His agent, Brian Barsbaugh, confirmed the death but did not give a cause of death.
Mr. Branson’s career trajectory parallels the history of poker in America, from illegal obscurity to mainstream entertainment.
ranking bluff magazine As one of the most influential players of all time, Mr. Branson has won 10 World Series of Poker tournaments, including Main Event titles in 1976 and 1977. He was the first player to win his $1 million in tournament play and ended that career. $6.2 million In live earnings — but that’s just what he gets in public.
Until recently, Mr. Branson was also involved in private games with staggering stakes, sometimes winning (or losing) millions of dollars a month. His wife, she felt, was angry with him at times.
“But this is what I do,” he said told Texas Monthly last year. “That’s what I’ve always done. And if I fall dead on a table in the middle of a monster pot, hell, I’ll die a happy man.”
In the early 1950s, he played in the backrooms of bars and other adult establishments in the seedy neighborhoods of Fort Worth’s Exchange Avenue.
“Exchange Avenue was probably the most dangerous street in America,” he explained to The Texas Monthly. “There were only thieves and pimps and hitmen there. It was amazing.”
Mr. Branson always carried a pistol. (When asked if he had ever used one, he said, “No comment.”) One night, someone interrupted the game and fired a loaded gun at a player’s head. Mr. Branson flew away with the chip and hid in a stream.
Another night, this time in Austin, armed robbers broke in, took the cash from the table and ordered the gamblers to line up against the wall and pull down their trousers. The bandits threatened to blow your feet off if you hid money.
Suddenly, the players started throwing $100 bills on the floor.
Mr. Branson was philosophical about the mayhem.
“Don’t worry about money at all,” he told the New York Times. “You have to look at it as an action, money as a unit. What you’re trying to do is get as many units as you can.”
Mr. Branson eventually joined the other players and traveled all over Texas playing private games with doctors, lawyers and other professionals, where more money was at stake and violence was certain. was declining.
In the early 1960s, he moved to Las Vegas, where poker was thriving. He competed in the 1st World Series of Poker event in his 1970.
A few years later, the World Series games were being televised. ESPN began broadcasting the event in his 1980s and interest grew steadily. Mr. Branson has become one of the most recognizable faces in the game, always with his cowboy hat on his head. he was astonishingly wealthy, reportedly Built the Titanic and invested millions of dollars to find Noah’s Ark.
Mr. Branson has also authored several books on poker. “Doyle Brunson’s Supersystem” In it he explained his method. The book and its subsequent sequels became the bible of sports, appearing in the opening scenes of gambling movies. “Rounders” (1998) Starring Matt Damon.
“More than any other game, poker depends on understanding your opponent. You need to know what excites him in the moment you are in. How is he feeling… what are his feelings? What is his apparent state of mind right now?”
The neck is a great place to look for Teru.
“Many people can see a pulse in their neck,” he wrote. “If so, a man can’t hide it, because no one can control his heart rate.” [stressful] situation. When you see a man’s neck throbbing, you know he’s excited. Usually he’s excited because he’s bluffing. ”
Doyle Frank Branson was born on August 10, 1933 in Longworth, Texas. Longworth is a rural farm town with a few homes, a general store, and no indoor plumbing. Doyle later learned that his father worked for a gin manufacturing company and secretly played poker to finance his children’s college education. his mother was a housewife.
Mr. Branson excelled in sports, primarily basketball and track and field. At Hardin Simmons University, a Baptist school in Abilene, Texas, he played basketball on his team and played poker with his friends on Saturday nights.
After graduating in 1954, he remained at Hardin Simmons and earned a master’s degree in education. He got a job selling office equipment. On his first day at work, he stumbled upon his game of poker.
“It was a Seven Stud match that paid a month’s salary in less than three hours,” he wrote. “Super System”. “I thought, ‘Oh my God,’ I could sit at the poker table and make ten times as much money in one-sixth of the time, and what am I doing trying to sell a machine that no one wants to buy?” Are you there?』
He quit his job and headed for Exchange Avenue.
In 1962, he married Louise Carter, a pharmacist, at the funeral home where his brother-in-law worked. “The chapel was amazing,” Branson told Texas Monthly.
Survivors also include his wife. their children Todd Branson and Pamela Branson; Stepdaughter Cheryl Carter. and several grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
Mr. Branson was a master at understanding tell.
“Once I spoke of Puggy Pearson,” he wrote. “Super System”. “Every time he racked his chips and bet, he was bluffing. He must have been doing it six months before someone else discovered it and told him .”
But he was equally good at bluffing.
“All top pros have defenses against people using tellurium against them,” Branson wrote. “Sometimes when I bluff, people [a] bluff. But next time I say “Majiwiz”, I won’t bluff. ”
