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Amarillo Slim - Poker Legend
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Gambler, raconteur, assaulter of children (convicted), and confirmed poker legend, Amarillo Slim is an old-school poker relic. Before televised multi-million dollar poker sweepstakes, and college kids playing online poker for a living instead of daytrading, no-limit poker was the true dominion of shady desperados. These men lived on their wits, roaming from town to town looking for suckers to bet against.
Amarillo Slim was one of the most colorful scalliwags, and he compiled a wonderful collection of witty remarks before falling from grace in 2003 with those regrettable child molestation charges. Chances are he won't be popping up at the featured table on ESPN any time soon, although Hollywood has jumped at the chance to turn his life story into a serious film. We know it will be serious because Nicolas Cage will take the starring role, and no-one does tortured soul better than Cage.
Amarillo Slim, real name Thomas Preston, Jr. once noted sagely that you can shear a sheep a hundred times, but you can skin it only once. He spent his life proving this to be true, taking on and beating the opposition at every form of wagering known to man, and a few that Amarillo Slim devised on the spot. Slim was one of the original road warriors of poker, forming a deadly partnership along with Sailor Roberts and Doyle Brunson. They would pool their resources, help one another out when possible, and travel the country shearing the sheep.
Amarillo Slim has won four World Series of Poker events including the main event in 1972. He almost made it five in 2000 when he was beaten heads-up by none other than Phil Ivey. Since his conviction, Amarillo Slim's stock has taken a bit of a nosedive and he doesn't spend a lot of time in poker tournaments these days. We'll end this profile on a high note, choosing to remember another one of Slim's hilarious observations, namely that Amarillo, Texas never alters in size of population because every time a woman finds out she's pregnant a man leaves town. Amarillo Slim represents a lost age of poker, when the game was slightly seedy, somewhat dark, but no less enticing.
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