Doyle Brunson remembered for poker, faith, betting on golf course

Gabe Kaplan became captivated with poker after Doyle Brunson won his second straight World Series of Poker Main Event in 1977.

Eventually, the actor and comedian ventured to the Horseshoe during the WSOP and met Brunson for the first time.

As a gesture of friendship, Brunson gifted Kaplan a copy of his poker strategy book “Super System” and wrote an inscription inside.

“And then he said, ‘This book I’m selling for $100, but I want you to have it for free as my gift to you,’ ” Kaplan recalled. “That free $100 book in the last 40 years has cost me $35 million.”

Brunson was remembered for his faith, fearsome negotiating skills on the golf course and character during a celebration of life Sunday. A near-capacity crowd gathered inside Jubilee Theater at Horseshoe Las Vegas as friends and family shared memories of Brunson.

The longtime Las Vegas resident and one of poker’s most influential players of all time died May 14 at 89.

Brunson started playing poker in illegal backroom games in Texas in the 1950s and recorded 54 consecutive winning poker sessions in 1963, according to his agent, Brian Balsbaugh. His 10 WSOP victories are tied for second all time, and he also earned a World Poker Tour title in 2004 to go with millions of dollars more in cash games and on the golf course.

Brunson was inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame in 1988 and was one of the stars of the televised poker boom during the 2000s.

“We’ve heard throughout our lives how players get lucky in certain games. What we don’t hear is when the games get lucky,” poker TV producer Mori Eskandani said. “Baseball got lucky when Babe Ruth hit his first home run. Boxing got lucky when Muhammad Ali knocked out his first opponent. Poker got lucky when Doyle Brunson dragged his first pot.”

Brunson was known for his unusual business ventures, including a search for Noah’s Ark. The devout Christian bought a religious TV station in Mobile, Alabama, and also spent thousands of dollars with his wife, Louise, to install water wells in Africa.

During the early days of the WSOP, Brunson organized Bible studies and paid to bring in famous preachers, according to friend and business partner Dewey Tomko.

“From 6 o’clock to 7 o’clock every day, we would get up from the table and go to the Bible study, come back at 7 o’clock and people were screaming at us, ‘Where’d you go?’ ” Tomko said. “This lasted for a pretty long time. Eventually the World Series of Poker outgrew us.”

While Brunson was best known for his poker skills, he also was a renowned bettor on the golf course. Brunson’s son, Todd, recalled his father waking up each day and getting on the phone to find a golf match, then playing 54 holes in the Las Vegas heat before a late-night poker session.

Six-time WSOP winner Daniel Negreanu remembered one instance at Shadow Creek when Brunson and poker star Phil Ivey wouldn’t budge while negotiating the terms of the bet, and the group never teed off.

“I’m not saying that Doyle was a tough bargainer, but if he was a hostage negotiator, there’d be a lot of dead people all over the place,” said Kaplan, drawing huge laughter from the audience.

Brunson won both of his Main Event titles with the 10-2 hand, and Balsbaugh proposed to make Oct. 2 known as Doyle Brunson Day in celebration of poker.

Todd Brunson capped the ceremony with a story about his father’s involvement in The Highlands Club, an online poker site in the early 2000s. The site was using player deposits for day-to-day expenses, according to Todd Brunson, and there was no money to pay the investors when it shut down.

“I think my dad owned 40 percent of the site, but he took 100 percent of the responsibility and paid back all the investors,” Brunson said. “It’s something he never talked about, never took credit for. But you stop and think about that, he wasn’t responsible. His name wasn’t on that site. That was truly an amazing thing, in my opinion, that he did.”

Contact David Schoen at dschoen@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5203. Follow @DavidSchoenLVRJ on Twitter.