The greatest poker comebacks - all you need is a chip and a chair!
Always check under cocktail napkins for rogue ante chips...
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1) Jack Straus
The greatest comeback of all time has to be attributed to Jack Straus at the 1982 WSOP Main Event. Straus famously lost what he thought were all his chips in a hand on Day 1 of the tournament, but as he got up to leave discovered a single chip hidden under a napkin. From there, "Treetop" miraculously rallied back to win the world title, and though he sadly died in 1988 aged only 58, will always be remembered in poker circles for only needing a chip and a chair.
2) Olivier Busquet
Arguably the greatest World Poker Tour (WPT) comeback in history belongs to Olivier Busquet, who somehow managed to overcome one of the biggest heads-up deficits ever seen in the game at the 2009 Borgata Poker Open. Busquet found himself with a 20:1 chip disadvantage against his opponent Jeremy Brown, but slowly ground his way back into contention before eventually clinching the title and a tidy $925,000. Reporters on the scene described what had occurred on the felt that day as "something that had to be seen to be believed".
3) David Chiu
Just a year before Busquet's heroics in 2009, David Chiu completed an insane comeback against Gus Hansen at the WPT World Championship. Hansen was in the zone having knocked out four players in 22 hands at the final table and held an almost 6:1 advantage heading into heads-up play, but the aggressive Dane failed to keep hold of his momentum. Chiu took advantage, the title, and the $3.4m top prize.
4) Greg Merson
Something of a modern day Straus, Greg Merson can stake claim to the best WSOP comeback since Treetop's win. On Day 5 of the 2012 Main Event he was down to just 50,000 chips (less than 3 big blinds), but by the end of that day he'd bagged up just shy of a million, and by the end of the tournament he was a world champion and over $8m richer.
5) Stu Ungar
Although Ungar's comeback wasn't strictly poker related, his achievement was so incredible that we just couldn't leave him out. "The Kid" enjoyed unrivalled success in the early 1980's, winning the WSOP Main Event back-to-back in '80 and '81, but a long-term addiction to cocaine had him in both physical and mental ruin by the early 90s. When Ungar was staked the $10,000 to play the 1997 WSOP by a friend in Billy Baxter, he had just a single tournament cash to his name across the previous six years, and was in such a bad way that he actually fell asleep several times on Day 1. Going on from there to win the event, and a third career world championship, earned Ungar a revised nickname - "The Comeback Kid" - and completed a legacy that will never be forgotten.
