POKER INFO - PROILE - Stu Ungar

people are so close minded there are many people who do drugs without anyone knowing instead of the focus being stu's addiction the focus should be how badly hed bust your ass in a second he saw through people and right through the deck hes the greatest no if ands or buts

i wish people would stp with the immature comments about stu. it is both crass and plain wrong. you are dishonroing a mans memory. i know my argument will do nothing do dissaude you, but stefanie i would like you to know that your father is my favorite player of all time, and i enjoy every story i hear about his wit and humor, as well as those about his card game mastery. i would have truly liked to meet him. i cant wait to read the book, still havent had any time to go out and get it. however ive heard great things and im very happy for you that you were able to do such a great thing for your father as tell the story, the true story, from his writings and the stories of others. thank you for posting on this site, i thorughly enjoy your posts. hope you had fun at the braves game. atlanta is my favorite team. hope hear back from ya.

Stu was the most feared player in the world. Hands down the best. I just finished the book One of kind and I think its very good. Its really a deep look into the geneius of a disturbed mind. Its too bad that he went out the way he did because he'd be bustting out the young guns today.

Just as there are better chess players now than in the past, eventually there will be a better tournament hold 'em player than Stu. Someone who reads Daniel Negreanu or Doyle Brunson like they're drunken Las Vegas tourists. Someone who can even tell what other players are folding before the flop, and calculate the probabilities instantaneously. Someone as brilliant as Stu, but still under control. I firmly believe this, just as Kasparov is considered by many to be superior to Bobby Fischer, someone will come along who's better than Stu.But we certainly haven't seen Stu's tournament equal yet, not even a remote rival. Yes, the fields are tremendously larger than they were even a few years ago, but consider that Stu sat down to 5 final WSOP tables and won all five bracelets, in a game that involves a tremendous amount of luck in the short run.

Very True Words Mike GG

Regarding Kasparov being superior to Bobby Fischer, that is conjecture that will never be settled.One thing that's for sure is that Bobby Fischer (who himself is half Jewish) is a rabid anti semite and severely mentally ill (not just because he is an anti Semite, but because he is genuinely insane).By virtue of Fischers words, many people try and detract from what he was in the world of chess because they don't like whatever it is that he has become.It's an arguable point whether Kasparov could have ever beaten Fischer, but it is very, very far from a slam dunk answer if I were to be betting on a match of either one in their prime.As this relates to Stu Ungar, it's true that an Ungar'esque player will one day emerge, but any way you look at it, he will never be Stu Ungar.It's doubtful that an individual that played at the level Mr. Ungar played at will ever be bested by much of a margin.There may be a more sober player who is more consistent than Stu Ungar or maybe a more diverse player who can dominate cash games in the same way he dominates tournamentplay, but I do believe Stu reached the apex of tournament play and reading into people that just can't get any better.It's an old philosophical debate that applies to lots of different things.For example, look at sprinters. Is there a ceiling where the human animal just can't run any faster, or 500 years from now will sprinters be running sub 2 minute miles?The fact is, I believe that Mr. Ungar was one of those rare cases where he had achieved 'absolute best'. While one day the historical dustbin may produce a player that is his peer, I seriously doubt that anyone will ever be a measurably 'better' tournament player than he was by sole virtue of his skill level being pretty much without flaw.Flawed as a man, yes. We all are.Flawed as a gambler, for damn sure. As far as tournament play, there were no flaws to speak of.

Maybe I'm just hoping to see a player of Stu's caliber emerge someday. I try to wrap my mind around the idea that one player won all five times that he sat down to a final table in the WSOP, and I just want to see it for myself. We've seen Tiger Woods play golf, and Michael Jordan play basketball, and I want to see another Stu.