High Stakes Poker Player Jerry Buss Dead at 80
The world lost a legend across many fields last week with the passing of Jerry Buss, who succumbed to cancer after struggling with the illness for the last year and a half. Buss, who was a longtime owner of the Los Angeles Lakers in addition to being well-known in the world of poker, passed away last Monday at his home in Southern California.
Buss was perhaps best known for his role as the owner of the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team, which he purchased back in 1979 for $67.5 million.
As part of the deal, he also became the owner of the Los Angeles Kings professional hockey team in addition to the Forum arena in Los Angeles. As a bit of proverbial icing on the cake, Buss also took ownership of the ranch belonging the former owner of the Lakers, Jack Kent Cooke.
Buss went on to grow the Lakers into the second-most valuable team in the NBA. Its valuation of $1 billion, determined by Forbes magazine, is bested only by the New York Knicks. That team is worth $1.1 billion, according to Forbes.
Buss was characterized by his willingness to make big, bold deals, such as when he signed Magic Johnson to a $25 million, 25-year contract after his second season with the team, a figure that at the time was eye-popping and attracted a great deal of attention.
Speaking to the Los Angeles Times Magazine in 2009, Buss said of the Magic Johnson deal, “Anybody who makes an outlandish salary obviously attracts attention.”
“That was what was behind my contract with Magic. I think it created a lot of attention for the Lakers,” Buss added.
Perhaps it was that kind of risk-taking spirit that attracted Buss to the game of big money poker. Though he played high stakes poker games for a great number of years, he is most famous in the poker realm for his 1991 WSOP third place finish in the seven card stud event. At the WSOP in 2003, he turned out a second place standing in the World Poker Tour Freeroll Invitational.
Buss was also noted for his appearances on the television show High Stakes Poker as well as for being on the series Poker After Dark on NBC.
Despite having left the world as a wealthy and powerful figure, respected for a diverse array of talents, the story of Jerry Buss was a not terribly-uncommon rags-to-riches tale. Buss was born a child of the Depression, and together with his single mother often struggled to obtain even the most basic necessities.
“I can remember standing in a W.P.A. line with a gunny sack, and I remember having to buy chocolate milk instead of white because it was one cent cheaper,” Buss said of his childhood.
