When it comes to grabbing a reader's attention online, nothing beats the combination of a celebrity and a sensational claim. What really baits the hook is if the outlandish claim has enough merit to make it sound believable.

This week, we saw this play out on X.com (formerly Twitter) when an account posted random stats about Drake's wins vs. losses, and it began to spread like wildfire.

Baited By Drake’s Bad Luck

Sports and gaming account @IcyVert decided to have a little fun with the internet, as online trolls do, by responding to an article discussing the fact that Drake lost $450,000 on the recent Adesanya fight, saying: “I saw a stat that Drake is now 17/189 on bets.”

Less than an hour later, the popular combat sports social media account @HappyPunch ran with the tongue-in-cheek comment, posting a stylish image and repeating IcyVert’s comment as though it were fact.

 Fake News Spreads Fast

As a renowned singer and songwriter, Drake is big news, and there has been a lot of coverage of crazy celebrity gambling losses in recent months. This fact, combined with the reach and popularity of the Happy Punch account, saw news of Drake's insane losing streak gain attention worldwide.

One of the more significant sites to have fallen foul of this hilarious round of fake news is the Daily Mail, a UK news agency. In an article titled "Drake curse strikes again! Rapper loses £348,000 betting on Israel Adesanya to defeat Dricus du Plessis as his pitiful gambling record gets worse", the site quotes Happy Punch saying:

Quote

“Drake is reportedly 17-189 in sports bets, meaning he has lost 92 per cent of the bets in his life - according to Happy Punch.”

While it is entertaining to poke fun at the Daily Mail, they are hardly the only sites to have taken the bait. A Google search for the 17-189 statistic brings up a variety of websites, social media accounts, and even Reddit posts bemoaning the Canadian rapper's bad luck.

One Last Dig to Seal the Deal

Making the most of how the internet, and specifically Happy Punch, IcyVert took to X.com to mock the account, announcing: “LMFAO I LITERALLY MADE THIS UP HAHA”

To drive home the fact that they not only ran with his made-up stats (without asking for a source site to verify his numbers) and didn’t reference him as the source on any of their posts, but he politely requested to get the kudos he deserves for all the research he did.

IcyVert, we salute you. Long may you rule as king of the trolls.