Casinoportalen has taken a closer look at a poker player whose name most people have forgotten. This may have something to do with the fact that he died almost 10 years ago. Still, despite his death, we think that Stu Ungar is a big name that deserves an article - Ungar was a fabulous poker player, who had the world at his feet until that day in November 1998...
Stu Ungar was found dead one afternoon in November 1998 at a motel in the cheap part of Las Vegas. The TV was showing a dirty movie and the room was in a mess. Ungar had been on heavy drugs, and the police didn't find it nessecary to examine if it was a murder. There was no moeny to found in the hotel room, and his bank account was empty. No one was sure if he ever had one. He was broke and his friends collected money for his funeral.
This is how the world's best poker player ended his life. Throughout his short life of 38 years he made more than £642585 playing poker. His was extremely intelligent, but all he ever did was playing poker and Gin Rommy. As the only player ever, he won the unofficial World Championship in poker three times. The only thing that skept him from winning the fourth title was his lonely death at the Oasis Motel in Las Vegas.
Related to the Mafia
With his superior intelligence Ungar could have chosen any career, but was playing cards that became his passion and his job. The environment that surrounded him didn't inspire him to choose another way of life. His familiy was Hungarian jews that came to America before the 2nd World War. He lived and breathed in his fathers cheap pub in Lower East Side on Manhattan. The pub was home of Italians Jewish gangsters and other criminals. He was a skinny little active guy who loved to listen to the people in the pub. Besides from owing a pub, his father was also a bookkeeper and lender. However, he wasn't able to read. As a result of this, Stu was the one to keep the books and Stu had a great talent dealing with numbers.
The surroundigs were rotten. Ungur once said that his Jewish confirmation was attended by so many suspicious types of people that the police was interested in the list of visitors. When Stu's father died these people became his friends.
At this time Stu had the reputation of having magic skills handling numbers and cards, and as time went by he became a member of the gangster family Genovese. Suddenly he found himself in the middle of the Mafia and through this he got in contact with a member of the Mafia called Victor Romano. Romano had several illegal card clubs on Manhattan, and Romano let him play as a pro and gave him protection like a real Mafia. Stu once said about being part of this environment:
»Back then in the 1960ies I mostly spent time with the Italians, but I also met the Irish. I tell you that these people were the hardest cold hearted murders I've ever met. I was only a teenager, but I spent time with these kind of people. Just like in school I was the smallets kid, but I had the biggest and strongets friends«.
He quickly earned the nick name »the Kamikaze Kid«, due to his fearless approach to gambling, but some people also named him »The Kid«, because he was small, thin and looked like a little boy. His weight never reached more than 110 pounds. You never see ham walk - instead he ran. Besides from that he spoke with a very fast classic Lower New Yorker jargon like you'll hear in criminals on TV and in Will Eisner eller Philip Marlowe books.
Stu started playing Gin Rommy, but in no time he was looked at as invincible both on Manhattan and the East Coast. As a result of this he skipped Gin Rommy and replaced it with poker, but no one wanted to play poker with him. He used his superior intelligence and his memory and through this he had a great feeling of his opponents' possibilities. Those people who played poker against Stu claimed that he had a sixth sence.
Stu the human
What was Stu Ungar like as a human? He was very generous and he loved his wife deeply. However, he was addicted to drugs and gambling. He won huge prizes, but he quickly lost the money on trotting. Here he couldn't use his "sixth" sence. If Stu was friendly when he didn't play poker, he was tough and hostile as soon as he got near a deck of cards. He went straight for winning the prizes.
Stu Ungar has desribed his life like this:
»They called me a monster. When I was 15 I slaughtered gamblers with 30 years experience. I made them look like fools. Well, maybe I was a kind of monster«.
Stu Ungar played non stop day and night and his life had no structure. He turned to horse racing, because this gave an unpredictable exitement: »I needed the constant challange. There is no challange in beating a bunch of losers playing cards. Give me a horse race instead, and let me guess the winner - that makes me high.«
Systematically Stu lost his money playing on horses.
Despite his life style he met a girl, Madeline. He instantly fell in love. Stu and Madeline had a daughter:
»I really loved Madeline. But she fooled me into marrying her, and I'll never forgive her that. However I thank my lucky star that she did it - otherwise we would never have a baby«.
The relationship between Stu and Madeline ended with a divorce and he slowly lost contact with his datter.
The World Championship
When Stu Ungar died in 1998, the poker crace hadn't begun yet. Despite of that poker was popular. The unofficial World Championship was held in Las Vegas. He won this tournament in 1980, but he couldn't bring home the $300.000 prize. He had nothing that could identify him as Stu Ungar. The year after he won again, but he quickly lost his money beting on horses.
He spent the following years gambling and doing drugs. Stu says:
»I had a party in my hotel room. People that I didn't know came in. Girls and party like types. They did drugs like cracy. After that happened I decided no to spent any more money on drugs, so I started doing drugs in private all by my self«.
In 1997 he showed up in Las Vegas to participate in the World Championship once again. He looked and smelled like a vagabond, and he didn't even have the $10.000 he needed to enter the tournament. He took a loan and won the title. He's the only one ever to win the tournament three times. The prize was one million dollars. He paid the man who loaned him the $10.000 half the prize, and the rest of the money was gone after just one month.
Ungar didn't blame his social background or his mafia friends He said:
»An old poker proverb says that you're your own worst enemy. I can tell you that nothing is more true than that. God gave me a present. Maybe I haven't used my talents.I'm not a big person, but what ever bad things I've done have not only harmed myself but also my closest family...« |
