The second story (long poker duel)

1949 Las Vegas. Horseshoe Casino. Well-known poker player Benny Binnion put forward the idea and organized an incredible bet!

According to its terms, players had to play poker for so long until one of them lost all his money. The bet was public. Anyone could take part in it by making a contribution of 10,000 US dollars.

Oddly enough, the participants did not take long to wait.

The first to respond to the invitation was “The King of Players” - Nicholas Andreas Dandolos (Nick “Grek”). He got such a nickname because he could win and lose just the same astronomical sums of money. For Nick, the process of the game itself was important, not the result.

His rival was Johnny Moss, who was also legendary. So, according to one of them, if Moss came to a particular city to participate in a poker tournament, all the other players left the city in a hurry.

Moss was a professional with a capital letter and an amazing intuition. Tellingly, he flew to the game completely unresponsive, immediately after another game that lasted 4 days.

Hearing about the famous poker bet participants, other players simply did not dare to play. However, this did not prevent them from arriving at the Horseshoe casino and putting money into the poker gurus.

With each new day, the poker marathon was gaining more and more speed. Players alternately raised their stakes and won each other a variety of amounts. An interesting fact, with one of the hands, Nick Grek managed to win a bank in the amount of half a million dollars, without even looking at his cards.

The game lasted for five months (only with interruptions to sleep) and ended with the victory of Johnny Moss. Johnny won over $ 2 million from his opponent.

It is known that when the climax came, Nicholas smiled and said: “Well, Mr. Moss, I think it’s time I let you go!”.

The phrase has become common and glorified Nick Grek even more. You also need to play with dignity. And Nicholas perfectly coped with it.

Well, Johnny Moss after this game became the unofficial best poker player.