by
No one can tease Ryan Riess about wasting his MSU business degree, earned last December, by sitting at poker tables.
The 23-year-old from Waterford walks away from the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas as an $8.3-million champ.
Wearing a Detroit Lions Calvin Johnson jersey, he won late Tuesday after about 3 1/2 hours of televised Texas Hold 'em play with no betting limit. He had been down nearly $30 million in chips after Monday night's games. (WDIV video is below.)
WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS MY FRIENDS
— Ryan Riess (@RyanRiess1) November 6, 2013
Ryan Reiss at his well-paying workplace in a Spartans T-shirt. (Photo from World Series of Poker)
A wire service report in The Oakland Press describes the scene in a casino:
Reiss . . . won the championship with the arms of a girlfriend around his shoulders. His fans immediately tackled him to the ground.
Moments later, he accepted the diamond-encrusted championship bracelet.
"I want to thank my family and my friends, they're the best friends in the world," he said, his voice choked with tears.
Asked how such a young player came in with so much confidence, he said, "I just think I'm the best player in the world." . . .
Riess and eight other finalists beat out a field of 6,352 entrants in the no-limit Texas Hold 'em tournament in July. On Monday night, Riess eliminated four competitors with a sly, steady playing style.
The former Michiganian now lives in Florida and Vegas, as befits a hot-hands poker millionaire.
He gives this personal background in a World Series of Poker promo interview posted in July:
I started playing poker when I was 14 years old. I actually taught myself. One of my friends learned how to play before me. He was playing and I was like, “Oh I want to play.” I basically just taught myself how to play and was always really good at it. I took it very seriously.
I graduated from Michigan State in December, so I didn’t have a chance to play many tournaments and randomly on a weekend I decided to drive out to the Hammond [Indiana] for the Main Event [and I placed second]. I got over a quarter million for that. I still finished college, then all of 2013 I’ve just been traveling playing tournaments.
