Player Focus: Brett Jungblut

Brett Jungblut is one of the new breed of players almost as famous for his table antics than for his considerable poker achievments...

By Steve Hall 14th March 2008

"At his first WSOP Brett Jungblut cashed five times. "
Brett Jungblut looks like a guy who grew up in Venice Beach the offspring of hippie parents. The truth is: he is from a tough New Jersey town and studied business at Roanoke college in Virginia.

These days Brett does love the beach life in San Diego if he is not conducting business in a Las Vegas poker room.

At his first WSOP Brett Jungblut cashed five times. "It was downhill from there" Brett joked with me today at a break in the PLO tournament at the Wynn.
He was part of the crew who planned to take the WSOP by storm.
The "new kids on the block" certainly caught the eye of the ESPN cameras and they achieved instant fame, not just through results but their behaviour.

Brett Jungblut, for his part, baited Phil Hellmuth who called the floormen over no less than seven times during one tournament. The floor concluded Brett had not broken any rules. Hellmuth tilted and was given a 15 minute penalty.

Brett cashed in three Omaha8 tournaments that year winning the $5k event. He still prefers to play Omaha to NLHE which means he has to play online more than live.

Brett is Gank on Full Tilt, Pokerstars, Bodog and UB. Purplelungs was his Party name. Last weekend Gank finished second in a $100 buy in on FT. He cashed out $6460 that day which took his overall online winnings past the $300k mark.

Gank met Marcel Luske at the WSOP two years ago. They both shared a desire to profit from the poker boom. However Gank looked more like an extra from a Cheech Chong movie with his dreadlocks and perma stoned eyes.

The sartorial elegant Dutchman took Gank to celebrity hairdresser Marco Traniello,who is now married to Jennifer Harman, who cut out the locks. Next stop was a tux rental shop. Once again, Brett Jungblut caught the media attention.

His dislike of flying saw him travel by Amtrak to Tunica one year. The train headed north to Salt Lake City before going east to Chicago and then three days later south to Memphis. I hope it had a smoking carriage.

14/03/08