Greatness

There was a time when I played poker regularly and I was pretty good.  I ended each year winning more than I lost, which put me in the top 10% of visitors to the casino.  However, I calculated that I was winning approximately fifty cents for every hour that I played.  Giving up my day job was never an option.  As I said, I was pretty good, but not great.

There are few who are truly great.  Why not me?  Searching for an answer, I read a biography about Stu Ungar, arguably the greatest poker player ever.  He was a genius, with a photographic memory, a quick mind for numbers, a quick read on his opponents coupled together with absolute fearlessness at the poker table.  Ungar has the distinction of being the only three-time champion of The World Series of Poker main event.

In his first attempt in 1980, Ungar won The World Series of Poker by defeating the legendary Doyle Brunson.  At that time, Ungar was the youngest winner ever. His win was no fluke.  The following year he won his second title.  However, Ungar did not win his third and final championship until 1997.  During much of that sixteen-year hiatus, Ungar lived a wild, roller-coaster lifestyle.  He was a high stakes gambler. On more than one occasion he won a million dollars, only to go broke soon thereafter on ill-advised sports betting.  When winning, he was lavishly generous to friends.  When losing, he could be abusive to card dealers and less-skilled opponents.  Ungar loved the fast life.  He didn’t sit down to eat.  He could go for days without sleep.  Maybe he had ADHD.  Maybe he was bipolar. However, close friends attribute his ultimate downfall to hardcore drug abuse.  After destroying his nose snorting cocaine, when he could no longer snort, he switched to crack cocaine.

Stu Ungar was my age.  He was born 2 months before I was.  He died on my 45th birthday. The cause of his death was heart failure attributed to chronic drug abuse.  In his lifetime, it is estimated that he won over $30-million dollars playing poker.  When he died, he had only $800 dollars in his possession, all that was left from a $25,000 loan.

Biographies can inspire and inform.  Ungar’s biography is not inspiring, but it does inform.  It is a warning. Stu Ungar was a great poker player, maybe the greatest ever.   He was one of the most fearless players ever, but there is a fine line between ‘fearless’ and ‘reckless’.  Ungar was ‘reckless’ in life.  He lacked perspective and priority.  The thrill of the bet, the rush of the game, like the rush of cocaine, was an end unto itself. Sadly, the fearlessness that made him so formidable at the poker table, was ultimately the recklessness that destroyed his life.  Ungar had talent and genius.  He was a great poker player, but greatness came at too high a price.

Is this story only about Stu Ungar and poker?  Is there's a broader lesson to consider, perhaps a lesson in-general about the high cost of greatness?  When it comes to poker, I'm okay with being pretty good.

Maybe next, I'll read a biography about the world’s greatest blogger.