We’ve all seen the local grinder who runs good in his first few 2/5 sessions and thinks he’s god’s gift to poker before the downfall, but I’m curious about cases at a much higher level, players who seemed to be great, maybe even were great for some time, but fell far from their peak and never made it back.
In chess there’s the well-known story of Ding Liren who won the World Championship and soon after started playing very poorly and became basically an afterthought among top players (and that’s in a game with no randomness); just a few years later and he basically doesn’t even play top level tournaments and is outside the top 10, which made me wonder if poker ever saw a similar case.
Ding Liren
I’m not at all well-versed in poker history so the only one who comes to mind is Stefan Burakov (what’s he up to these days anyway?) but there must be others.
Stefan Burakov
– "Chris Ferguson and Howard Lederer."
– "Add Annie Duke to that list. Even though she became minted."
Ed. – Annie is Howard Lederer's sister. At the height of her poker career, she was at the center of several major scandals. It's known that, as an UltimateBet ambassador, she knew that some people had access to opponents' cards, but she didn't take advantage of this software feature. In 2011, Duke was one of the organizers of the Epic Poker League series. The company held three tournaments in the first season, after which it declared bankruptcy. The top 27 players at the end of the year were scheduled to play in a freeroll with a $1 million prize pool, but it was canceled. The company was left owing over $8 million to creditors.
In 2012, Annie retired from poker. She now writes books and lectures. On her official website, she describes herself as "Author. Speaker. Strategic Decision-Making Specialist." According to the Washington Speaker Bureau, a single speaking engagement costs over $70,000.
– "Did they go bankrupt? They just stopped playing poker."
– "Chris Ferguson is still rich as hell."
Chris Ferguson
– "Brad Booth was the first to come to mind.
Stu Unger is probably the best answer. The last few years of his life sounded miserable."
– "Doesn’t work for Stu. Became the only person to legitimately win the Main Event 3 times and then died the next year."
– "He was like Bobby Fisher. Disappear, turn back up and crush everyone, disappear again..."
Stu Unger (right)
– "Played against brad booth at MGM 15 years ago. He had a cute Asian prostitute with him. he was going all in blind at $2/5. I remember deliberating for about 5 minutes with pocket deuces. Then I finally realized it's actually the worst hand in poker to call a blind flip with. Felt completely retarded. thx for reading."
– "Stu literally won the main event in the last few years of his life.
His case is a lot different than Brad's, Brad was just not good, I still remember his ridiculous nonsense bluff against Phil Ivey that happened to work, but it was still ridiculous. Stu was at the top of the game until the very end, his problem was himself."
– "Stu was a professional drug addict who dabbled in cards."
– "He had to borrow money to play in the main the last year he won it.
He was dominate but his demons got the better of him.
He was homeless and a drug addict. I’m not sure there’s much of an argument here."
– Gus Hansen.
– "This was the first one to come to my mind. I think online especially killed him. Back in the day he was easily one of the most aggressive live players around. When he was crushing WPT tourneys."
Gus Hansen
– "I really loved his book “every hand revealed” where he walks through step by step a tournament that he won.
There was a famous video of him shoving almost every hand and winning a tournament. Younger me was like 'omg he’s so aggressive this is the way!'
Older me is like 'well yea the blinds were huge and he had a short stack.'”
– "The tournament where he went all in over and over was not because the blinds were huge and he had a short stack but was in a points league where he only got paid if he finished 1st and a couple of the other guys didn't get score more points, so shoving almost every hand was a strategic adjustment to that very specific scenario. Regardless, it was great fun to watch."
– "This is probably gonna be the best answer here. was in the pantheon then attempted to stay at the top of online as it evolved into durrrs era and he lost like 20M."
– Ali Imsirovich.
– "Wunderkind to persona non grata in an instant."
Ali Imsirovich
– "Is he the idiot who tried to cheat Paul Phua?"
– "This one sucked cause him and I are from the same hometown and attended the same university. I was really rooting for him but what he did, you can’t come back from that."
After cheating in poker, should Ali Imsirovic be banned for life or forgiven? Find out what led to the bans, how the community feels, and whether there's hope for redemption.
