Stu Ungar

Stu Ungar won a local gin tournament at age 10 and dropped out of school to play gin rummy in the 1960s full time to help support his mother and sister after his father died, and began regularly winning. By 1976, he was regarded as one of the best players in New York.

The fresh faced Ungar destroyed anyone who challenged him including a professional gin player, Harry “Yonkie” Stein. Ungar beat Stein 86 games without losing once!

Ungar became a victim of his own success, soon no-one would play him at rummy, he was just too good, but poker offered up a whole new world.

Technically brilliant with cards Ungar had a genius-level IQ and eidetic memory which contributed to his card counting (and remembering) skills, so much so he was frequently banned from playing (blackjack) in casinos. With poker he was noted for his ultra-aggressive playing style and well-timed bluffs, but was also incredibly obnoxious to play against and was often down right rude to opponents.

Cocaine entered Ungar’s life at around the time his mother died in 1979. The drug was originally helpful, keeping Stuie up and at the table, wired and jittery but still winning.

In 1980 Ungar entered the World Series of Poker (WSOP) looking for some action, he claimed it was the first time he had ever played a Texas Hold’em Poker tournament. Ungar promptly won the main event, defeating Doyle Brunson to become the youngest champion in its history, and took the nickname The Kid along with the title.

Ungar won his second bracelet in 1981 in the $10,000 Deuce to Seven Draw event, defeating 1978 world champion Bobby Baldwin and took home $95,000 and in the 1983 WSOP, Ungar won his fourth bracelet and $110,000

When Ungar had money, was one of the most generous people to be around. He feely gave large amounts of money to friends on bad streak, associates on a losing run, chatty taxi drivers, random dealers, pit bosses, local strippers and even complete strangers.

But Ungar, was never “good” with money, he never had a bank account in his own name, had no concept of how a bank account even worked and paid for everything in cash. This child like attitude to currency was mirrored in his infantile enthusiasm for drugs.

A telling example is that during the third day of the WSOP main event in 1990, Ungar was found passed out on the floor of his hotel room from a drug overdose when he should have been at the table. Yet, he had such a bankroll at the table that even when the dealers kept taking his blinds Ungar still finished 9th in absentee.

By 1997 Ungar was drowning in debt, but received the $10,000 buy-in to the WSOP main event from fellow Poker Professional (and friend) Billy Baxter moments before the tournament started. And then went on to win the main event for the record-setting third time.

The comeback was short lived; around 1998 Ungar disappeared from the public view. He was slumming it in cheap hotels and was seen around various Las Vegas poker rooms begging for money. The money fed Stu’s new addiction, Crack.

On November 22nd Ungar was found dead with $800 cash on him, in a cheap motel room. The medical examiner concluded that he had died of a heart condition brought on by is incessant drug use.

Despite having won an estimated $30 million during his poker career, Ungar died with just $800 cash to his name, and a collection had to be raised to finance his funeral.

He was a genius with the cards, a winner at the tables, ill equipped for life away from the tables and ultimately offers a cautionary tale of obsession.

When Dwan put the original challenge out, there were plenty of players that said they wanted a piece of him, but Dwan stated, “There looks to be a lot of interest in people wanting to play me, but they never seem to appear online.”  That being the case, he has taken his challenge live and will be putting up $500,000 to play anyone for 500 hands in either Omaha or No Limit Hold’em.

All of the matches will take place in London and will start out with $500/$1,000 blinds.  The match cannot end until someone is broke or the 500 hands have been played out.  Rumor has it that 4 players have stepped up to take on Dwan in his latest challenge, but no details have been released as of yet as to who they are.

Dwan continues to be one of the hottest young names in the game and with his latest circus act, he pretty much assures himself that he will remain in the limelight.  While his online play speaks for itself, his live play comes under a lot of fire as he plays very aggressively and recklessly.   He has benefited from some incredible cards during his days on the High Limit Poker show, but still donked off a lot of money as he refused to ever back off.  The style did manage to get him some large payoffs as the session was winding down, but you have to question how that will work in a heads-up match.

