Jay Halfert - Stuey Ungar

Ken_4fun

Ken_4fun

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
Hey all,

I hope this is appropriate, but again I thought I would share that another book that I am finishing up.

Again, some pool was actually in this book, "One of a Kind: The Rise and Fall of Stuey ',The Kid', Ungar, The World's Greatest Poker Player". It speaks about "the run" where it started with pool, then to gambling with Archie Karas. It was a very small part, but it mentions it.

For my friends here, I recommend this book, as I only recently heard about Stuey Ungar.

I was wondering about our AZ local celebrity Jay Halfert, pool player, gambler, poker player. I wonder if he ever met Stuey. I always enjoy reading Jay's accounts as he remembers better than most.

Ken
 

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Did you see the movie? It was good.
Altho i like books better usually . Didnt get to read this first.
 
Ken_4fun said:
Hey all,

I hope this is appropriate, but again I thought I would share that another book that I am finishing up.

Again, some pool was actually in this book, "One of a Kind: The Rise and Fall of Stuey ',The Kid', Ungar, The World's Greatest Poker Player". It speaks about "the run" where it started with pool, then to gambling with Archie Karas. It was a very small part, but it mentions it.

For my friends here, I recommend this book, as I only recently heard about Stuey Ungar.

I was wondering about our AZ local celebrity Jay Halfert, pool player, gambler, poker player. I wonder if he ever met Stuey. I always enjoy reading Jay's accounts as he remembers better than most.

Ken
Click to expand...

Rumor has it that he was the best gin player in the world. People from all over the world flew out to play him and couldn't win. He had a gift when it came to cards 4 sure :-)
 
One of a kind was awesome!

If your looking for another great read in the same vein check out positively fifth street.

Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk
 
I never actually talked to him, but I watched him play Poker (No-Limit) for super high stakes in the 80's and early 90's. He liked to play heads up against anyone. Archie did beat him, but not for much and it took a long time. I also watched Stuey play Gin on one occasion. They were playing flop Gin, 500 and 1,000 per hand! I never saw anyone play like Stuey. He never put the cards together in his hand, leaving a mish-mash of cards that only he could decipher. He even had some cards high in his hand and some low, so weird like no one else ever. This way his opponent couldn't tell if he had a good hand or a bad one. Meanwhile Stuey would watch how you placed the cards in your hand and it told him all he needed to know. Everyone said he was the all time best Gin player and I believe it. I was told that Stuey would bet he could remember every card in the deck in the discard pile. He would gamble that you could slowly turn over card after card and when you got down to the last one he would tell you what it was! I never heard of anyone else who could do that.
 
his cousin lives in Silver Spring Maryland

His cousin Jerry Ungar was a friend of mine when I lived in Bethesda, MD. The first time I talked to Stuey was when a high rolling friend invited me to go to Atlantic city with him and Jerry and a few others because he could get us free rooms at the Trump Taj Mahal. We were walking through the gaming area and Jerry said, hey, thats my cousin over there. I had no idea who Stu was and when Jerry tried to get close to the table some other people started complaining. Jerry and Stu were both a bit different, hahaha and Jerry yells, F*** this and Stuey too. Stuey heard what Jerry said and asked what was going on so Jerry yells, hey, its me Jerry Ungar your cousin. So Stuey tells the crowd to part so Jerry can come over.

We spent some time with Stuey over the next couple of days and he was really quite nice and paid for a few of our dinners. He could really spend that money and when I once suggested that it would be fair for us to pay for our own dinners he said, na, no way, this is easy money, they don't have a chance winning against me, you guys work for a living, hahaha.
 
jay helfert said:
I never actually talked to him, but I watched him play Poker (No-Limit) for super high stakes in the 80's and early 90's. He liked to play heads up against anyone. Archie did beat him, but not for much and it took a long time. I also watched Stuey play Gin on one occasion. They were playing flop Gin, 500 and 1,000 per hand! I never saw anyone play like Stuey. He never put the cards together in his hand, leaving a mish-mash of cards that only he could decipher. He even had some cards high in his hand and some low, so weird like no one else ever. This way his opponent couldn't tell if he had a good hand or a bad one. Meanwhile Stuey would watch how you placed the cards in your hand and it told him all he needed to know. Everyone said he was the all time best Gin player and I believe it. I was told that Stuey would bet he could remember every card in the deck in the discard pile. He would gamble that you could slowly turn over card after card and when you got down to the last one he would tell you what it was! I never heard of anyone else who could do that.
Click to expand...

Chris Ferguson can do that.
 
In the 1980's, I met Ungar on a few occasions at the Golden Q in Queens, NY. He would pop in now and then, often at crazy hours. I recall watching him play three cushion billiards there, although he didn't play it well.
 
jay helfert said:
. I was told that Stuey would bet he could remember every card in the deck in the discard pile. He would gamble that you could slowly turn over card after card and when you got down to the last one he would tell you what it was! I never heard of anyone else who could do that.
Click to expand...

.....................................
 
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jay helfert said:
I never actually talked to him, but I watched him play Poker (No-Limit) for super high stakes in the 80's and early 90's. He liked to play heads up against anyone. Archie did beat him, but not for much and it took a long time. I also watched Stuey play Gin on one occasion. They were playing flop Gin, 500 and 1,000 per hand! I never saw anyone play like Stuey. He never put the cards together in his hand, leaving a mish-mash of cards that only he could decipher. He even had some cards high in his hand and some low, so weird like no one else ever. This way his opponent couldn't tell if he had a good hand or a bad one. Meanwhile Stuey would watch how you placed the cards in your hand and it told him all he needed to know. Everyone said he was the all time best Gin player and I believe it. I was told that Stuey would bet he could remember every card in the deck in the discard pile. He would gamble that you could slowly turn over card after card and when you got down to the last one he would tell you what it was! I never heard of anyone else who could do that.
Click to expand...


Jay -

All of that was in book.

The last card was in 1977 he was bet $100,000 by Bob Stupak, an owner and designer of casinos, that he could not count down a six-deck shoe and determine what the final card in the shoe was. Ungar won the bet.

He was good friends with Sexton and told him, there might be someone better than me in the future playing poker, but he thought there was nobody that would ever beat him playing gin......his favorite game.
 
I know no one will believe this, but I knew a guy in college that took seven decks of cards (he did this in front of me) shuffled them, went through them one by one for a few minutes and then bet me that I could ask him one week from today what the cards were, in order. I did, one week later. And I kept the cards in my room, so he wasn't going over them. He recited every single one in order without a single mistake. I have never witnessed a memory like that.
 
Funny I just reread this book a week ago. Another great book is "The Professor, the Banker, and the Suicide King...Inside the richest poker game of all time", by Michael Craig.
 
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