After what could only be described as a plane crash–one which was filled with rabid rottweilers and king cobras and featured in-flight music by Nickelback–into a bubbling volcano after the multi-million dollar hole he dug for himself in 2010, Gus Hansen has encountered the ultimate case of run good. If what goes up must come down, then Hansen is living proof of the adage’s more optimistic sibling, as he has won over $1 million this week alone.
The action junkie has risen like a rocket shot at the moon from the grave that was last year, which left a number of people suspecting the Great Dane’s bankroll, walking with a limp, was put down behind the ol’ tool shed. After all was said and done, the tourney phenom’s lifetime of massive cash game hemorahging culminated with over $4 million in losses in 2010, bringing his deficit to a mind-numbing $9.3 million. He didn’t even have the money to buy a bullet and rent a gun.
Illari Sahamies, Patrick Antonius, Tom Dwan, Cole South, Phil Galfond, Scott “URnotINdanger2″ Palmer, and Phil Ivey were just some of the nosebleed luminaries that became beneficiaries to Hansen’s millions. In one epic session in the worse sense of the word, Hansen lost a staggering $3,701,913. Outside of the now infamous Isildur1 session with Brian Hastings, who took the master of swings for his largest revolution ($4.2 million), internet poker hasn’t seen somebody with the chronic propensity to lose it all as consistently as Gus. Once the poster boy of televised post-boom poker, his reckless and aggressive style of play earned him a lot of attention, which was about the only thing it earned him in the end. While he has won $8,675,464 in tourneys, massive losses both in live cash games at Bobby’s Room and online collectively negate most, if not all of his accomplishments.
Following his August 2010 session was this chat conversation with fellow pro Cole South, suggesting he had hit bottom:
GH: “Cole, can you send me some money? You’ll get them back on Tuesday”
CS: “Sorry, I wish I could. I know that you’re good for it, but I have lend out a lot of money this summer and I still haven’t got it back.”
GH: “No problem. Probably it’s just good for me”
In 2011, Hansen has blazed a path down the comeback trail, having earned $4 million so far from pot-limit Omaha and limit deuce-to-seven triple draw games. Although it may seem like he’s living at The Ritz, he’s only recooping his previous online losses. It’s also substantial to note that he started both 2009 and 2010 off to similar fantastic starts, before waking up face down and shirtless in a ditch on the side of the road come December with an earnings graph that looked like 2008′s Dow Jones.
Graph courtesy of Highstakesdb.com.
