Poker Hall of Famer David "Chip" Reese, who built a reputation as one of the best cash-game players ever, died at the age of 56 on Tuesday from undetermined causes.
Reese, whose career live tournament winnings reached nearly $3 million, died in his sleep and was found by his son early Tuesday at his Las Vegas home. He was suffering from symptoms of pneumonia, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
Reese was born in Dayton, Ohio and graduated from Dartmouth College. In a chapter dedicated to him in the legendary book, Doyle Brunson's Super System, Brunson told the story of how after graduating from college, Reese worked for a year as a manufacturer's representative before he and a friend visited a Las Vegas poker room one weekend with $800 between them. They doubled their bankroll in one day and Reese found a permanent home in Las Vegas.
"In addition to being a fundamentally sound player, [Chip] has the best natural instincts about what to do in difficult situations of any card player I've ever sat at a table with," Brunson wrote in his book, in which Reese assisted with the chapter on Seven-card Stud.
Reese went on to win three World Series champion's bracelets. At the 2006 World Series of Poker, Reese outlasted a field of 143 players and won the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. event, which netted him $1,716,000. In 1991, at the age of 40, he became the youngest person to be elected to the Poker Hall of Fame.
"Many consider Chip the greatest cash-game player who ever lived, but he was also a World Series of Poker legend," said WSOP Commissioner Jeffrey Pollack. "His victory in the inaugural $50,000 buy-in H.O.R.S.E. championship in 2006 won him his third WSOP bracelet and made him part of WSOP lore forever."
