Drake Drops 650K on Joshua Van at UFC 331 and Fans Are Already Mourning
The Drake Curse rides again as the rapper wagers $650,000 on Joshua Van to beat Alexandre Pantoja in the UFC 331 main event.
Drake has done it again. The rapper placed a $650,000 bet on UFC flyweight champion Joshua Van to defeat Alexandre Pantoja in the UFC 331 main event on Saturday night at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, per MMA Crossfire. The potential payout sits at roughly $1.1 million.
The problem, as fight fans immediately pointed out, is the Drake Curse. The rapper has developed a reputation for backing fighters and teams that go on to lose, and the internet wasted no time reminding everyone of the pattern.
Drake previously bet on Conor McGregor to defeat Max Holloway at UFC 329, a wager that did not end well. He also backed Argentina to beat Spain in the 2026 World Cup Final, another loss. The track record has turned his betting slips into something between a meme and an actual concern for whatever side he picks.
Van enters the rematch as the champion after dethroning Pantoja in their first meeting at UFC 323 in December 2025. The flyweight title fight headlines a stacked card that also featured several highlight-reel finishes on the undercard.
Fans of Van were not thrilled to see Drake's money land on their guy. Social media filled with variations of "we are cooked" and pleas for Drake to switch his pick. Whether or not supernatural betting curses are real, the psychological weight of $650,000 in Drake money sitting on your fighter is its own kind of pressure.
The main event had not yet taken place at the time of this report.
Six hundred and fifty thousand dollars on a flyweight title fight to win about $1.1 million. That is a heavy favorite price on Van, and the Drake money makes the ticket even funnier. The man bet on McGregor against Holloway. He bet on Argentina against Spain. At some point the curse stops being a meme and starts being a data set.
Do I believe in curses? No. Do I understand why Van fans were begging him to switch his pick? Absolutely. There is something about a champion walking out knowing a rapper has more riding on the fight than the fighter's purse that feels like tempting fate.
Here is my honest read on the bet itself, before the cage door closes. Van earned the belt, he is the younger man, and Pantoja has already lost to him once. The price is steep but the pick is logical. If the curse holds anyway, that is the most Drake outcome possible, and I will laugh with everyone else.
