Posts Tagged ‘doyle brunson’

David “Doc” Sands retires from Poker

Monday, March 3rd, 2014

David “Doc” Sands has become the latest famed poker pro to retire from the game. But unlike other players, Sands isn’t retiring because he’s burnt out or doing badly on the tables. Instead, he’ll be working for a hedge fund, as he told Doyle Brunson via twitter. Here’s a quick look at their twitter exchange:

(Brunson) There is a rumor going around that you are retiring from poker. Surely it’s not true?

(Sands) I am, to an extent. I took a job at hedge fund – learning how to place some bigger bets 😉

Sands has been playing poker since the mid-2000s. He first gained fame after racking up some impressive online poker scores, even achieving the number one ranking on PocketFives for a while. He’s earned over $3 million in online tournament cashes, with most of this money coming at Full Tilt and PokerStars.

Both he and his then-girlfriend (now wife), Erika Moutinho, achieved some mainstream fame after they made deep runs in the 2011 WSOP Main Event. This was obviously a true love connection because Sands busted out in 30th ($242,636), with Moutinho shortly following him in 29th place (same payout).

After this breakthrough in the live circuit, Sands went on to take second in the 2011 Doyle Brunson Five Diamond $100k High Roller ($664,027), second in the 2012 L.A. Poker Classic Main Event ($806,370), second in the 2013 PCA $100k High Roller ($1,259,320), and first in the 2013 WPT Championship $100k Super High Roller ($1,023,750). Thanks to all of these huge scores, he has $5,738,008 in live tournament winnings.

Given the success that Sands has maintained in recent years, it’s interesting timing that he would choose now to step away from the game. But on the other hand, maybe Doc is looking at investing as a way to turn his poker profits into even more winnings. Whatever the case may be, we wish him luck in the future.

Doyle Brunson’s Montana Summer Home featured on ESPN

Thursday, August 22nd, 2013

For years the poker world has heard about Doyle Brunson’s Montana summer home. The 10-time WSOP gold bracelet winner visits this beautiful piece of property to get away from the craziness of Las Vegas. Now we get an in-depth look at Brunson’s summer getaway thanks to ESPN.

The world’s leading sports network featured the house on their coverage of the 2013 WSOP. During the segment, we get to hear about how Brunson got the idea to visit Montana from his best friend, poker legend Chip Reese. After visiting, Brunson fell in love with Montana and eventually decided to get his own place there.

One of his favorite things about going to the summer home is that he gets a break from poker and the world in general. As Brunson said, it’s rejuvenating to visit his Montana home.

Another thing that the Texas Dolly made sure to express during the WSOP segment is how important family is to him. “I think that people who don’t have family are really missing out on life,” said Brunson.

Those who watch the video will get to see plenty of lovely shots of the Montana countryside along with some views of Brunson’s summer home. If you’re a fan of the 80-year-old, it’s definitely worth checking out the following video. And seeing as how it is still summertime, you can bet that Doyle is probably lounging around his vacation home as we speak.

Michael Phelps competes in First Major Poker Tournament

Thursday, January 10th, 2013

Olympic great Michael Phelps continues his flirtation with the poker world after competing in the 2013 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure Main Event. This was actually Phelps’ first “major” live tournament and he admitted to being nervous about the experience.

However, the nerves quickly subsided and he got some big hands early on to remain in contention. Phelps would go on to survive the first day and make a strong run in the second day as well. Unfortunately, he was eliminated on the final level of Day 2 by Eddy Sabat.

The hand began with Sabat leading out with 4,800 chips, which Michael called. With the rest of the table having folded, the flop was dealt Ks-Qd-5d. Sabat bet another 6,200 and Phelps called before the dealer dealt a 6c turn card. Eddy checked here while the 18-time Olympic gold medalist bet out 8,000 chips; Sabat called and a Jc river card was dealt afterward.

This prompted Sabat to go all-in while Phelps called him and flipped over 6s-6h for a set. However, Sabat had him beat after completing a broadway straight on the river.

With Michael Phelps now eliminated, so too goes the biggest celebrity at the 2013 PCA Main Event. But with a solid performance in his first big poker tournament, it’s likely that we’ll see the best swimmer in history at other major events.

