Incredibly, Brunson yet again made a full house on the river when a 10 hit, and he was crowned world champion for the second year in a row. When Berland pushed all-in, Brunson gladly called. Yet again, the 2 hit on the turn to give Brunson two pair, and this time he was ahead. Yet again Brunson found himself behind when the flop of 10-8-5 gave him a pair, and his opponent two pair. The very next year, Doyle Brunson was defending his title heads-up against Gary “Bones” Berland when he looked down at 10-2 – again. In one of the worst bad beats in Main Event history, Brunson caught runner-runner 2s on the turn and river to make a full house! 1977: Doyle Brunson wins the WSOP Main Event again – with the same hand! The story of the 1976 WSOP could have been about how an amateur car dealer bested the world’s top pros… but the poker gods decided otherwise. Brunson went all-in with the weaker hand, Alto of course called. The flop came A-J-10, giving Alto two pair. Jesse Alto bet out with A-J, an excellent starting hand when heads-up. As a result, he had not fully learned to keep cool in tight spots, and Brunson said he was looking to exploit that weakness. Unlike Brunson, Alto was a keen amateur rather than a professional: his day job was as a car dealer. In the 1976 WSOP Main Event, Doyle Brunson was heads-up with a player called Jesse Alto. 1976: Doyle Brunson wins the WSOP Main Event In 2006, after Super/System 2 was published, Brunson was voted by Bluff Magazine the most influential force in the world of poker. Brunson has won 10 WSOP bracelets, and his poker strategy book Super/System, originally self-published in 1978, became the bible for a whole generation of poker players.

He’s 83 years old, and has been plagued for most of that time by the bad knee that ended his youthful dream of becoming a professional basketball player.īasketball’s loss is poker’s gain. But of all the unlikely strokes of fortune over nearly 50 years of the WSOP, there cannot be anything to rival Doyle Brunson taking down the championship two years running – with the very same lucky hand! Who is Doyle Brunson?ĭoyle Brunson, nicknamed “Texas Dolly” or “The Godfather of Poker”, is one of the last of the old poker greats still standing – or at least sitting, since you’ll often see him in a motorised chair these days. With the sheer number of hands that have been played during all the successive World Series of Poker (WSOP) tournaments, you would think that anything could happen. In the second of a 10-part series, the Paul Phua Poker School recalls how 10-2 became the luckiest hand in World Series of Poker history

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