Mattress Mack bets $2 million on the Astros to win the 2023 World Series

On Friday, Houston furniture tycoon and obsessive gambler Jim “Mattress Mack” McIngvale placed a new bet on the Astros ahead of the Major League Soccer playoffs, which begin Oct. 3, Sports Illustrated’s Frankie Taddeo reported. McIngvale had previously bet $1.9 million in March for Houston to win the 2023 World Series, and now he’s upping it with another $2 million at +600 odds. If Houston wins, McIngvale will win $12 million.

McIngvale is known for making big bets, especially on the Astros. He filled a wheelbarrow with a record $75 million return on a $10 million bet after Houston beat the Philadelphia Phillies in last year’s Fall Classic. McIngvale is clearly hoping to repeat his previous success. The Astros have won the AL West five times in the past six years, but Houston is struggling to hold off its surging rivals in the Texas Rangers and Seattle Mariners, who each sit within 1.5 games of the lead with less than a month left in the season. season.

But as Taddeo reports, McIngvale knows how to hedge his bets. He positions his bets as a way to advertise his business, offering refunds to customers who buy his furniture during these promotions. If McIngvale’s team wins, it uses its winnings to pay off customers — and if it loses, the revenue from its sales gives it some financial cushion.

While McIngvale is known primarily as a prominent businessman, he is also a force in local politics. He was also in the news this week for a botched campaign video featuring Houston mayoral candidate Jack Christie.

On Thursday, Christie’s staff posted a video of McIngvale praising the local politician and claimed it was an endorsement for their camp, according to Dylan McGinnis of the Houston Chronicle. But McIngville had already thrown his support to another candidate — Democratic state Sen. John Whitmer — and it didn’t take long before McIngville and his team corrected the record and pushed Christie’s team to remove the video from their sites. “While I think Jack Christie would be a good mayor if elected, I do not support him as the Christie campaign has stated,” McIngvale told the Houston Chronicle. He said his vote “will be for John Whitmer in November.”