Home Games At The Wolf’s Dennis

Back in my poker playing days in Madison,there were regular $5-$10 limit hold'em poker games on Tuesday and Thursday at Wayne Wolf’s place.  Wayne originally ran the Sportsmen’s Club south of Madison. He would take members  on a bus trip to hunt in' northern Wisconsin twice a year. In the beginning, his business was all about poker the Sportsmen’s Club, but over time it became all about the poker game.

            Initially, Wayne kept up the Sportsmen’s Club image by decorating the walls with stuffed animal heads card game, but eventually even these were replaced by an old green poker table against the wall.  When he started in the business, Wayne made his gaming money from the dues paid by the Sportsmen’s Club members. The Wolf’s Dennis, an old, green, rundown three-bedroom house (it might sound awful, but the place had a certain charm), was open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and Wayne began to run his poker games five days per week.

            On Monday s and Wednesday s, we played another regular game at a local bar.  If, at bar time, the play poker card games wanted to continue play, we would go over to the Wolf’s Dennis and resume our game at 1:00 a.m.

 If  a played ran into hard times, he might actually live with Wayne Wolf at the Wolf’s Dennis. Sometimes, two or three people lived at the Wolf’s Dennis, in addition to Wayne. The poker game was never shorthanded with so many players living there!

            I have fond memories of playing poker at the Wolf’s Dennis. I always liked Wayne, and he was always good to me. While the other games had strict rules, seemingly designed to pull me away from my family at dinnertime, Wayne didn’t care what time you showed up to play night poker!

            One game at Nora’s Bar (later at the Crossroads Bar) had a rule that you had to show up at 7:00 p.m. in order to have a seat.  I wound up missing that game quite a bit.  But Wayne’s poker games would start at 2:00 in the afternoon, and I would usually show up at 10:00 p.m.  after putting my wife and kids to bed.  Of course, I usually woke at 1:00 in the afternoon, so I was relatively fresh for the next late-night poker game. Believe me, being fresh didn’t hurt my over-all results at the Wolf’s Den.

            With more than 40 players rotating in and out of the game of cards, there was always action in Madison.  In fact, our annual Super Bowl poker tournament always drew at least 35 players.  Players like Tuli Harmony Gary Miller, big Al Emerson, Dewey Weum, Wayne “Tilly” Tyler, Tommy Hun, chad “I Had” Blackburn, Russ Bouffiou, Tommy Sperel, Denny Ruff, Morgan machine, Matt Cooney, Bruce “The Fox” DeWitt, Larry Warmke, Larry Michaels Beilfus, Laura Balch, Phil Carey, Don Eithun, betty “Boop’ Johnson, Gary Hines, John Duthie Clauder, Robin Selvag, and Jerry Metzger frequently were involved in the poker games in Madison.  In 2004, Madison area poker is still alive and well, with new players like Jon Green and Timmy Belstner.

Sometimes the games at the Wolf’s Dennis were low stakes, and sometimes they were high stakes.  One night, memorable for me, we were playing pot-limit Hold’em game with $5-$5 blinds, and I set the record loss for any poker game ever held in Madison: over $20,000! It was Big Emerson, Matt Cooney, and me playing that bad beat night at the Wolf’s Dennis.  I remember that I was ahead about $2,500, Matt was winning about the same, and until Matt started lending him more money, big Al was out of money and credit that night.

  In fact, we were about to quit when Matt offered Big Al $500 more of credit poker fundamentals. Things began to change, and as I hit the break-even mark for the night, I began a classic Phil Hellmuth meltdown.  Break-even felt like $2,500 loser to me, and I started to tilt, because we had almost quit, and now I was all the way back down to even! Later that night/morning, “even” looked pretty darned good to me.  A couple of hours after Matt extended  Big Al the additional $500 in credit, Matt was out of money and out of credit from both Al had given Matt a lot more credit than Matt had given Big Al, but enough was enough bluff.  When Matt dropped out of the game, I had lost over $7,000!

            Imagine Big Al almost quitting broke, and then, three hours later, sitting with over $12,000 in chips in front of him, and a stack of markers as well! Unfortunately for me, that night, big Al was willing to give me as much credit as I wpt 2003! I do remember that I deserved to lose whatever it was that I lost that night (just over $20,00).  I do remember trying to bluff Big Al out when he had four of a kind-not a good time to bluff a guy! I do remember being deeply depressed after I quit and drove home. After all, it’s not often that you set a record for most money lost! As you know, I like to set records advanced poker! Though that disastrous night it still fresh in my mind, even after all this time, I still have fond memories winner wsop 2000 of the Wolf’s Dennis and all of the players in Madison, Wisconsin!