DOYLISM OF THE DAY: “May the work that you have be the play that you love.”

There is finally some poker action in Bobby’s Room at the Bellagio.  We have lowered the stakes and more players are coming in. It’s really dumb to play so high no one except the ultra rich guys can play. I was completely exhausted when I got through traveling but after playing poker for 4 straight days, I feel great again. It is really amazing how playing helps me. I guess I’m a junkie after all these years.

DoylesRoom.com is putting on a “Twitter Followers Freeroll”  because I’ve got over 100,000 followers on Twitter. The winner gets a weekend in Vegas, dinner with me and partying with the young DoylesRoom pros. I guess they decided I couldn’t handle the partying and they may be right. The tournament is on this Sunday at 6pm Eastern time. I’ll tweet the password at 4pm Eastern the same day because our tournaments hold a few thousand players at a time. You have to have an account at DoylesRoom along with the password to play.

Cardoza publishing has already ordered the second printing of my autobiography because of the unexpected number of advance sells. It is going to hit the bookstores Nov. 10th and I’ve still got mixed feelings about writing this book.

I appreciate all the tweets, emails and phone calls expressing concerns over my toy poodle Casper. Casper jumped off a desk and knocked both his hips out of socket and Louise has to carry him everywhere because he can’t walk.  I should say couldn’t walk because he is able to walk on level ground now, he just can’t jump or put any weight on his back legs. Casper is tough and I expect him to last a lot longer as he is only 13 years old.

I’m back in retirement on pro football. I bet on Minn +6 points when Pitt made 2 defensive touchdowns in the last 5 minutes to beat me. I had Miami +6 against N.O. Saints and was ahead 24-3 at the half and lost. Then, I had Houston -3 and was ahead 21-0 at the half and managed to tie that one 24-21. I’m sure I’m going to get lots of sympathy, all poker players are unlucky when betting on sports.

-DB

DOYLISM OF THE DAY: “Winning is not everything – but making the effort to win is.”

Back from Montana! I’ll never complain about hot weather again. It was 3 degrees on the mountain my grandson lives on, along with 8 inches of snow. That cold cut through me like a knife. We had talked about having the Brunson Christmas at my place on the Flathead Lake but they can scratch that!

There are so many deer in upper Montana that you to be super careful not to hit one while driving. I saw 6 bodies on the side of the road on a 20 mile trip. There is all kind of wildlife. My friend has a large pond stocked with fish. He told me the eagles and osprey take 60-70 fish a day out of it. I had better be careful letting Casper run around outside because one of those big eagles could pick him up and fly away with him. I’ll bet Casper would get one good bite of that eagle if that happened.

I was there for the Todd Brunson Montana Challenge poker tournament. The weather was so bad we had less than 100 players but everyone had a good time. I told Todd to have his next on in the summertime. Of course, my daughter Pam was the “Last Brunson Standing.”

No disrespect intended, but these poker shows are awful. Full Tilt’s “Face the Ace” and Poker Stars “Million Dollar Challenge” are so bad, it’s embarrassing. There is no skill involved in either show and I can’t imagine getting an audience that will watch the shows. As I travel around, the High Stakes cash games are the ones all the fans talk about and I agree with them that they are by far the most interesting. Speaking of that, I read where A.J. Benza is being replaced on GSN’s High Stakes Poker show. That’s too bad, I like A.J.’s subtle sense of humor. Vanessa Rousso is named as his likely replacement. I’m pro-Vanessa so I think she will fit in nicely with the old comic Gabe Kaplan.

The golf-poker tournament in Orlando with David Leadbetter has been postponed because of some complications. I’m glad because along with Mike Caro, Daniel Negreanu, Todd Brunson and Dewey Tomko, I was one of the poker instructors. To tell you the truth, I’m traveled out! I look forward to staying home for a while. Harrah’s has asked me to do a few things in conjunction with the WSOP final table that I’m glad to do, but it would have been a tight fit to be back from Orland in time to do them.

My autobiography is supposed to be out November 10th and I’m doing a book signing right after the final table is completed. I’m having a special edition that I’m going to give to the final  nine. Also, at the book signing, or right afterwards, we are having a press conference to announce the signing of the 5th player to the Brunson 10 at DoylesRoom.com  I’m really pleased at the selection of this young man, as I am with the previous four.

I’ve started reading blogs. Again, I find the blogs about poker hands extremely boring. The same thing with the tweets on Twitter; does anyone really care about the hand by hand update of a poker tournament? If it was a real poker game and someone tweeted they had just won a million dollar pot, it would interest me.  But I guess some folks like the updates, that’s why they make chocolate and vanilla – different tastes.

After saying I want to stay home, I’m leaving in the morning for Abilene, Texas. My University is inducting me into their athletic Hall of Fame. After being turned down for 40 years I have mixed feelings, but all my old teammates will be there, so I’m going down and will be on my best behavior.