– "I'm surprised not see durrrr's name yet. It's hard to overstate how immaculate his reputation and public perception were circa 2008-2010. He was the golden boy of poker. He seemed invincible and could do no wrong. Maybe he's still good enough to get staked in big games and live a baller life, but the subsequent debt and mental health challenges make him just another cautionary tale."
– "He was more or less the first superstar to come purely from an online background. Interesting guy. I don’t know the details of his issues but he always looked like he hadn’t left the basement in months."
Tom Dwan (durrrr)
– "Well, him and Galfond. Which is why Galfond was goated, because he's still crushing."
"In terms of universally despised, persona non grata, it's got to be Russ Hamilton.
Even with Lederer and Ferguson there's some level of plausible deniability to the extent of their involvement, but Hamilton is bang to rights."
– "This. I'd give Jesus a pass, he was the software guy. Howard had to know, but the Justice department freezing accounts just brought it all to a head. They were swimming in rake."
Russ Hamilton
– "I lost 35k playing 25/50 at UltimateBet against a “fish” that kept winning. Turned out to bea cheater. Got 1.5k back. Was this Russ? Where does he hang out these days?"
– "Most recent one, Action Dan? He ran hot for few weeks before the MDG, then he disappeared right after that."
– "He was great to watch but got f***ing destroyed in the Million Dollar Cash Game, whew. He must've had a significant piece of himself to just disappear like that..."
Action Dan (Dan Kwon)
– "Not action Dan the author, right? The other action Dan?"
– "Yes, Dan Kwon went on a sick run at mostly Hustler playing ultra-LAG then gave it all back and then some in a week.
Action Dan Harrington is like 80 now and seems to just do a few tournaments for fun nowayears."
– "I dislike that some young guy calls himself Action Dan in poker, when there was already a famous Action Dan in poker."
– "That was the 2nd person I was thinking of right after Gus Hanson. Lindgren was solid back in the day and crushed WPT even more than Hanson I believe. Never really saw what happened to him or why he stopped playing. Obviously I have my assumptions."
Erick Lindgren
– "He owned millions in unpaid debt from football squares to people on 2+2 and accusations of welching on other sports betting debts are well documented."
– "That was my biggest assumption. Sports betting and then running terribly in Online poker. Plus probably some other cough extra curricular activities."
– "In one of those early 2000s books about how to play poker, each chapter had an excerpt from a someone who was on Poker After Dark. In one of the chapters, the guy recommended sitting with your entire bankroll at a much higher limit, shoving, winning the blinds, and then leaving.
I’m 90% sure it was Lindgren who wrote that, but I might be wrong."
– "He was on Hustler Casino Live recently.. and won quite a chunk."
Ed. – In May, Eric qualified for the Million Dollars Game via satellite, played one session, and finished with a profit of $283,000.
– "Lately, I would say Rampage. He became a sensation when he was grinding 2/5 and 5/10 and the less than $5k tournaments. He was grinding and doing well and he made way more from YouTube than he made playing poker. He started playing high stakes and has been getting absolutely torched. He's lost even more on sports gambling. He's lost so much money that he can't even stake himself and now he's resorting to small stakes on WPT Gold instead of live poker and it's killing his YouTube channel."
Rampage Poker reflected on losing a million dollars in high-stakes cash games and announced his upcoming poker plans, including the Million Dollar Game.
Ed. – Actually, things haven't been going so badly for Ethan at Hustler lately.
– "Not a famous person but a guy I played with. He disappeared for years and then all of a sudden showed up to play 5/10/20. He started telling me and the table about how he had gone broke and quit poker. Then he started watching a bunch of poker vlogs and live streams and couldn’t believe how terrible everyone was playing these days. He went on and on about how he played the night before and won a couple thousand without even trying and didn’t even run well but everyone is just so terrible it’s impossible for him to lose. He quit his job to go all in on poker again.
He got staked by one of the guys who he used to play with… he lasted exactly 3 sessions before quitting again."
Some old school legends.
Ted Forrest – used to play high stakes, now plays 5/5 in some backwater.
Lane Flack was grinding micro stakes at Aria shortly before his death.
Barry Greenstein plays micro-stakes in California.
Ed. – In the 2000s, Greenstein was called the "Robin Hood of Poker." He played the highest limits at Bobby's Room and participated in tournaments for fun. There was a period when he donated all his tournament winnings to various charities. However, this didn't last very long.
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