Gus Hansen enjoyed a wonderful year on the WPT where he was the only player to make it to the closing poker table in 3 of the tournaments. Gus Hansen has been seen on High Stakes Poker on GSN where he bought into the game for $400, 000. You may remember one of the largest pots in big stakes poker recorded history up against Daniel Negreanu. He raked in a big pot with 4 of a kind against Daniel’s full house. Hansen has made many televised poker appearances and is considered to be one of the strongest players anywhere in the world. While competing in net poker, a different side of Hansen has emerged. He frequently competes in the 200/400 No Limit maximum buy in of Forty Thousand dollars. Gus generally buys-in for the min of $16, 000 and gambles very weak. He waits patiently for a decent hand and then pushes all in. I accept that Hansen is an amazing poker player but not even close to the regular players at 200/400NL. Unless Gus is broke, he has absolutely no reason to sit at the game with the min buy-in.
Buying in for the min takes most of the skill out of big stack poker. Hansen is supposed to be one of the greatest players in the world but he cannot buy-in for the total dollar value. I believe television can skew our perception of the real world every now and then. The greatest poker players anywhere in the world might be guys you have never heard of before. Gus can be seen betting on online poker on Full Tilt. He generally competes in big stakes omaha eight-or-better and hold’em. Gus has proven himself as a competition player. Can he back up his talents in cash games?