Odds for Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest revealed with Joey Chestnut banned
For the first time in years, the annual Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest will be without multiple-time champion Joey Chestnut, who has been banned from the event this year. And that means the competition is wide open for which man can consume the most dogs.
According to odds from VegasInsider, 2023 runner up Geoff Esper is the favorite to win at -120. The third place finished the last two years, James Webb, is sitting at +200. The third best odds are for Nick Wehry at +560 — Wehry is husband to Miki Sudo, the favorite in the women’s competition.
Sudo is the runaway favorite on the women’s side, with -1600 odds to win the competition. The 2023 runner up, Mayoi Ebihara, is at +700. No one else has better than +2000 odds to win on the women’s side.
If Wehry can pull off the slight upset and Sudo wins as expected, they’d be the first husband-wife duo to win both events in the same year. It would be quite the achievement for “The Hungry Couple.”
And Chestnut is not sitting idle in all this.
In lieu of competing at Coney Island in the Nathan’s contest, Chestnut has set up his own exhibition where he’ll be competing solo against the combined efforts of four soldiers at Fort Bliss, located in El Paso, Texas.
Even going solo against four competitors, Chestnut is favored to out-eat the quartet, at -200. That’s a far cry from the -1600 odds he had to win the Nathan’s contest prior to the 16-time champions banishment.
Chestnut shared more about the spat between him, Nathan’s
Chestnut has shared his side of how it got to the point that he wouldn’t be competing, including arguing that the terms of his agreements were changed and that information was leaked.
“Everything with Impossible was perfectly fine by all my previous agreements,” Chestnut said. “They changed terms and conditions [around] exclusivity. And it’s not the first time they’ve changed some things, but it’s the first time they’ve really changed things after the fact, and I had to say, ’Hey, it’s too late, I’ve already started working with this brand.’ This was never an issue in the past.”
It was at this point that Chestnut says information was leaked about him, including untrue information.
“And they tried to dance around it — they changed a lot of terms, and then they escalated things to a degree they didn’t imagine when they started leaking information and telling people I was banned and that I turned vegan, which clearly isn’t the case,” Chestnut said.
George and Richard Shea are the brothers who run Major League Eating. Chestnut says that they both have messaged him, apologizing for the dispute getting ugly.
Notably, Chestnut also added that he’s not opposed to competing in the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest in the future, even if there is tension right now.
“I don’t think the Shea brothers are bad people,” Chestnut said. “I’m not burning any bridges. And I love it — I love the Fourth of July and that contest. I’m always willing to try. I don’t hold grudges. So nothing is out of the question.”
On3’s Dan Morrison contributed to this report.