{"id":43408,"date":"2017-01-04T14:00:31","date_gmt":"2017-01-04T22:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/?p=43408"},"modified":"2017-01-04T15:41:33","modified_gmt":"2017-01-04T23:41:33","slug":"barista-wins-record-breaking-westgate-las-vegas-supercontest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/barista-wins-record-breaking-westgate-las-vegas-supercontest\/","title":{"rendered":"Barista Wins Record-Breaking Westgate Las Vegas SuperContest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p1\">A record-breaking Westgate Las Vegas SuperContest has been won by 32-year-old Starbucks barista Damon Graham.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">To those late to the party, the Super Contest is the biggest NFL handicapping competition in the world, held annually at the Westgate Las Vegas, which also boasts the world\u2019s biggest race and sports book.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_43415\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-43415\" data-style=\"width: 1074px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-43415\" src=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/1686_Supercontest_Web_850x571.jpg\" alt=\"2016 Westgate Las Vegas SuperContest draws record field\" width=\"1074\" height=\"721\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/1686_Supercontest_Web_850x571.jpg 850w, https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/1686_Supercontest_Web_850x571-142x95.jpg 142w, https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/1686_Supercontest_Web_850x571-768x516.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1074px) 100vw, 1074px\" \/><figcaption  id=\"caption-attachment-43415\"class=\"text-description\">The Westgate Las Vegas SuperContest drew a record field, inviting comparisons with the growth of the World Series of Poker during the poker boom. Does this make the winner, barista Damon Graham, the Chris Moneymaker of sports betting? (Image: Westgate Las Vegas Resort and Casino)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p class=\"p1\">The contest began in the eighties as a means for the best professional sports bettors to compete against one another and has since become something of a Vegas institution.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">This year it boasted its largest ever field and numbers have no doubt been swelled by the craze for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/draftkings-fanduel-relaunch-new-york\">daily fantasy sports<\/a>, which has engendered a new legion of number-crunching, stats-studying sports enthusiasts.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">These days, both amateur and pro bettors like to do their homework and compete, and the huge field and $1,500 buy-in fee yielded a huge prize pool and almost a $1 million first place prize.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"p1\"><b>Betting Boom <\/b><\/h2>\n<p class=\"p1\">In fact, the explosion in the contest\u2019s popularity is being compared to the growth in fields at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/world-series-of-poker-2016-main-event-sees-qui-nguyen-win\">World Series of Poker<\/a> during the early days of the poker boom.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">The event has grown from 345 entries in 2010 to 1,854 this year, as more and more amateurs join the field.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"main-blockquote\">\n<p class=\"p1\"><strong>The aim of the game, of course, is to outsmart the bookies, or, in this case, Westgate&#8217;s point spread, picking five games each week throughout the 17-week regular season.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"p1\">Graham bought into the contest for the maximum two entries, to turn a $3,000 investment into $907,699. Entering Week 17, both of his entries were tied for fourth place and so he decided to go opposite sides for the remaining five games with each entry, one of which came in at 5-0 to seal him the title.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">&#8220;I&#8217;ve never been happier to be wrong about anything in my whole life,&#8221; he told ESPN.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"p1\"><b>Smell the Coffee <\/b><\/h2>\n<p class=\"p1\">Asked how he could afford the $3,000 buy-in on his barista salary, he said: &#8220;I decided last year, after just having one entry, that I wanted to give two a try.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">I just saved my money by cutting expenses and making sacrifices in my social life. I worked and just got ready for the football season.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">Graham spent Sunday morning at Starbucks concocting iced caf\u00e9 lattes and double chocolatey-chip frappuccinos as usual, only to discover during his lunch break he had won the whole thing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">&#8220;I went to work to take my mind off of it,&#8221; Graham told The Associated Press. &#8220;I knew I was going to win something, but it was pretty amazing to find out I finished first.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A record-breaking Westgate Las Vegas SuperContest has been won by 32-year-old Starbucks barista Damon Graham. To those late to the party, the Super Contest is the biggest NFL handicapping competition in the world, held annually at the Westgate Las Vegas, which also boasts the world\u2019s biggest race and sports book.\u00a0 \u00a0 The contest began in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":43415,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Barista Wins Record-breaking Westgate Las Vegas SuperContest<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Amateur bettor Damon Graham outsmarts the bookies at Westgate Las Vegas Super Contest to win sports betting\u2019s most prestigious prize.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Barista Wins Record-breaking Westgate Las Vegas SuperContest\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Amateur bettor Damon Graham outsmarts the bookies at Westgate Las Vegas Super Contest to win sports betting\u2019s most prestigious prize.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/barista-wins-record-breaking-westgate-las-vegas-supercontest\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Casino.org\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Casino.OrgNews\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-01-04T22:00:31+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-01-04T23:41:33+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/1686_Supercontest_Web_850x571.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"850\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"571\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Casino.org Staff Writer\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@Casino_Org\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Casino_Org\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Casino.org Staff Writer\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/barista-wins-record-breaking-westgate-las-vegas-supercontest\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/barista-wins-record-breaking-westgate-las-vegas-supercontest\/\",\"name\":\"Barista Wins Record-breaking Westgate Las Vegas SuperContest\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/barista-wins-record-breaking-westgate-las-vegas-supercontest\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/barista-wins-record-breaking-westgate-las-vegas-supercontest\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/1686_Supercontest_Web_850x571.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2017-01-04T22:00:31+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-01-04T23:41:33+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/8c48bf89dc86da77b4d856c7b3b78d77\"},\"description\":\"Amateur bettor Damon Graham outsmarts the bookies at Westgate Las Vegas Super Contest to win sports betting\u2019s most prestigious prize.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/barista-wins-record-breaking-westgate-las-vegas-supercontest\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/barista-wins-record-breaking-westgate-las-vegas-supercontest\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/barista-wins-record-breaking-westgate-las-vegas-supercontest\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/1686_Supercontest_Web_850x571.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/1686_Supercontest_Web_850x571.jpg\",\"width\":850,\"height\":571,\"caption\":\"The Westgate Las Vegas SuperContest drew a record field, inviting comparisons with the growth of the World Series of Poker during the poker boom. 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