He no longer has the benefit of the element of surprise as everyone knows his name and how he plays.  Antonius is proving that he is very beatable if you are patient and don’t get caught up in letting him bully you out of pots.  Dwan is not afraid to throw a large amount of money at the pot in order to take it down regardless of what he has in his hand.  You better be prepared to fight back when you have something or he will walk all over you.

Antonius has laid down the blueprint of how to beat him so far, but will other players follow his lead.  When he pushes, you have to push back and when you get a hand, you have to make him pay.  The ideal match would have him up against Doyle Brunson, Phil Ivey or Daniel Negreanu. All three of those players treat chips as weapons and have no problem mixing it up with middle cards.  The fireworks would surely be going off if they sit across from Dwan in London.

Gus Hanson continues to play strong and is currently sitting at 725,000 in chips. Vitaly Lunkin is once again putting in a very strong performance and is currently located in the top ten with 560,000. There are still a lot of big names left in this tourney and you will probably continue to see a lot of movement as this is one of the most volatile games you will see. Every game guarantees a lot of action and your chip leader very well may be a short stack within 5 hands. They are going to play this one till the early hours of the morning.

In other tournaments…

The Limit Shootout Event is down to 6 players, but the stacks are fairly even among the top 3. This is another tournament that you can expect to go on for quite a bit tonight and not see a winner until after midnight. The current leader is Greg Mueller with 950,000. Marc Naalden and Millie Shue round out the top three and are both within less than 200,000 of Mueller.

The dinner break has sounded in event 51 and there are still well over 100 players alive. You will not recognize many of the names in this one as a lot of the pros have stayed away from these $1,500 tournaments as the WSOP has played on. Huge fields have given them all problems and they seem to be sticking with the higher buy ins and other poker variations for the time being. They are going to have enough problems in the Main Event so why sit down with this aggravation now. The one big name that is making his way up the leader board is Men Nguyen. We haven’t heard much from him so far this year so this may be his warm-up for next week’s tournament.

The Triple Chance No Limit Event is at full steam and has had a surprising amount of eliminations already. They started with 854 players and are close to 300 eliminations so far. Overall chip stacks are not available, but a quick glance around the room says that a lot of the pros were taking advantage of the ability to have the free triple re-buy and play very aggressively. Don’t be surprised to see some big names on the leader board at the end of the day in this one.

Doyle Brunson and Scotty Nguyen also made a nice run in this tournament and at one point, it looked like the possibility of 4 previous bracelet winners fighting it out. Scotty went card dead and Doyle slowly faded and went out in 7th position. This may have been his best shot of the WSOP for number 11 because we are now only 2 weeks away for the circus. The fields are starting to get larger and larger and the pros will continue to have trouble working their way through these humongous fields of amateurs that put targets on their heads the moment they see a pro seated next to them.

The other bracelet winner on the evening was Jordan Smith who outlasted 1694 other players to take down Event 36 and the $586,212 that goes along with it. At one point, this tournament seemed like it was never going to end as day 2 was just brutally slow. However, Jordan Smith stuck to his guns and continued to wear down the field until he has a massive cheap lead and the other player’s fates were sealed. This was his first bracelet, but he is no stranger to the WSOP with 12 other cashes to his credit.

In other tournaments…

At one point, it looked like there was no stopping Phil Hellmuth, but after making a humongous comeback and getting atop the leader board, the cards went the other way on his and he made his way to the rail. The played down to the final table on Saturday Night and will get back at it at 2pm to decide a winner. Marc Naalden is the current chip leader with 755,000 in his stack.

Day 2 of Event 39 will get under way with a lot of work to come before they see a final table. This was an amateur dominated field as most of the pros were eying up the Pot Limit Omaha Championship later in the evening. Mohsin Charania is the current chip leader with 144,100.

