Hannibal Buress Had a Gambling Problem That Almost Got Out of Control

I had a gambling problem for a little bit. Did you? Yeah. What kind? Sports and casino, a lot of sports. When you say gambling problem, what made it a problem? What made it a problem is that it was really taking up a lot of time. And I'd never gotten to real trouble, just because I was constantly working. I had great weeks, I had bad weeks. But if you're betting on stuff every other day or whatever, then that means you're kind of on tilt and not able to function most of the time. And this is when you were drinking a lot, too. This is when I was drinking a lot, too. So I was drinking. So drinking and gambling together. I was drinking and gambling. Woo! And then getting up at midnight. No, that was quarantine sleep schedule. Oh, OK. My regular sleep schedule was drunk stuff, 4 or 5 AM. How did you kick it? Gambling habit. The gambling. I had to just really take a look at what I was doing and then how it was serving me. And look at the other stuff that I was doing. And that's also gambling. Investing. So realizing I had that outlet, it just wasn't in sports or throwing some dice. But you can gamble by investing in a company early. You can gamble by getting a build. And you can gamble by trying to produce your own show out of pocket. All of these other things are gambling. Yeah, sort of. It's more of an invest, though. It's an invest, but if investments go bust, companies, people that put millions of dollars, billions into companies. That quibby. And so that was an investment. They were really hyped about it and wrote big checks. So it was realizing that and just realizing that when I was looking at a game, it would take up time. Because I would get really into it and research the history with teams and look at all these other matchups. And so I could spend that time and mental energy on something else that's more productive. Well, that's a wise way of looking at it. But a lot of people don't. When they get sucked into something, it's very hard to get. We were just talking about video games, about my addiction to video games. I just had to go cold turkey. I just had to step away and go, I can't fucking do this anymore. And I figured it out and I stopped. But that's not easy to do sometimes. Sometimes whatever it is about gambling, whatever switches that pops off in your brain that gives you that dopamine charge. Yeah. I mean, there's certain bets that are just super pleasurable. If you bet the total in an NBA game, if you bet over and you're there live, the total is saying the total is what the two teams would score, 200 points. And that's, you're rooting for every score. Everybody. Everybody. You're just, yeah, yeah, free throws. You're like, yeah, free throws. So to have a couple grand on a game and you're rooting for both teams live. And like, what's wrong with this guy? Yeah, any total score. Yeah, hockey, whatever, soccer. If the goals are over three, then you're rooting for both teams. You don't care if it's two to two or four to nothing or 54. That's exciting. Yeah, the over bet is super high. Jamie, you gamble a little, right? Yeah, yep. You gamble on fights too, right? Yeah, sure. I would gamble on the, it's more fun to gamble on the over, under, on rounds and shit too. You're like, don't, don't hang on, hang on. Right, right, right, right, yeah. Who did I, I'm trying to think of some memorable fights. I had some money. I think I had, I had Rumbel Johnson against Texera. I had Rumbel Johnson against Texera. Oh, that was a brutal knock out. I had, yeah, I had Rumbel on it. I take Rumbel over everybody except Cormier. For whatever reason, Cormier's got his number. But Rumbel hits anybody, they go night-night. He's coming back. He's bored, so he's coming back. Might come back as a heavyweight. Oh wow. He's huge now. I mean, fucking huge. Like 250, gigantic. I'll tell you the, my craziest gambling story. I've told it on stage, but this is the most, this is where it was like, it was really bonkers. So I started, I was bedding with a bookie, but I would use a site, you know? But it was, you know, if I won, the guy would send, send money, send like a bunch of money in $500 money orders, or, you know, I would just send a PayPal, whatever. And it was, it was like that. But the thing was that since you could just do it like that, it made it, it's like sending a text. You just do it on a site. And so it doesn't, it's not the same as holding the cash and bedding where you really have to think about it. It's like you just typed it real quick. And so you're doing, you know, these large bets. So after a while, my tolerance was, I needed more. And I was on a hot streak. And so I asked my friend for another bookie with a higher limit, because the limit on my one was like two grand. And so he found this, he knew this guy had to do 5,000 a game. And so, but then it's 5,000 on the Honors. So it's not, you're not putting up five. He's talking about putting up five with my physical, and each time I probably would, but because it was like five and five here, and I had a hot streak, I was betting on a lot of hockey at this time. And I was getting, I had a hot streak on hockey so much in my gambling buddies, Bozeman and CJ, they started calling me hockey Hannibal, because I just was betting on Vegas Golden Knights were doing really well. That was their first season, and Black Hawks were hitting some stuff. So I was doing parlay. So if you parlay a $5,000 bet with, you know, with the total or something, then that five is, you know, 12, 15 wins. So I had a good run after a week. I was up a hundred thousand cash. And I love a hundred and so, but I'd never put in any money. So it was just, I got this a hundred thousand from type. And so I meet up with the guy in Chicago, and I mean, I pull up next to his car, and he had me a hundred grand cash and a brown paper bag. Whoa. And then- Did you do like the Demi Moore thing? Where you throw the money on the bed and roll around naked? No, I put it on the table and kind of just really looked at- I thought, I kept it pretty, considering, I kept it kind of, I just put it on the table. Like what the- All hundreds? Just, yeah, all hundreds. How big is a hundred thousand dollars in all hundreds? It's not crazy. It's a lot, but it's not massive. It's a couple, it's a few stacks, yeah. And it was, it was why. So because there was no real effort to get that money, I didn't value it like that. And so in my head, the gambler's mind is not happy. It's just like, it won't. And so I'm like, you know what? Let's get them 400 more. And the next week proceeded to go down, go down like 90 grand out of that hundred. And so he started hitting me up, hey, can I get that 90? And so I was too prideful at the time. I didn't want to give him the cash. I just want, he, we had an agreement to do PayPal on some stuff, but he, of course it wasn't for anyone. PayPal for no 90, he didn't do PayPal for, you know, it was two, three, but I was in a zone of, I don't want to, I can't deal with giving this cash back. And so, and so he's asking for, I'm PayPal, and I PayPal him the 90 grand. And then he sends that shit back. So now we plant hot potato. He wants the cash. Plant internet hot potato with $90,000. And, and yeah, and so it was just really, it was intense cause I was like, yo, is this, and then he hit me up, hey, we see you gonna be in Brooklyn. Oh no. And so I try to, I puff up and just kind of say, hey, you don't want to show up to Brooklyn, dog. I gotta make sure you, like I tried to talk some shit to the, to the, hey man, you gonna come to Brooklyn, you gonna get touched. Like don't come to my show. You said that? Yeah, just try, I texted him that thing, like don't come through Brooklyn. You said you're gonna get touched? I texted, I was just trying to, I was out of my mind. I was on tilt, man. I was being ridiculous. Cause I wanted, I didn't want to Welch, but I just didn't want to pay like that. And so eventually, you know, we sent it back, and he eventually just took it, but yeah, that was, Eventually he took what? The 90 grand via PayPal, even though that probably was a heat, you know? Yeah, that's bad for the taxes. That's bad for taxes or whatever. And so I actually called him this week to, I was like, yo, sorry, man. I was bugging back then. He says, yo, that was poor form on my part. My bad, I don't gamble no more. Sorry to put you through that and bring heat on you. And it wasn't, but it was, that's, that was the wildest one, man. While I was like, it just had me in a real irrational zone. My friend, David. Delete all that. My friend David.