Matusow: Big Mouth, Thin Purse?

Those of you who read my post on Mike Matusow losing $2 million on a bet with Ted Forrest [3] and concluded that The Mouth couldn’t possibly pay that sum have now turned out to be right.

[4]
Ted Forrest and Mike Matusow

After losing about 50 lbs (22 kgs) in only two months, thus beating the challenge on which they bet, Forrest now seems to be fooled by Matusow, as the latter sais he is unable as well as unwilling to pay the $2 million, at least in full. Matusow argued that the original bet was about paying the sum by monthly portions of $5,000, which would take 33 years and 4 months. He also admitted that he had made the bet because he couldn’t have imagined Forrest could do it, risking his life for the money: “I don’t have the $2 million to pay out. I made that bet because I didn’t think it was feasibly possible. I could pay him a big lump, but I’m going to wait six months to see if he dies first. I think he’s 50-50 to die. He starved himself for 11 days and ran 16 miles a day. He’s lost all of the muscle around his heart. He could have a heart attack. All that for $5,000 a month.”

Ted Forrest, on the other hand, doesn’t really share Matusow’s point of view, which is quite understandable, especially considering he paid Matusow after a similar bet last year: “He beat me, and I paid him off. I think he should try to pay me as much as he can in the next two months and then work out a satisfactory, reasonable, agreeable payment arrangement.”

Although Matusow has just won the $1,100 Florida State Poker Championship main event and earned $103,000, he obviously isn’t in the financial state to pay his debt. Besides being unfair to Forrest in such a repulsive way, to questions regarding the issue he was also reportedly [5] like “To all you idiots digging into my finances Ted Forrest has been paid so go jerk off.”