Event 40, the World Championship of Pot Limit Omaha got underway and as predicted, it was packed with all the superstars of poker. The leader board is littered with names like David Williams, Josh Arieh, Steve Zolotow and Barry Greenstein. Nate Lindsay currently leads the way with a huge chip lead of almost 200,000 over the second place player. He will start the day off with 482,200 and he is going to need every last one of them to fight off this hungry field of professionals.

This table is actually loaded with talent as Scotty Nguyen, Jeff Lisasandro and Lyle Berman are all still loaded for bear in what should be a great final day. Abe Mosseri managed to hold onto his chip lead for one more day, but the odds are against him holding off this talented field. There are only 12 players remaining and you know every person in the room is going to be pulling for Big Papa.

Event 36 missed making the final table by 8 players. This tournament appeared as though it was on a good pace to continue down, but the brakes were hit as the money started growing and play has once again come to a grinding halt forcing the final table to play a much longer day than anticipated. Corwin Cole is the most experienced player at the table with a whopping 4 WSOP cashes, but Steven Tabb is holding the lead with just over a million chips in his stack.

Event 38 kicked off on Friday and it still has a mountain of players remaining. Phil Hellmuth made an early run as did Kid Poker, but both are nowhere to be seen on the leader board now. The overall leader is David Baker with 72,100 in chips.

There are two more events kicking off on Saturday and you can expect to see a monster field in Event 39. With only one event going yesterday, players may be a little antsy, well rested and looking for action. The second tournament of the day will be the World Championship of Pot Limit Omaha. The $10,000 buy in assures us of two things: a small field and a lot or professionals. Expect to see Negreanue, Ivey, Clements and several other big names to made a deep run in this tournaments.

Aldridge had been getting the best of Cavella for quite a while at this point and Cavella needed to make a move to try and get back in the tournament. He looked down at K4 diamonds and liked his chances so he shoved in and got an instacall from Aldridge who had him dominated with KQ. The flop gave him a little hope with K99, but the board never matched or hit an Ace and this marathon was finally over. Aldridge takes down $428,259 for first and Cavella will take home $264,814 for second place.

Event #10 was another long day, 13 hours in all. This tournament had been moving much slower than the others. So much so that the last day was only supposed to be a final table, but they had to play from 18 because of the pace. In the end, Boukai would emerge as another first time bracelet winner. We are seeing a lot of new names emerge so far as the pros are having a very difficult picking their way through these massive fields of very aggressive players. Here is a recap of the last hand.

Bennani was on the button and made a pot limit raise. Bouakai came over the top to put him all in and Bennani made the call. Boukai was sittign on pocket 9’s, but Bennani had two live over cards with a JdQh. The flop was great news with AKQ and it looked great for Bennnani until Boukai hit a 2 outer on the turn with a 9d. To add insult to injury, an Ad hit the river and Bennani was sent to the rail. He collected $151,335 for second place and Boukai wins $244,862 and his first bracelet.

In other tournaments…

Event #11 has finished its day two with 25 players still remaining so they will have to come back a little early and play a long session down to the bracelet winner. Hellmuth was eliminated to his usual rant when he placed his faith in 66 and was not rewarded. Picking a name out of this one is like a blind draw, but Scott Hall has been playing great and is well within striking distance of the chip leader. Let’s see if he can make a move on the final day.

Event #12 is easily the largest field of pros that we have seen go this far in a tournament. In fact, the top position is held by Huck Seed and Todd and Doyle Brunson are nipping at his heels. When Seed has chips he is as good as they get, but nostalgia has to have you hoping that Doyle can get it done one more time.

Event #13 is still trudging along with 180 players left in the field. Chip counts were not yet posted for this event. Event #14 was also in its first day and this one has a surprising amount of eliminations being a limit tournament. Our guess is the players playing no limit hands in a limit game and donating their chips in pot after pot. This is another event that is stacked with top name pros as the game of limit is a little more than most No Limit players can adjust to. This should be a great day two.