Joey Chestnut, Takeru Kobayashi to Settle ‘Unfinished Beef’ at Netflix Hot Dog Eating Contest

Just a day after Joey Chestnut was banned from the 2024 Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest, Netflix revealed that he will finally go head-to-head with his old rival, Takeru Kobayashi, in a special showdown. The event, named “Chestnut vs. Kobayashi: Unfinished Beef,” will be live-streamed on Netflix on Labor Day, Sept. 2.

The exact time and place for the match will be announced later. This will mark the first time in 15 years that these two eating champions will compete against each other in a hot dog eating contest. Kobayashi, a six-time Nathan’s Contest winner in the early 2000s, has not participated in the event since 2009 due to his refusal to sign an exclusive deal with Major League Eating.

Kobayashi’s past dispute with MLE mirrors Chestnut’s recent banishment, particularly Chestnut’s sponsorship with Impossible Foods, a competitor of traditional hot dog suppliers.

“MLE and Nathan’s really bent over backward recently to accommodate Joey and his team, even agreeing to his appearance fee and letting him take part in another hot dog eating contest on Labor Day,” MLE’s statement mentioned. This was in reference to the upcoming Netflix competition, although it hadn’t been officially announced at the time. “For close to twenty years, we’ve operated under the same hot dog exclusivity terms. But it appears that Joey and his team have chosen a new alliance with a different hot dog brand over our longstanding partnership.”