As for his entire poker career, Phelps spent a lot of time playing cash games in Las Vegas following the 2008 Summer Olympic Games. He became friends with poker greats like Doyle Brunson and Phil Hellmuth during this time while improving his live skills. Eventually, Phelps final tabled a 2008 Caesars Palace Classic side event and earned $5,213 for the finish. Now that he’s retired from swimming, we should see a few more strong tournament finishes from him.

Phil Hellmuth wins WSOPE Main Event

Friday, October 5th, 2012

Just yesterday, we discussed how Phil Hellmuth was leading the 2012 WSOPE Main Event final table. The truth is that we didn’t expect the Poker Brat to actually win – even with his experience and skill – because it seems like the final table chip leader is never a safe bet for some reason. But Hellmuth was able to finish the job and win the WSOPE Main Event along with €1,022,376 ($1.33 million).

The Poker Brat was quite humbled by his victory as he said, “I don’t say this often, but I am truly humbled by this. This is one of the most prestigious titles in poker and to get this one, it’s right up there with the (1989) World Championship.”

Hellmuth continued to reflect on the WSOPE win by saying, “I played the best poker of my life in this tournament. My game is constantly evolving. I tried some new things out that really worked this time. My game is never the same. You’ve got to constantly be improving, and that’s what I do.”

What’s truly impressive about Hellmuth is how he continues to make poker history, despite holding plenty of records already. His WSOPE victory makes him the only player to ever win both this tournament and the WSOP Main Event.

The Poker Brat also extended his gold bracelet record to 13, which means neither Doyle Brunson nor Johnny Chan will be catching him any time soon with their 10 bracelets. It’ll also be a long time before anybody even comes close to the 95 WSOP cashes that Hellmuth has accumulated in his career.

Once the 2012 WSOP Main Event concludes on October 30th, Phil will be adding a Player of the Year award to his lengthy list of accolades. All in all, this year was extremely kind to Hellmuth.

Michael Phelps eyeing Poker after 2012 Olympics

Sunday, August 5th, 2012

The 2012 Summer Olympics may still be raging on in London, but for Michael Phelps, the Olympics are over. He added four more gold medals and two silvers this year, which is a nice cap to what seems like the end of his career. So what’s next for the most decorated Olympic athlete in history?

Well it looks like he’s already planning his next move with poker. He’s dabbled in poker before, and now there are rumors of him preparing to hit the felt again. Doyle Brunson and Phil Hellmuth are just two of the poker players who have been keeping Phelps company, and ever since the 2008 Olympics, it seems like the game has become one of his main hobbies. Since Phelps enjoys poker so much, it’s rumored that he wants to become more serious about playing in the future.

The New York Times revealed the swimmer’s future plans of focusing more on poker with the following:

An avid card player, Phelps said it would be cool to participate in the World Series of Poker. “My game is a little off right now,” he said, “so I’ll have to start improving it a little bit.”

Since he was a little preoccupied with training for the 2012 Summer Olympics this year, he wasn’t able to focus as much energy on playing poker. Not to worry though…there is always next year’s WSOP and with the swimming career being put on the back burner, he can finally focus on poker.

Michael Phelps will surely enjoy his time away from swimming by returning to as normal of a life as possible for the all-time Olympic gold medal record holder (18). He plans to go to NFL football games, have play dates with the likes of Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods.

Daniel Negreanu rants on Full Tilt Poker

Thursday, February 23rd, 2012

To those who follow Daniel Negreanu, it’s pretty clear that he hates two things in life: 1) the Lederer family, and 2) Full Tilt Poker. And lately, Negreanu has been ranting on both of these subjects in-depth through some recent video blogs that he has released.

Now the whole point of the video blogs isn’t to bash Full Tilt Poker because Negreanu also discussed his trip to Sao Paolo, Brazil for the recent LAPT event. However, the videos have gained the most attention for what Negreanu has to say about FTP and the former owners.

In the first blog, which was entitled “VBlog with some Real Talk,” much of the blog was centered on how Jason Somerville came out and said that he was gay. The Canadian was a big supporter of Somerville coming out, and said that he was proud of the New Yorker for admitting he was gay.

Moving on to Full Tilt Poker subject, KidPoker backed up earlier comments he had made about how somebody should take a baseball bat to Howard Lederer’s testicles. Negreanu continued his rant on the former FTP owner by saying that he and the other owners were “scumbags” for not speaking at all about the situation. He finished by saying that Lederer hides out like a “shameful little weasel,” and Full Tilt knew they had no money, yet still took player deposits.

