Vision quest: Blind player in the money
By Bob Harkins, MSNBC.com
Updated July 13, 12:30 p.m. ET Hal Lubarsky stares down at the table as he is dealt his cards, a young guy in a baseball cap leans forward and whispers into his ear. Is this a friend on the rail, passing along a possible tell he noticed about another player, or just passing on words of encouragement? Is he stopping to say hello? Are they making dinner plans for later? No, the young guy is telling him what cards he has been dealt, because Lubarsky is unable to see them for himself. He is blind, and he is playing in the main event at the World Series of Poker. Actually, Lubarsky is not just playing, he is thriving, entering Friday's Day 4 in 118th place out of the remaining 335 with $409,000 in chips. He has already become the first blind person to cash in the World Series of poker, and there's no telling how far he'll go. | |
Hal Lubarsky gets some help from his reader(photo courtesy IMPDI) Lubarsky suffers from retinitis pigmentosa, a genetic disorder that causes the retina to slowly deteriorate over time.
“You’re born with it,” he explains. “It just gets progressively worse.”
In Lubarsky’s case, it was his night vision and peripheral vision that have gradually faded away until he has nothing more than a tiny floating window to peer through.
“It’s like looking through a straw,” he says.
The ailment was devastating for Lubarsky, 46, a lifelong gambler who moved to Las Vegas from Brooklyn at age 29.
“I was extremely well known in cash games,” he says. “I’ve played with all the big names except for Doyle (Brunson) and Chip (Reese), and I know them.”
He spent most of his time at the Mirage and Binion’s Horseshoe — before the Bellagio was built and became the biggest place for cash games — looking for action.
He’d play in the $150-$300 (minimum bet) H.O.R.S.E. game, enjoying life as a high-roller.
“I was a famous poker player,” he says, “I was a world champion before I went blind.”
It was the late nineties when his vision started to get worse, to the point where it became difficult to play. At first he needed to ask the dealers to help him read the community cards in the middle of the table. But it didn’t stop there.
“Then I started having trouble reading my own cards,” he says, “And I quit.”
Lubarsky fell into depression, unable to play a game he had played for most of his life. A game he loved.
Then in 2003, Chris Moneymaker came along and won the main event. Moneymaker was an Internet qualifier, the first to win the big prize. He inspired others to try and do the same, leading to a mad rush of players to online card rooms.
Lubarsky decided to give it a shot playing poker on the Internet. He’d have a friend sit next to him and tell him what cards he had. He still does play online, but says “it’s harder than live games because it goes so fast.”
Then, about six months ago, a friend encouraged him to try a live game, with a reader to help him with the cards.
He wanted to practice working with a reader first, and it was like a massive lab experiment. He tried all sorts of things, such as having his helper tap him on the back (10 times for a 10, one for an ace, etc.). Nothing seemed effective or practical.
Then he realized a major flaw in his experiments. He was practicing at home, where it was quiet. Casinos tend to be much noisier, so why not just have his helper whisper in his ear?
Lubarsky also gravitated away from his favored game of limit hold’em, switching to no-limit because there tend to be less players in any one hand, making it easier to track.
In Lubarsky’s first live game, he played $2-$5 no-limit, and says he won $2,300, surpassing his expectations.
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