-DB

DOYLISM OF THE DAY: “When it comes to poker players, there is a fine line between genius and insanity.”

I thought Casper, my toy poodle, had settled down because he was getting older. But when I pulled into a gas station, one of the attendants made the mistake of reaching in the car to pet him. Bam, Casper got his 44th bite victim. If that wasn’t enough, the other attendant laughed at him and said “dogs never bite me, they love me.” Despite my warning, he reached in to play with him and Casper got #45. Two in one day! Casper weights 7 pounds and couldn’t whip a good Texas jackrabbit, but he is absolutely fearless. I try to watch him, but he lulls everybody to sleep by being so nice.

I’m almost back to normal after my dental surgery. The bleeding has stopped and most of the swelling is gone. Now I have to wait several months until my gums heal to get my implants. I sure hope it will be worth it. I didn’t want to wear a bridge the rest of my life.

The WSOP is having an event called, “Table of Champions”. It will be for all the living winners of the main event. There will be two controversial players for that game. Russ Hamilton is caught between a rock and a hard place. Russ is accused of being the mastermind behind the cheating scandal at UB. The evidence looks like Russ is guilty but I’ve learned to wait for the verdict to be handed down. If Russ shows up, he is going to take lots of abuse from angry poker players, and if he doesn’t show, every will say, “See there, he is admitting he is guilty.” My guess is he will be there.

Amarillo Slim is the other person that is under scrutiny. He was indicted for some vague thing that happened with his granddaughter. Slim might have said or done something that was inappropriate, but to call him a pedophile or child molester is ridiculous. I spent 10 years traveling and playing poker with Slim and I never saw one thing that I thought was wrong in that area. Poker owes Slim a lot and he should be recognized for that. I don’t know how many years I’ve got left, but I would like to bet double or nothing Slim Preston is no “child molester”.

-DB

DOYLISM OF THE DAY: “People think a rabbit’s foot is lucky. It wasn’t lucky for the rabbit.”

Superstition is a strange thing. It seems gamblers are more inclined to be superstitious than most people. I have known poker players who wouldn’t change their clothes, even their underwear, when on a winning streak. I try to sit upwind from them when they are doing that. Black cats, spilling salt, walking under ladders, etc. are supposed to be unlucky. I don’t think that I believe in that stuff, but I do observe some of them simply because it doesn’t cost anything.

There are two Caspers in my family. The first Casper is my toy poodle who has bitten almost forty people in his ten years. He is very territorial and protects his turf, which are our house and our back yard. He couldn’t whip a good old Texas Jackrabbit but if you try to jerk away when he bites, he will break the skin and bring blood. He has bitten everyone from the mailman to Jack Binion. He doesn’t play favorites. We have started locking him up in my office when we have guests. On the plus side, he is really a personable, sweet dog to his family and he is a great watch dog. He hears everything and needless to say, he is ready to attack.

The other, more famous, Casper is a card protector with a picture of Casper the Friendly Ghost. It is a small piece of black rock with the words Texas Dolly on it. Someone gave it to me over twenty years ago. I used it to protect my cards and as a joke, I started talking to Casper and asking him to bring me luck.

Strangely, it seems as though the things I asked for happened a lot. So, I started renting Casper to the other players. I would charge them $500 every thirty minutes which seems ridiculous but when you are playing very high stakes poker, was considered to be reasonable. It went on and on and finally Casper was rented for $5,000 for an hour to a poker player from Greece. That was the pinnacle for Casper and as his luck began to change, the demand to rent him became less and less. I figure I rented him out for over $15,000 in a one year period! Not bad for a $5 piece of black rock!

However, Casper’s reputation had been established and Howard Lederer wanted to buy him. After negotiations, we settled on a price of $3,500 and I got to keep Casper until I died. I had to go to my lawyer and write an addendum to my will stating that Casper would belong to Howard at my death. Some magazines got a hold of the story and wrote articles about it. Then ESPN televised the story and showed pictures of Casper at the poker table protecting my cards.

After that exposure, Casper became a celebrity in his own right. Many, many times people have asked me how Casper was doing when they wanted an autograph or a picture with me. Then my daughter Pam borrowed Casper before the WPT Ladies Tournament at the Bicycle Club last year. She won the tournament. After that she kept Casper and outlasted both Todd and I for five straight tournaments. The media had a field day with Pam and Casper as she would announce….”I’m the last Brunson standing!”

Pam is very sentimental and would plead on national television for Howard to let her keep Casper forever. Casper became more and more famous. Now comes the really sick part. The next time I saw Howard, after much begging, I gave him $7,500 to release my obligation to give Casper to him. I would like to point out, however, that it wasn’t superstition but sentimentality that brought Casper back into the Brunson family. -DB