Last time I wrote about my favourite poker player, a calm and analytical person – Chris Ferguson. Well, Doyle Brunson falls into the same category, regarding both his player personality as well as my personal admiration for him. He is definitely on my list of people I would like to meet and have a chat with, not necessarily poker related. I hardly dare call him an old man out of fear of sounding disrespectful – however he always is amongst the oldest players at the World Series of Poker (WSOP). And amongst the most successful.
The poker pro and author of numerous poker strategy books that are referred to as poker bibles among serious players is 75 years of age. He was born on August 10, 1933, in Longworth, Texas. He can look back on more than half a century of experience as a professional poker player. He was the first player who managed to win the WSOP Main Event in consecutive years, the first to earn more than $1 million playing poker, one of only 4 players to win the WSOP Main Event more than once, has won 10 WSOP Bracelets (tied for second place with Honny Chan in that category) and the first of 5 players so far to win a WSOP Main Event as well as the World Poker Tour Title. It should not come as a big surprise that he is one of the most famous poker pros and has been inducted to the Hall of Fame as early as 1988. And he doesn’t show any signs of slowing down, let alone quitting the game!
Doyle Brunson used to be a very good athlete as he grew up in Longsworth, a small town with approximately 100 inhabitants. He had early success as a basketball player as well as long track runner and showed a lot of promise. However an accident while working forced him to wear a cast on his leg for 2 years and he had to abandon any dreams of a career in sports. From that moment on he concentrated on his studies and poker and found out that playing poker came very easy to him. After finishing his studies he realised that he could earn much more than his regular monthly salary in just a few hours of playing poker and decided to become a professional poker player.
Early career and a misread name
He started earning his first money by participating in illegal games in Fort Worth, Texas, and later also travelled to neighbouring states. Due to poker generally not being legalised back in these days he happened to find himself in some tricky situations on several occasions. Doyle Brunson was on the wrong end of a gun more than once, was held up, beaten up or robbed – you name it. After many turbulent years he eventually ended up in Las Vegas. By now his name is known not only for his poker skills but his much heralded books. One of the most famous of them is the popular Super System (as mentioned by Max in his blog post Sit&Go – Position and Starting Hand Requirements) which is being regarded as the poker bible by many poker players. Even though he claims that he lost a lot of money because of this book because now other players improved their game, he nonetheless managed to win more than an impressive $5,500,000 in live tournaments.
Some people wonder how he got his nickname Texas Dolly – in fact it was a very mundane mistake committed by Jimmy Snyder, an American sports commentator who simply misread Doyle’s last name and introduced him as Texas Dolly. From that moment on he was simply referred to as Dolly by many of his poker friends. His son Todd is also a poker pro and managed to win a WSOP Bracelet in 2005 playing Omaha Hi/Lo. This made Doyle and Todd the first father and son to win WSOP Bracelets.
If we talk about poker legends we will not be able to omit the name Doyle Texas Dolly Brunson – he is arguably one of the players who can claim to have influenced and shaped poker over the past few decades, be it as player or author. And it seems if he has his way this will continue for many years to come. And there is one thing that I really enjoy when he sits at a table: a lot of the usually chatty and noisy players decide to tone it down a bit and show some respect instead. Respect for his age? Rather respect for pure quality and style of one of the poker greats of all time.