At the age of 73, Archie Karas (full name Anargyros Karabourniotis) has unfortunately passed away.
The general public knows about Archie from the many YouTube documentaries and articles published about his sun run. As the story goes, he hit Vegas with $50 in his pocket, eventually turning it into millions upon millions of dollars through gambling. He played it all, including poker, winning against Stu Ungar, Chip Reese, Johnny Chan, Johnny Moss, and a list of other names. By the end of his winning streak, Archie was up over $40 million.
However many millions he once sat atop, Archie didn't manage to keep them. Most of his staggeringly large winnings went back to the casino and other players. Later on, he was even caught cheating in San Diego at a blackjack table. Apparently, he took the casino for $8,000.
In what was probably his final major interview, Archie Karas gave a sobering summary of his life. Here's that interview with the Soft White Underbelly.
Archie Karas – You have to understand something. Money means nothing to me.
I don't value it. I had all the material things I could ever want. Everything.
The things that I want, money can't buy. Freedom, love, happiness, and health, especially health. I don't care about money, so I have no fear. I don't care if I lose it. That's what made me a great gambler, I guess.
Alright. Archie. Where'd you grow up? Where are you from originally?
– I'm originally from, Greece.
– You grew up in Greece?
– Yes.
– You had both your parents?
– I had both my parents. Yes.
– How would you describe your childhood?
– It was a rough one. I grew up in a very poor, you know. It was right after the 2nd World War, so I was born in 1950.
Things were rough everywhere, especially in Greece, a small country. My father was a contractor, you know, but he didn't make much money. He worked for pennies back those days, you know, for small money. People didn't have any money.
I grew up pretty poor, you know? So I decided to, you know, look somewhere else for a little better living, you know?
– So you came to the United States at what age?
– I was 16 years old, 17 actually. I came by myself. I worked on the ship and I came there and ended up staying here.
– At what point did gambling come into your life?
– Well, they were playing a little poker and a little pool. So that's how I got involved.
You get losers, and then you need to learn how to get better so you can win, you know, get better and better. And it worked for a long time and broke, and you'll lose your paycheck. So that's, that's pretty much it. Are there gamblers in your family? Yeah.
Small time. My father played a little bit, you know, in Gin Rummy. We got some few games, you know, the Greek games, a coffee house where they get together, the Greeks, at night after work. And he played little, but he wasn't a big gambler, you know, he couldn't afford it.
He hardly could afford the food for the, you know, for the family.
– But for you, gambling became a more serious part of your life.
– For me, it came the whole my whole life. So I started getting better, and I got real good at it. I can see that I was making pretty good, you know, up and downs, of course, because that's what gambling is.
That's what, you know, I go up and then I go down and up and down and up and down, you know. It turned my whole life around. I got better and better as as I went. Took me a long time. It's a rough, living. I don't recommend it to anybody.
– Tough way to support your family, I would think.
– Not support your family anyway. But I don't recommend it, period. That's a rough living. A lot of stress, a lot of pressure.
– Do you have a family? Do you have a wife?
– I did. I was married. I was I was married 2 times. It didn't work out. It doesn't mix. Gambling and family or gambling and women or gambling and drinking, some of those things don't mix, they don't go together.
– Do you use alcohol or drugs or anything like that?
– No. No alcohol, no drugs, not even smoking. Mhmm. But back then, you know, it got me there, the second hand smoke. They used to smoke at the [tables]. They stopped later on.
But in the beginning, it was smoking, and that hurt my health.
– I'm sure, yeah. Yeah. You were spending a lot of time in casinos?
– All my life in casinos and finally, last year I paid the price. I had a, you know, I was I got diagnosed with an aneurysm when I had from the pressure and from all the ups and downs of the gambling.
– The pressure of gambling?
- Gambling, yeah. So I paid the price.
– What games were you was it blackjack that you started with?
– I started playing pool, and then went into poker, and then, you know, all kinds of poker. Poker, they have they have about 10 different versions. And then, some blackjack in the casino, dice.
Dice was my main game, you know.
– And there is some skill involved. Right?
– There's a skill, there's a skill in that. In the casino, the casino's got the best of it all the way.
The casino's got the best of it all the way. Poker is a lot of skill.
Casino is, is a lot of money if you win, but there's a lot of pressure and they don't want you to win because that's how they make their living. Right. They don't want you to make a living off them.
So, you know, the casino is very hard already.
– You have what's been called the biggest run in the history of casino gambling.
– I don't wanna call it a run, but, it took a long time.
– But the rumor is you started with $50 and came to Vegas.
– Yeah. I had $50 when I got to Vegas. But then, you know, gamblers, they borrow from each other. They lend money.
So I borrowed $10,000 and it went up to $130,000. And then started gambling, played a little pool, and then played a little poker. Then, you know, I got it up to millions. You can do it. If you get lucky, you can do it.
– You turned $50 into how many million?
– In the beginning, it was like maybe $18,000,000. Then it went a lot more. I don't wanna say exactly, but it doesn't matter. I lost the money back anyway, so, you know.
– How long did it take you to build build it all?
– The whole thing lasted, 3 years.
– 3 years? And was it a pleasurable experience or was it stressful?
– Very stressful. The casino didn't like it.
They were trying to beat me, and I was trying to beat them, and then it was a war.
