Mike “The Mouth” Matusow Biography
Mike Matusow was born in LA, California on the 30th of April, 1968. Mike was often bullied as a child and to cope with this he started playing video poker at the local casino for hours on end. It got so bad that he was stealing from his mother’s purse to pay for his habits and even suffered shoulder and arm injuries. In 1989 Matusow was taught how to play Texas hold’em by Steve Samaroff and as it turned out this would be one of the best things to ever happen to Mike.
Matusow is a very volatile player and all of the bullying he took growing up seems to have affected the way he conducts himself at the poker table. Matusow can often be found needling opponents and whining about being the unluckiest player in poker. It also doesn’t help that Mike is known for his meltdowns. After many days of great play Matusow will often have a lapse in judgement and basically give away all of his chips. This could have something to do with his attention deficit disorder.
That being said, Matusow is quite a solid player and has many tournament wins to back up this claim. In 2005 Mike had quite the year becoming the first player to ever win 2 million dollar prizes in one year. First he finished 9th in the ’05 WSOP main event for $1M and then he won the WSOP tournament of champions to take down another $1M. Matusow has won a total of three gold bracelets and about $5,000,000 in career tournament winnings.
Matusow’s 2005 success, coupled with his extravagant personality and bad boy mentality allowed him to become a poker superstar very quickly. Mike is always invited to play on television shows such as High Stakes Poker, Poker After Dark and Face the Ace. Mike is the player everyone loves to see lose and when he does he gives quite the show.
Mike Matusow’s life has not been a cakewalk. Along with his early life troubles of bullying and gambling addiction, Matusow has also dealt with drug addiction. He even had to spend nine months in prison for drug trafficking. After all of this Mike has come out with a book entitled, ‘Check Raising the Devil’, that goes into detail about his life’s struggles and successes.
Mike is a very unique player and has made a living whining about suck outs. He is a well known member of team Full Tilt and you can often find him playing the medium stake cash games or some of the bigger tournaments online.
