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Doyle Brunson, a legend to high all poker legends, handed away Might 14 on the age of 89. [Image: Flickr.com / World Poker Tour]
Unmatched in poker historical past
Doyle Brunson, the primary poker participant everybody would placed on the sport’s Mount Rushmore, handed away Sunday, Might 14 on the age of 89. The “Godfather of Poker” was one in every of poker’s trailblazers, serving to convey the sport out of the seedy Texas again rooms and into the sunshine as a legit type of leisure.
His son, fellow Poker Corridor of Famer Todd Brunson, confirmed the information Sunday evening:
“Texas Dolly” performed within the very first World Collection of Poker in 1970, in the end successful ten gold bracelets in his profession, two of which had been for the Fundamental Occasion. Solely Phil Hellmuth, with 16, has extra whole bracelets. Brunson was a fixture within the highest stakes money video games in Las Vegas for half a century, even nicely into his 80’s, each intimidating and soft-spoken on the similar time. His Tremendous/System might be a very powerful poker guide ever written.
My first WSOP, his final bracelet
However you’ll be able to examine Doyle Brunson’s poker accomplishments wherever. I need to take a second to speak about what he meant to me originally of my profession within the poker world. After I earned my MBA in 2004, I ended up in a consulting job with an terrible firm. I stop after a number of months and was lucky sufficient to hitch up with a web-based poker affiliate to assist launch its poker information web site.
studying to swim by leaping into the pool
Inside only a couple months of beginning, I flew out Las Vegas to cowl the World Collection of Poker. I had watched poker on tv and performed micro-stakes video games on-line, however aside from that, I knew little or no concerning the poker business or group. However there I used to be on the Rio, media badge round my neck, studying to swim by leaping into the pool.
However I knew who Doyle Brunson was. Wandering across the tables, snapping footage and taking notes, I took each alternative I may to linger by his and different well-known professionals’ tables, as if I may take in data simply by sharing the identical ambiance.
I spent a number of my time within the bleachers at closing tables so I may report on them as quickly as they ended. So there I used to be in late June, sitting there with my notepad and new fancy digital camera that my boss purchased as soon as we realized my little point-and-shoot wasn’t reducing it, watching Doyle Brunson compete on the closing desk of the $5,000 Brief Handed No-Restrict Maintain’em Occasion. Going into the 2005 WSOP, he was tied with Johnny Chan for the all-time lead in bracelets with 9, however Chan scored his tenth that sequence to drag forward.
Though forces like Jason Lester, Minh Ly, Scotty Nguyen, and Layne Flack had been on the desk, everybody, together with me, was rooting for Doyle. And certain sufficient, he beat Ly heads-up to win his tenth and closing WSOP bracelet. Although I used to be new to the poker world, I may really feel the significance of the second. With the super-duper digital camera, I took as many images as I may of Brunson as he held up the bracelet in triumph, hoping I may get one thing appropriate for my article.
Doyle Brunson gave me confidence
That summer season, I additionally began writing for Canadian Poker Participant journal and, together with my media outlet, agreed to share the images I took with the periodical. To my nice delight, a WSOP article I wrote was the quilt story and much more stunning, one in every of my images of Doyle Brunson made the quilt. Within the grand scheme of my profession and the business, it didn’t matter – the article wasn’t superb, no one knew I took the image, and in the event that they did, they wouldn’t have cared – however it was a proud second for me, one which made me really feel like I belonged.
The next 12 months, Brunson was signing autographs sooner or later within the Doyle’s Room lounge, the room close to the principle poker site on the WSOP the place followers may go join his branded on-line poker site and seize some swag. I truly had the aforementioned situation of the journal with me in Las Vegas, so being the unprofessional “journalist” that I used to be, I made a decision to go stand in line and get it signed.
to have Doyle Brunson’s approval as a still-novice 30-year-old poker author meant every part to me
As I handed Doyle the journal, I advised him that I took the quilt picture. He paused, examined it, and mentioned in his comfortable Texas drawl, “That is actually good. You took this?” He then proceeded to take a second to flip by the pages, nodding in approval. He even had me speak briefly together with his publicist, who took my data. Nothing got here of it, however to have Doyle Brunson’s approval as a still-novice 30-year-old poker author meant every part to me. To have a legend like him know I existed, even when for only a minute, made my summer season.
Doyle Brunson meant a number of issues to lots of people. To me, in these early days of my profession within the poker business, he was the one who advised me I belonged.
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