Stu Ungar

Ungar was born to Jewish parents Isidore (1907–1967) and Faye Ungar (1916–1979).

He was raised on Manhattan's Lower East Side.

His father, Isidore ("Ido") Ungar, was a bookmaker and loan shark who ran a bar/social club called Foxes Corner that doubled as a gambling establishment, exposing Stu to gambling at a young age.

Despite Ido's attempts to keep his son from gambling after seeing its effects on his regular customers, Stu began playing underground gin rummy and quickly made a name for himself.

Ungar was gifted at school and skipped seventh grade, but then dropped out of school in tenth grade.

Stuart Errol Ungar (September 8, 1953 – November 22, 1998) was an American professional poker, blackjack, and gin rummy player, widely regarded to have been the greatest gin player of all time and one of the best Texas hold 'em players.

Ungar is one of two people in poker history to have won the World Series of Poker Main Event three times.

He is the only person to win Amarillo Slim's Super Bowl of Poker three times, the world's second most prestigious poker title of its time.

Additionally, Ungar is one of only four players in poker history to win consecutive titles in the WSOP Main Event, along with Johnny Moss, Doyle Brunson and Johnny Chan.

He dropped out of school to play gin rummy in the 1960s full-time to help support his mother and sister after his father died, and began regularly winning tournaments which earned him $10,000 or more.

Ido died of a heart attack on July 25, 1967.

Following his father's death, and with his mother virtually incapacitated by a stroke, Ungar drifted around the New York gambling scene until age 18, when he was befriended by reputed organized crime figure Victor Romano.

Romano was regarded as one of the best card players of his time.

He had the ability to recite the spelling and definition of all of the words in the dictionary and apparently shared a penchant and interest for calculating odds while gambling as Ungar did.

By many accounts, the two developed a very close relationship, with Romano serving as a mentor and protector.

Ungar was infamous for his arrogance and for routinely criticizing aloud the play of opponents he felt were beneath him, which included just about anyone.

One of Ungar's most famous quotes sums up his competitiveness: "I never want to be called a 'good loser.' Show me a good loser and I'll just show you a loser."

However, his relationship with Romano gave Ungar protection from various gamblers who did not take kindly to his crass attitude and assassin-like playing style.

Ungar won a local gin tournament at age 10.

By 1976, he was regarded as one of the best players in New York City.

Ungar eventually had to leave New York due to gambling debts at local race tracks.

He later moved to Miami, Florida, to find more action.

In 1977, Ungar left Miami for Las Vegas, Nevada, where he reunited with Madeline Wheeler, a former girlfriend who would become his wife in 1982.

One of the reasons Ungar eventually took up poker exclusively was because gin action had dried up due to his skilled reputation.

Ungar destroyed anyone who challenged him in a gin match, including a professional widely regarded as the best gin player of Ungar's generation, Harry "Yonkie" Stein.

Ungar beat Stein 86 games to none in a high-stakes game of Hollywood Gin, after which Stein dropped out of sight in gin circles and eventually stopped playing professionally.

As one observer who knew him put it, Stein "was never the same after that night."

After beating Stein and several other top gin professionals, Ungar was a marked man.

Nobody wanted to play him in gin.

In the hopes of generating more action for himself, Ungar began offering potential opponents handicaps to even the playing field.

He was known to let his opponent (professional or not) look at the last card in the deck, offer rebates to defeated opponents and always play each hand in the dealer position, all of which put him at a strong disadvantage.

When Ungar first visited Las Vegas in 1977, gin was still popular in a tournament format, much like heads up poker tournaments.

Ungar won or finished highly in so many gin tournaments that several casinos asked him to not play in them because many players said they would not enter if they knew Ungar was playing.

Ungar later said in his biography that he loved seeing his opponent slowly break down over the course of a match, realizing he could not win and eventually get a look of desperation on his face.

Shortly after arriving in Las Vegas, Ungar defeated professional gambler Billy Baxter for $40,000.

Baxter noted that when Ungar first entered the room, Baxter did not believe he was his opponent because of Ungar's youthful looks and small stature.

Baxter also said that during their match, a Coca-Cola crate had to be placed on Ungar's chair so he could reach the table.

Though he is nowadays more well known for his poker accomplishments, Ungar regarded himself as a better gin rummy player, once stating,

"Some day, I suppose it's possible for someone to be a better no limit hold 'em player than me. I doubt it, but it could happen. But, I swear to you, I don't see how anyone could ever play gin better than me."

In 1980, Ungar entered the World Series of Poker (WSOP) looking for more high-stakes action.