Archie Karas - Biggest Gambler in the World

Anyone have details about this man? This guy is said to have won over $40 million dollars, and then eventually lost it all. They said that he beat Stu Ungar, Chip Reese, Barry Greenstein, Doyle Brunson and everybody. And then later, after losing, he goes back to playing with $1-5 chips then goes back to being millionaire then dead broke. I never knew such man existed. I wish I can roll my bankroll to $40 million dollars and see what it feels like. For him to lose that in a week must've been devastating.

PokerNews ran an extensive series of articles on him a few years back - go over there and do a search for them if you wanna read the whole story.

One thing though: while he did beat most of the big names in poker at the time he didn't really play them that many times because he refused to play anything other than his best games (predominantly razz) and soon they all stopped giving him action. He ran the $40 million up and then lost it all back playing craps.

He was staked into a few tournaments at the WSOP last year, pretty sure he made a razz final table and had a decent run in a stud tournament as well.

Aaw, that doesn't prove much about him then. I mean, it's amazing how he got upto $40 million but in popular games like hold'em, omaha, he's not the best. I guess he's a legend as a razz player and the only gambler to reach 40 mil but he doesn't prove as the best in hold'em, omaha and other popular variants of poker.

Indeed. By all accounts he's an alright NLHE player (he did OK in the Main Event last year, for example) but razz was the game where he had a huge edge on people.

Dunno if I worded my last post right, BTW: he won and lost the majority of his $40 million playing craps, mostly at the Horseshoe. Poker winnings only made up a small part of his roll.

I just saw video of him in 2008 where he traps the kid but kid makes a straight and beats him. But I guess most of his money were won through craps, baccarat and others.

I've rolled my bankroll upto 20k through blackjack + hold'em starting year and a half ago. Lost over 15k later. Even that itself was devastating for me. Imagining myself losing 40 million dollars, I would feel like commiting suicide. But this man moves on with his life as if money is just pieces of paper. That's the part I envy about. Watching this man makes me feel like how stupid and lame I was about getting angry over $2000 that I lost in a single night. I also had lot of ego problem to move down from $5/$10 to lower. But when I went to Vegas 2 weeks ago, I played $1/$2 and it was fun again. For guys like Archie who plays with stakes as high as 200/400 to move down to $5 chip tables is very admirable.

Uhmmm...that's just a tad bit low....try $8000/$16,000 against Chip Reese. And that was the main reason other players didn't want to play against him - because of the stakes, not the type of poker game. Check out the Wikipedia on him:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archie_Karas

I think Karas is someone who loves the thrill of gambling a bit too much...

I read his quote

"You've got to understand something. Money means nothing to me. I don't value it. I've had all the material things I could ever want. Everything. The things I want money can't buy: health, freedom, love, happiness. I don't care about money, so I have no fear. I don't care if I lose it."

good quote and very true.

money can only get you so far, i value money, but i am not fixated on it.

i wonder what he did with ALL that cash?

...Um, he lost it. Hence the won AND lost $40 million part.

^ this.

He also had his photo taken standing in front of large chunks of it from time to time - pretty baller IMO:

yeah i looked him up on wikipedia that was one crazy guy gambling addiction much?

[x] Ditto

wat

I value the things i can buy with money though... even if i dont value money lol.

As quoted from his wiki page:
'The only player to beat Karas during his run was Johnny Chan, who beat him for $900,000 after losing to Karas the first two games.'

'He preferred playing the both of them instead of just Chan, as he felt Chan was a tougher opponent.'

pretty much testament to chan's poker skills, really. anyway, this guy has balls no doubt, but the moral of the story is still, w/o br management, luck/skill/balls are still useless.

Bankroll management will only affect the rate you go broke when you're playing -EV games and that's what Karas was playing. From memory he took even worse odds than normal on craps bets so that the Horseshoe would let him play higher.

That is so awesome hahaha, i've heard about him before but I love him even more now.

I don't know if i have ever heard of this player and have definately never seen him on any of the major tv shows. This is a huge amount of money to have as a bankroll, obviously if his bankroll was on such a rollercoaster ride i don't know if he is using the correct bankroll management, i would say he had a bad loss and went on tilt and lost it all, that is the only way to lose that much money.
adsthepro

*sigh*

He was featured in a few episodes of the WSOP Main Event in 2008 but other than that no, you wouldn't have seen him on any of the poker TV shows because:

1 - He's broke nowadays (he was staked in a couple of events in the 2008 WSOP, including the Main Event)

2 - As discussed above the vast majority of his bankroll was run up playing craps, not poker. He's a gambler first and a poker player second. Or maybe he's a pool hustler first then those things second and third, IDK.

3 - Even when he is playing poker, NLHE isn't his game. He specialises in stud games, razz in particular, and it's highly unlikely he'd have any kind of edge in a televised NLHE game outside of huge donkaments like the Main Event.

Now as I mentioned above, bankroll management will only affect the rate you lose at when you're playing -EV games like craps.

Anywho, for those who want to read the whole story here's the link to the first in a ten-part series on Karas that Tom Sexton wrote for Poker News:

http://www.pokernews.com/news/2008/0...ras-part-1.htm

Follow the links at the bottom for the other nine parts. It's long but it's fascinating and it'll probably clear up a lot of the funny ideas people seem to have ITT

These guys are hard to beat as out and out Gamblers
IMO I still Think Stu Unger edges it as he never ever had a job and got paid twice, Once for appearing on a US TV Show and 2nd a repeat of the same programme,

Are they Mad or Brilliant?
I think in a twisted way Archie had a bankroll management system in place as he owned Equity in Bars and Resturaunts

It does make you realise that there is always someone bigger out there

Yeah true, but I guess he got enough money for his expenses so he doesnt care about the rest.
I think he had some nights without sleep cos those lost 40M anyway.

All I can say is if I was fortunate enough to win big money in some tourney one day. Then you would never see my rear at another table. I would be living the high life.

Archie Karas was pretty sick. But the biggest gambler? Not quite.

Check the post for sick gambling.....

Terrance Watanabe