Gus Hansen experienced a marvelous year on the WPT where he was the only player to achieve last table in three of the tournaments. Gus Hansen has appeared on High Stakes Poker on The Game Show Network where he bought into the game for $400, 000. You might recall one of the biggest pots in high stakes poker history competing against Daniel Negreanu. He secured a huge pot with quads against Negreanu’s full house. Hansen has earned many tv poker appearances and is thought to be one of the strongest players anywhere in the world. While gambling on net poker, another side of Hansen has emerged. He often plays in the 200/400 No Limit max buy-in of $40, 000. Gus frequently buys-in for the min of $16, 000 and plays very poorly. He waits patiently for a good hand and then goes all in. I accept that Hansen is an excellent poker player but certainly not even close to the familiar players at 200/400NL. Unless he is flat broke, he has absolutely no reason to settle at the game with the min buy in.
Playing for the min takes most of the skill out of big stack poker. Gus is assumed to be 1 of the greatest poker players in the world but he can’t buy in for the full dollar value. I think television can skew our perception of the real world every now and then. The best poker players anywhere in the world might be guys you have will not have heard of before. Gus can be found competing in web poker on Full Tilt. He normally competes in high stakes omaha eight-or-better and texas hold’em. Gus has proven himself as a competition player. Can he use his talents in money games?