Simon Trumper On A Mission At 2015 World Series of Poker
July 8, 2015 12:46 pmSimon Trumper is live poker director at the Dusk Till Dawn casino in Nottingham, as well as being a respected UK poker pro with $1,536,766 in winnings. Alongside thousands of other players from around the world, the 52 year-old is currently in Las Vegas taking part in the 7-week long poker extravaganza called the World Series Of Poker, and already Trumper has achieved two of his three main objectives going into the competition, namely making a final table, and recording his biggest score to date.
Trumper managed to achieve these aims after finishing Event #54: $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha Championship in 4th place for $267,778, although he ultimately fell short of his third objective which was winning a career first gold bracelet. However, Simon Trumper also has another important mission aside from advancing his poker credentials, and that is honoring the achievements of his good friend David “Devilfish” Ulliott, who passed away in April following a brief battle with cancer. Trumper intends to accomplish this goal by promoting Ulliott’s public nomination for the Poker Hall of Fame, and in order to gain greater exposure and public support for his mission has been handing out t-shirts with Ulliott’s photo on them at the WSOP.
For a long time Dave Ulliott was the UK’s biggest money earner with $6,218,293 in winnings, although that title eventually fell to Sam Trickett. He was also a larger than life character who won the first series of Late Night Poker, a TV show which ran from 1999 until 2002 and which helped popularize the game before the poker boom of 2003 to 2006. Talking about the player affectionately known as the “Devilfish”, Simon Trumper had this to say:
“I think he’s a Hall of Famer, not just because he ticks the obvious boxes, which is someone whose played amongst his peers at the highest levels and has had results, he’s won a World Poker Tour and he’s won a World Series of Poker [bracelet] and he’s had I think five runner-ups. It also says anybody whose contributed to the growth of poker and I don’t think anybody who has ever met him or heard of him could argue that he doesn’t deserve to be in there on that one.”
If nominated, it will then be left to the media and other members of Poker’s Hall Of Fame to vote David “Devilfish” Ulliott into the pantheon of legendary players, and already the UK has a number of high-profile players behind him, including Phil Hellmuth, Doyle Brunson, and Tony G.