Additional reporting by Sammie Gruber.
“If you’re under the age of 65, go ahead and sit down.”
There’s a tradition at the WSOP Seniors event. Once the bubble has burst and everyone left is in the money, the hunt starts for the oldest remaining player.
"Okay, if you're under 70, sit down."
How high would it go this year? 75… The applause starts at 80. Then a sprightly-looking gentleman turns up alongside the floor person.
“Are you still in the tournament, sir?" the floor person asks. "Which table are you on? How old are you? He says he’s 90. What’s your name, sir?”
“Vince Burgio.”
Bracelet winner and poker author
Burgio is poker royalty. A bracelet winner and a poker author, he knocked Howard Lederer out in third on his way to winning the 1994 WSOP $1,500 Seven-Card Stud Split event for $127,200.
‘94 was his year. Burgio almost wrote himself into poker history days later when he finished fourth in the Main Event for his biggest career cash of $168,000. That Main Event isn’t talked about much after the disgraced Russ Hamilton went on to win it for $1 million.
Burgio was also a member of the now-defunct Seniors Poker Players Hall of Fame. Johnny Moss was the first inductee.
It all started for him at family get-togethers, where he got to play cards for the first time.
“I loved it,” Burgio says. “Then, 40 years ago, I played in a tournament and enjoyed the fact that you could win money. I did real well, and then I started playing professionally.”
Burgio owned a construction company, but he sold that to play poker at a time when that just wasn’t seen as a viable career option. “The game’s been real good to me,” Burgio states with pride.
Burgio has written two books: Pizza, Pasta And Poker: The Private & Public Life of a Professional Poker Player, and Inside Poker: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, a collection of his columns from Card Player magazine that he wrote between 1998 and 2006. Those columns saw him named ‘The Andy Rooney of poker.’
The changing face of the WSOP
His first recorded cash at the WSOP was in 1992, when he placed 16th in a $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em event. Johnny Moss finished 12th in the same event, and Phil Hellmuth was 9th. Burgio later finished second in the $1,500 Limit Ace-to-Five Draw event, earning $45,000.
So how has the WSOP changed over the years?
“Dramatically,” Burgio says. “The biggest buy-ins were $1,500 and maybe one $5,000, and then the Main Event at $10,000. Now there are $250,000 and $100,000 buy-ins. It’s changed. If you’ve got a lot of money, you can play these. Nobody in their right minds would play a $100,000 buy-in.”
At 90, Burgio still has his poker chops and passion for the game. He won a $340 HORSE event at the Wynn in 2023, finished 107/3,362 in the WSOP Super Seniors last year, and placed 6th in the Seniors event at the Venetian DeepStack Showdown in March.
And he’s still in the 2025 WSOP Seniors event at the time of writing this.
So what advice has he got for young players like him who are thinking about a career in the game?
“Use your head,” he says.
It’s an answer that, like Burgio, has stood the test of time.
