. That meant the final session this week, in which Polk won $250k and crossed the magic $1million mark, plunged him an extra $625k into the red.
“The worst thing about this bet I had, I bet against the online pros with all their data and their analysis,” Yong revealed on Joey Ingram’s YouTube show.
“I hate paying them!” added Yong, who thought the $700,000 ‘headstart’ was a decent sum.
His revelations came on the day Negreanu lost almost $300k, plunging from that magic $700k bet starting point to $1million down. Polk admitted afterward it was his “luckiest day of the challenge.”
Not lucky for Yong though as he effectively lost $750k that day, the Englishman betting on Negreanu because of “nostalgia” as well as the thought that “getting a $700,000 start was a step in the right direction.”
It turns out his bet may have been even more complicated, a similar but messier cross-bet back in November costing him another chunk of his fortune…
I have x-book bet @RealKidPoker V @DougPolkVids at 7.5bbs/100 for remainder of their Challenge
So, 22k hands left, Doug wins $660k & I am even, Doug wins $200K, I win $460k, Doug wins $1m, I lose $340K, but dream happens & Dengs wins $340 & I win $1M
How do you like this bet?
— Rob Yong (@rob_yong_) November 22, 2020
Mike “Bank of Timex” McDonald, who founded the PokerShares betting platform, had explained the betting patterns just as the Grudge Match was about to kick off in November last year.
Mike was taking all sorts of bets on the match, such as the possibility of ex-President Donald Trump and Negreanu both winning, as we revealed here.
“Generally the guys betting on Doug have never played live, and the guys betting on Daniel have never played online!” explained McDonald.
He added: “It’s an interesting dynamic where I think online players tend to estimate Daniel, and live players tend to underestimate Doug.”
Hellmuth and Matusow also lose big
That brings us to two other poker legends, both of whom lost a pretty penny on Negreanu, and who fit McDonald’s description perfectly – Phil Hellmuth and Mike Matusow.
“Poker brat” Hellmuth bet Doug Polk $20k that Negreanu would beat him…
I bet $20,000 to $80,000 w @Dougpolkvids. That’s enough for now Dan…
— phil_hellmuth (@phil_hellmuth) October 22, 2020
…while Mike “The Mouth” Matusow bet half of his entire ‘bankroll’ on Negreanu, though that bankroll seemed to include money for food and bills.
Even Polk himself begged Mike “Please don’t do this!” before adding jokingly, “I mean come on, you are really going to leave the other 10k on the sideline?”
Please dont do this.
— Doug Polk (@DougPolkVids) October 22, 2020
It’s not yet clear who exactly won all the money from Yong, but Polk has obviously come out of the match with much more than his $1.2million winnings from DNegs.
That might have taken a twist had Negreanu fought back though, as Polk revealed he had miscounted by “a few hundred K”…
Was settling sidebets and just realized I donked it up and bet a few hundred k more on myself than I realized.
That would have been extra painful if I had lost.
— Doug Polk (@DougPolkVids) February 4, 2021
The other big bet that nobody seemed to want to take – Negreanu’s $1million run-better bet – might be the only way Doug could actually lose some money from the three-month online poker battle.
If you missed how it all ended, you can rewatch the closing hands of the Grudge Match here.
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