The following week’s video blog contained some more rants on Howard Lederer as well as Chris Ferguson. Negreanu also talked about how Doyle Brunson made a mistake in defending these two in a recent blog post. He went as far as to relate Brunson’s post to the time when Barry Greenstein defended Russ Hamilton after the UB mess.

In any case, it’s nice to have a high-profile pro like Daniel Negreanu ranting against guys like Lederer and Ferguson because of how badly their company mismanaged player funds. Now that we’ve covered all of this, you can see the video blogs below.

Is Phil Ivey Too Young For The Poker Hall Of Fame? Doyle Brunson Thinks So.

Tuesday, October 19th, 2010

Back in August the nominations for Poker Hall of Fame 2010 opened and the poker world has been on the edge of their seats waiting to find out which poker greats will make the cut this year. One of the prime candidates for admission into the Poker Hall of Fame, in the eyes of many poker fans, is Phil Ivey. However, despite Ivey’s success in the professional poker arena, Doyle Brunson thinks that the 34-year old poker player is too young to make it into the Poker Hall of Fame.

What qualifies Ivey for the Poker Hall of Fame? Well, for starters he won an L.A. Classic title in 2008, he’s got 8 WSOP bracelets under his belt, 9 WPT final tables, he is the top live tournament winner of all time, and that’s just a short list of his accomplishments. However, one of the requirements for players to gain entrance to the Poker Hall of Fame is that they must have “stood the test of time.” In Brunson’s opinion, Ivey is still too young to prove that he has stood the test of time.

Last year, 26-year old Tom “Durr” Dwan was nominated for the Poker Hall of Fame but was denied a spot because of his age. However, Ivey is substantially older than Dwan and has more years of experience in the game. Brunson also thinks that Daniel Negreanu, who is 36, is too young to become a hall of famer.

World Team Poker’s USA Roster Announced

Wednesday, April 7th, 2010

One of the poker world’s most exciting events, World Team Poker, is coming up and the roster for the USA team has been announced. For those of you that don’t know, World Team Poker is an international league for poker players. Each team is lead by a designated captain and the captain chooses four professional poker players from his or her country, plus an alternate, to join the team. Teams compete in regular matches throughout the season to see which country comes out on top.

What makes World Team Poker really exciting is that team captains serve as couches and are allowed to play themselves, substitute players and make calls just like in live sports. I’m really excited to see how the USA team will work together and look forward to watching the games when they are broadcast on television.

This year’s USA team captain is Doyle Brunson. Phil Hellmuth is going to be Brunson’s number two man, with Howard Lederer, Annie Duke, Allen Cunningham, Chris Ferguson, Mike Matusow, Jennifer Harmon and Erik Seidel also taking part.

The USA team will compete against seven other countries-Australia, China, England, Greece, Vietnam, Israel, and Brazil. Events include Limit Hold’em, No Limit Hold’em, Pot Limit Hold’em, Stud, Omaha and others and the games will commence on May 19 at the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas. World Team Poker games will be televised as well as broadcast on the Internet with interactive chat.

Paul Zimbler Breaks World Record for Continuous Heads Up Poker

Friday, September 25th, 2009

Yesterday, after 75 hours, 20 minutes and 21 seconds of nonstop poker playing, Paul Zimbler broke the world record for longest continuous heads up poker. Zimbler stayed awake for over three days in order to beat the previous world record setter, Paul Cain, who played for 74 hours and 12 minutes straight last year.

I’m all for people shooting for the stars and reaching their goals, but to me staying up for three days without a wink of sleep is just crazy! At least Zimbler, who is also known as “The Marbella Kid”, was not just trying to reach the goal for his own benefit-he was doing it for a good cause. Zimbler was playing for the Make a Wish Foundation and by the end of the stretch he has raised over ÂŁ35,000.

Zimbler played against famous poker players and champions from around the globe, including Annette Obrestad who won the WSOP Europe Main Event and Doyle Brunson. He ended by playing against Mike Matusow, followed by which he was carried away from the table, certainly off to sleep for a few straight days.

I saw surprised to hear that Zimbler ended his record-breaking streak as an overall winner. He banked 102 wins and only 81 losses, which is exceptional considering he was sleep deprived and probably not thinking at his clearest. Kudos to you, Paul Zimbler!