What would you do for a shot at $5 million?
Mr. Beast, the most-subscribed-to YouTuber, on Wednesday will unveil the winner of the $5 million jackpot for season two of his Amazon Prime competition show, “Beast Games” — and it could be someone from the Sunshine State.
The second season of the reality show premiered Jan. 7, with weekly releases narrowing 200 “strong vs. smart” contestants down to 10.
Of those who made it past the first few episodes, eight are from Florida — with three residing in Tampa Bay. And a few Floridians are still up for the grand prize.
If you’re not caught up to the finale, beware of spoilers.
The contestants spent last summer in “Beast City” in North Carolina, which was home to a 24-hour Starbucks, a cafe serving Mr. Beast’s chocolate brand, Feastables, and sleeping pods.
Colby Sparkman, a Clearwater native and business student at the University of Central Florida, was approached by a “Beast Games” producer while waiting tables at the Cheesecake Factory in Orlando.
“I asked some of my friends, asked some of my family, ‘Does this sound like a real opportunity?’ And they all said no,” Sparkman said in an interview with “smart” contestant Brandon Borick.
His “great success” playing high school football in Palm Harbor paid off as he was cast as part of the ‘strong’ team.
After Sparkman was tasked with hanging 50 feet in the air for two and a half hours stacking giant blocks, he faced an intense obstacle course race — but didn’t make it out. He was eliminated in episode three.
Another Tampa Bay local that met an early fate was “smart” contestant Andrew Herkelman, a pre-calculus teacher at IMG Academy in Bradenton.
Most of Herkelman’s digital footprint is recorded precalculus lessons, but this isn’t his first game show appearance. He was dueling for $250,000 on Rob Lowe’s “The Floor” a few years ago.
Herkelman’s chance at $5 million ended during the blocks challenge. Now, he posted on Instagram that it’s a love-hate relationship with blocks.
Pinellas County’s Vance Walker made it the furthest out of those representing Tampa Bay.
Being the first “American Ninja Warrior” winner with cerebral palsy in 2023 led him to be cast on the “strong” team in “Beast Games.”
“Nobody wants it as badly as I do,” Walker told the Tampa Bay Times a few years ago. “When there are times that I want to stop, I picture myself at the bottom of that rope, climbing it for that million dollars and reaching my goal.”
Kicking it off with a familiar rope hang, he excelled in an obstacle course, but met his fate in one of the most notoriously brutal games in the series, the solitary box. In the challenge, three contestants enter a box with a telephone that can bring them anything, but only two will make it out.
Top-10 finalists Nick Mariano and Auguste Auger teamed up against Walker by asking Mr. Beast to survey the other contestants, assuming he wouldn’t be selected to move on.
Mariano, a wrestler from Orlando, is one of the three finalists who call Florida home.
He was selected as team captain in episode seven, where the 10 contestants each pulled from a $1 million pool. Mariano grabbed more than his fair share, guaranteeing him$250,000.
The other Floridians that still have a shot at $5 million include Navy veteran and dad of three Cory Sims and the self-proclaimed “Enigma of Boca Raton,” Jim Bent.
The season finale will be released early on Wednesday morning, at 3 a.m. on Amazon Prime.