| “ | Look, you know what I can do? I can re-task a satellite. I can get a level-3 NSA security clearance. But I can't hack a hick. | ” |
Nate's team schemes against a crooked fight promoter (Jed Rucker). But their mark is on to the sting, forcing Eliot to enter the ring.
The Clients[]
The Mark[]
- Jed Rucker, owner of Rucker's Gym.
The Con[]
An MMA fighter, Mark Howorth, is winning a bout when suddenly he begins to feel woozy, and his opponent, Tank, takes advantage and injures him severely enough to put him in the hospital. Mark's father, Jack, tells Nate afterwards that someone drugged Mark's water. Mark's old manager, Jed Rucker, had told Mark a few days ago to take a dive so Rucker could make money betting against him, so they fired Rucker, and Jack suspects retaliation. Jack tells Nate that the only reason they can afford Mark's hospital care is the fact his cousin Jonny is the ring doctor, and Jonny says that Mark will never fight again.
The team researches Rucker, sending Nate in to play golf with him. Posing as Bill Wells, an MMA league operator from South Dakota, Nate bets two grand that he'll beat Rucker, and with the help of Hardison's tech-rigged golf balls and some quick pickpocketing from Parker, Nate routs Rucker on the golf course. When Rucker looks for his money, he's unable to find his wallet (as Parker's lifted it from him), and Nate declares they can square up the debt at his hotel.
Later, Rucker goes back to the gym and notices Nate is there managing Eliot. Rucker pays up, and clearly recognizes Eliot's talent for fighting. As Eliot is leaving, Rucker and a collection of his men pull up in cars and the men attempt to jump Eliot one by one, but are easily fended off. Nearby, Parker films and sends the footage to Hardison, who uses his tech skills to inflate the hit count on the video of Eliot's fight.
Back in Rucker's office, he and Eliot have a conversation. Rucker sees the video of Eliot's fight with hundreds of thousands of views already, and Eliot feeds Rucker information about "Bill Wells"-- how he's in town searching for talent, how he has a meeting with Debbie Dreiling (a producer cover for Sophie), and how Eliot owes Wells a debt of 20 grand. Rucker agrees to cover Eliot's debt if he'll bring the producer to Rucker before Wells.
At the golf club bar, Rucker meets with Sophie, who is posing as Dreiling, and attempts to convince her to make a deal with him first. When Rucker asks her what event she's in town to produce, Hardison suggests through the earbuds a concert by a "teenybopper kid's star" Trianna, and when Sophie mentions the event, Rucker makes a plan to meet with Sophie at the concert. Nate interrupts and pulls Sophie away, but now the team has to figure out how to steal the concert.
All they need to do is show Rucker a production trailer with Sophie in charge, so Hardison and Parker set up on site at the concert while Nate sidelines the actual director Todd Laurence, posing as his limo driver and then stranding him on the side of the road. In the concert control trailer, Sophie explains to Rucker her deal with Wells and their potential for huge profits-- 5 million an event for 500 grand event costs. Rucker declares he wants in. He promises Sophie he'll front the 500 grand for her operating costs, and it seems that Rucker is on the hook, but there's a catch-- Rucker's assistant Engel has a cousin who knows all the managers in South Dakota, where Nate's cover is allegedly from, and he's never heard of Bill Wells. Moreover, Jack Howorth was spotted visiting Nate's hotel. Rucker realizes they're setting him up, and rather than going to the police, he decides to take matters into his own hands.
The next day, Sophie comes to Rucker's gym to collect, and Rucker instead confronts her about the con she's running. As his fighter Tank menaces Sophie, Nate and Eliot rush in to break it up, and Nate calls off Hardison and Parker in the van to let them know they're blown. Rucker still wants Eliot to fight and then intentionally lose so he can clean up by betting against him, and as the team prepares to leave, Rucker casually threatens Jack's home and Mark's life. Eliot agrees to fight and take the dive if it will keep the Howorths safe.
On the night of the fight, Rucker bets it all on Tank through a number of online bookies and instructs Tank to go all out on Eliot. With Rucker, Sophie, Parker, Nate, Hardison, and Jack Howorth all watching, Eliot and Tank square off in the ring, and each get a few hits in before Eliot starts looking dizzy and Tank seizes the upper hand. Nate inspects Eliot's water bottle and Sophie calls out Rucker for having drugged Eliot's water. Sophie sends Parker to fetch the doctor and fearfully tells Rucker that a drugged Eliot is infinitely more dangerous than a sober one. With that, Eliot turns the tables on Tank and puts him in a headlock to the point where Tank taps out.
As Nate and Hardison pull Eliot aside, Tank collapses and the ring doctor Jonny attempts to resuscitate him, but to no avail. Rucker orders the arena cleared, and the doctor pronounces Tank dead. Rucker attempts to pay him off, but the doctor refuses, pointing out the hundreds of witnesses, so Rucker rushes up to his office to clear out his safe full of money and flees the state to Iowa in his car to avoid liability.
The Reveal[]
Unbeknownst to Rucker, Parker has planted a transmitter on Rucker's GPS. Jonny tells Jack that Nate and the crew approached him for his help-- Tank will be fine, and has just been administered a mild paralytic to fake the appearance of death. Nate reveals that they'd caught the drugged water bottle earlier and swapped it out with a clean one, so neither Eliot nor Tank were in any real danger. Meanwhile, Hardison has called in a tip to the Iowa state police that a fugitive is headed their way, and in a flashback Parker is shown having purchased several thousand dollars worth of guns (and a saxophone), which she'd planted in Rucker's trunk. From there, the team tips off the IRS that Rucker has been evading taxes on the income from his fighting ring operation, which should keep him out of town indefinitely, and it's shown that Hardison had posed as the online bookies Rucker had used to place his bets on this last fight, so the team now holds all the rest of Rucker's money.
The next day, the team meets with Jack and Mark at the gym and points out that with Rucker gone, the gym and its fighters are in need of some new management. They encourage Mark to take charge, and Nate tosses him the keys as Jack and Mark contemplate their new start.
Locations[]
- Lincoln, Nebraska
- Rucker's Gym
- Jack Howorth's Home
- Temporary Leverage HQ (a room in the Derby Hotel)
- Alley behind Rucker's Gym
- Restaurant Interior
- Mid-American Palace
- Highway Shoulder
- Parking Lot Behind Rucker's Gym
Guest Cast[]
- Brian Goodman as Jed Rucker
- Tony Doupé as Jack Howorth
Aliases[]
- Bill Wells (Nate)
- Kid Jones (Eliot)
- Debbie Dreiling (Sophie)
- Todd Laurence (Hardison)
Episode Notes[]
- This was the first time that the tables have turned, and our heroes' plans unravel and they are discovered by the mark.
- This episode includes an overhead shot of the five team members, then shows Eliot walking away after losing his patience with the rest.
Trivia[]
- The team uses succinylcholine to temporarily make another fighter appear dead. While they are correct that it is a fast acting paralytic with a short duration, it is not mild at all. It would also paralyze the diaphragm, meaning the victim would not be able to breathe. Even if this scene only covered a few minutes, this would be enough time to cause noticeable brain damage due to lack of oxygen.