Doyle Brunson, Poker Legend

Doyle Brunson is one of the most well-known names in poker today. He is one of the first people to have brought Texas Hold'em to the Las Vegas Gambling scene, and is considered one of the top authorities in the world of poker. This is so much so that in its January 2006 issue, Bluff Magazine voted him the number one most influential person in the poker world. He has even been inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame.

Doyle Brunson has written a number of very influential books on the subject of poker. One of his first, "Super/System," is believed to be the single most authoritative work on poker. Self-published in 1978, this book offers an insight into the way professional poker players like Brunson, Chip Reese, David Sklansky, and others, play and win. It was one of the first of its kind, and is arguably his greatest achievement outside of the poker table. His other works include "Poker Wisdom of a Champion," which was published in 1984 as "According to Doyle," by Lyle Stuart.

Brunson's poker career began in Forth Worth, Texas. He and a friend, Dwayne Hamilton, played in illegal games run by organized crime syndicates on Exchange Street. He eventually became a rounder; a poker player who travels around the country looking for poker games. He and Hamilton traveled around Texas, and reached as far as Oklahoma and Louisiana. In their travels, they met fellow poker playing professionals, Sailor Roberts and Amarillo Slim. Because of the illegal nature of some of the games that Brunson had taken part in, certain rules were not always enforced, and Brunson admits that he has had a gun pulled on him many times over the course of his early poker career.

Hamilton eventually quitted the life of a rounder, and moved back to Fort Worth. Brunson and the others, on the other hand, went on to travel around the United States, gambling on -in Brunson's own words- "just about everything." They eventually pooled their money and went to Las Vegas sometime during the 1960s. After an exciting life of gambling and traveling, Brunson finally settled in Las Vegas, and continues to live there to this day. Despite his having settled down though, Brunson continued to be a forced to contend with in the poker world. He has won ten World Series of Poker bracelets, and is the first ever to have won first prize in the World Series of Poker's Main Event twice in a row, in 1976 and 1977.