WSOP 1980
It is with a vivid sense of clarity that, even after all these years, I can recall the hope and feeling of limitless possibility with which I began the year 1980. There�s something undeniably thrilling about charging into in a new decade, especially since the 1970s had been such a painful decade - both for me and for the nation at large.
Yes, that first day of 1980 was absolutely glorious, despite the fact that I had a hangover that would kill most men. The previous night I attended a New Year's Eve party on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. I won't debase myself by actually dropping names in regards to who else may have been in attendance, but if you guessed Mick Jagger, Jack Nicholson, Julie Christie, Lauren Hutton and Henry Kissinger, you would not be too far from the mark.
Anyway, despite the fact that my head felt like someone had parked a garbage truck on it while I was passed out in a gutter, I was still feeling great that first day of 1980. I was absolutely convinced that nothing but good things would happen in the worlds of politics, sports, movies and music for the following ten years. Naturally, with hindsight, it is easy for me to say that I could not have been more wrong.
Nonetheless, 1980 did have some absolutely wonderful elements. And chief among these I would consider to be the World Series of Poker.
Benny Binion also decided to celebrate the new decade by taking his already well-respected tournament and jacking it up to a new level of excitement. Once again, the WSOP was held in Binion's very own Horseshoe casino in glittering Las Vegas. And, as to be expected, the very best poker players in all of America assembled at this venerable gambling hall in a quest to take the big prize home.
There were 73 entrants to the main event, by far the biggest field at that time. Each paid $10,000 to enter the tournament. Many people involved in the competition were winners from earlier tournaments, including the great Doyle Brunson and Bobby Baldwin.
How much respect do you think those established giants gave to a young pipsqueak from New York called Stu "The Kid" Ungar? In fact, they gave him a whole hell of a lot of respect after he won the main event and an absolutely whopping total of $365,000. It would not be the last time that Ungar would make a big splash at the WSOP, but in later years he would always look back upon it as this sweetest moment in his poker career.
by Mason Raymondv
