Editor's pick

Mike Caro's look at Bobby Baldwin's life

Product

Bobby Baldwin's Winning Poker Secrets by Mike Caro

Hits

  • Gives readers an inside look at the rise of one of poker's truly seminal characters
  • Chock-full of interesting anecdotes about Bobby Baldwin's early life on the road
  • Not one but two forewords by Doyle Brunson
  • Includes a broad accounting of the most common mistakes in seven different variations of poker
  • Includes both firsthand narrative by Bobby Baldwin and the writing of Mike Caro

Misses

  • Majority of the strategy laid out in its pages will not be new to most players
  • Comes up short as a strategy guide to poker

Review

In Bobby Baldwin's Winning Poker Secrets: Fascinating Anecdotes and Winning Strategies of a Poker Champion, Mike Caro gives us an inside look at how Bobby Baldwin went from playing penny-ante poker with his childhood friends to become a world champion and president of the Bellagio Hotel and Casino.

Mike Caro puts the reader in the shotgun seat with Baldwin as he travels the southern U.S., honing his poker chops in smoky backrooms and underground home games. The stories are punctuated by a first-person narrative related by Bobby himself and a few brief lessons learned by Baldwin in each situation.

This structure succeeds in entertaining the audience while providing real-life context for the lessons. Readers in the market for hard-core strategy, though, would be well advised to find another book because storytelling fills the majority of the pages between these covers.

Interestingly, this text was put together just one year after Baldwin had won the Main Event in 1978. Caro did the interview and Doyle Brunson was involved in the book's production.

Due to popular demand it was reworked and republished for a new generation of poker enthusiasts. Because of this, there are actually two forewords by Brunson included in the new version, the original from 1979 and one written specifically for this new edition.

The 1978 world champion, holder of three other WSOP bracelets, president and CEO of Bellagio and a member of the Poker Hall of Fame, Bobby Baldwin is counted among that small group of people who can truly be called legends of poker.

Brunson begins his original foreword with the phrase, "Bobby won all the money again." Unfortunately for all the other players in the game, this was a concept they would be forced to come to terms with.

Details:

  • $14.95
    Paperback
    Cardoza Publishing
    256 pages