Doyle Brunson, pistol-carrying poker legend who won millions, dies at 89

His agent, Brian Balsbaugh, confirmed the death but did not provide a cause.

The arc of Mr. Brunson’s career parallels poker’s history in America, from illicitly out of sight to mainstream entertainment.

Ranked by Bluff magazine as the most influential player in history, Mr. Brunson won 10 World Series of Poker tournaments, including Main Event titles in 1976 and 1977. He was the first player to win $1 million in tournament play and finished his career with $6.2 million in live earnings — though that’s just what he made in public view.

Until recently, Mr. Brunson also played in private games with staggering stakes, sometimes winning (or losing) millions of dollars a month. His wife more than occasionally found him exasperating.

“But this is what I do,” he told Texas Monthly last year. “It’s what I’ve always done. And if I drop dead at the 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 a seedy neighborhood along Exchange Avenue in Fort Worth

“Exchange Avenue was maybe the most dangerous street in America,” he explained to Texas Monthly. “There was nothing out there but thieves and pimps and killers. It was amazing.”

Mr. Brunson always packed a pistol. (Asked if he had ever used it, he answered, “No comment.”) One night, someone interrupted a game, put a loaded gun to a player’s head and fired. Mr. Brunson took off with his chips and hid in a creek.

On another night, this time in Austin, armed bandits busted in, took the cash off the table and lined the gamblers up against a wall, ordering them to drop their pants. The bandits threatened that if players were hiding money, their legs would be blown off.

Suddenly, the players began throwing $100 bills on the floor.

Mr. Brunson was philosophical about the mayhem.

“You have to have absolutely no regard for money,” he told the New York Times. “You have to look at it as action and the money as units. What you’re trying to do is win as many units as possible.”

Mr. Brunson eventually joined up with other players, traveling throughout Texas to play in private games with doctors, lawyers and other professionals where there was ever more money at stake — and certainly less violence.

In the early 1960s, he moved to Las Vegas, where poker was thriving. He played in the First World Series of Poker event in 1970.

A few years later, World Series events began to be televised. ESPN began broadcasting events in the 1980s, and interest grew steadily. Mr. Brunson became one of the game’s most familiar faces, a cowboy hat always fit tight on his head. He was…