– Between?
– Between me and the casinos. Yeah. You know, the casinos trying to stop me. They thought that I was dangerous because I had so much speed.
You know, I bet all my money, and then when I win, I win a lot. The casinos aren't used to that. They used to go lose your money, go home, sleep, or slip it off.
– What kind of things happened behind the scenes? Are you treated differently because you're walking away with so much money?
– Yeah. Very dangerous, beating casinos out of their money. You know, I even end up being arrested. They may accuse me of a whole bunch of things and this is this speculation, but that's probably what took place. I didn't give it a good cancel, cost me a lot of money, and they told me to, let's play let's play the plead down so you have to get out of this.
So they gave me 1-year probation, which turned out to be a lie, and they gave me 3 years probation. When I went in front of the judge, everything was different. So all my attorneys lied to me, so I got terrible counsel. And then they told me, you don't have to do restitution, pay this and that. So I said, no.
They hit me with a restitution of $12,000. So it was a horrible experience. It's, you know
– But what was it what was it stemming from? From a claim that you were cheating?
– Yeah. They claimed that they found some, some kind of marked card or something in a casino. It was it was a lie. They didn't have it if they had it, but they didn't have any proof that I did anything. And they got me to play play it down, and they hold you for about a year to put the pressure on you. And then after a year, they said, well, don't you wanna plead?
We'll give you 1 year probation. You don't have to pay this. You don't have to pay that. And it was all life. So it was a horrible thing what happened to me there.
But they wanted to destroy my name. I had the biggest name in the industry by gambling and poker. I've beaten some of the best poker players in the world. They didn't like that at all. And then casinos that go up and down, they didn't like that either.
They like the downside when you go, but when you go up, they didn't like it. They gotta find some way to so they'd already be up pretty good, and then they put me up there, you know, and they need the mental stuff. They say that I was cheating and this and that.
They never they never proved they never proved it. Otherwise, they would have hit me with it.
– Yeah. So what is gambling for you? Is it an addiction?
– No. I made a living with it.
– But is it a compulsion? Do you have any control over it?
You go to compulsion. But everything is a compulsion even when you work. Something you have to do to make a living. You know what I mean? It goes into your blood pretty much, the winning part and the losing part.
– Do you enjoy winning?
– Gamblers enjoy both winning and losing. Really? You get a fix by losing. You know, you get the downside of it. It's like a heroin, and I don't do drugs, but I got a pretty good idea what it is by just by watching people that did it.
Heroin, you go down, and then you go up, you do cocaine. So when you win, that's a cocaine of gambling, and when you lose, then you're down back in the heroin that side, so you're speedballing over there. That's why it's not a good thing. I don't recommend that to anybody.
– What kind of people are you mingling with in that world you're living in?
– You get from the highest class to the lowest class. You get all kinds of people from A to Z in there. You got some good people and you get some terrible people, you get all kinds.
– Does it affect your emotions?
– It destroys your emotions. Look what they did to me. They make me look like a criminal. You know? I never broke a law in my life.
– What's meaningful to you in your life?
– Well, it's too late now in the game. I meaningful is, you know, to take it easy, but I can't even do that now. I'm old, and I'm pretty sick now, and broke. That's a bad combination.
– You're broke now?
Oh, yeah. I'm broke too. I lost all the money. I lost millions, lost it. I lost the bag.
If I was cheating, first of all, I'm not gonna get broke. I have some kind of defense, but I lost. So, you know, because there's the proof is in the pudding.
– What was the highest point of your life or your career as a gambler?
– You mean how much money? It was in the millions. I don't wanna say it.
– I heard 40 million.
Yeah. That's very close. It didn't matter. After I got broke, it was 0.
– What's your biggest regret?
– My biggest regret, I should've tried to invest money, but I'm not an investor. I'm a gambler. That's who I am. That's my personality.
– What are you proudest of in your life?
– Not much, to tell you the truth. Not much. Yeah.
Because, you know, in the end, it's, like I said, you know, the pressure got to me, you know, my health went down. So I pay the price anyway. Whatever you do, you pay the price. Nothing is for free, there are no free rides here. You know, you win, you pay the price.
– What was the lowest point in your life?
– The low point was when I got sick. Health is more important than anything, in life, in anybody's life. You can't buy it. I don't care if you got millions or billions.
People would give billions just for a few days of life. So health is number 1. So I did, you know, say back then, I said that money didn't mean anything, which it didn't, otherwise I wouldn't gamble it. I wouldn't gamble it and I wouldn't I wouldn't have lost it either.
So that means that's what makes a gambler. He's not afraid to win and he's not afraid to lose. You understand? Now if I was if I was to be now, it's a little different, you know.
I don't think that I have the speed that I had when I was younger. You know what I mean? Yeah. Now I size money a little more. Now that's gonna change my style.
If I have to gamble again, I have to gamble the same way. I gotta go all out. You know what I mean? I'm in attack mode, you know, trying to win.
– What's the most important lesson you've learned in your life?
I learned, like I said before, the good things you cannot buy with money.
A good friend you can't buy, a friend can save your life, or he can help you when you're down and out, you know. Some of the good things, your health and stuff, you can't buy with money. Some of the best things you can buy with money.
Money is very important, but it's not number 1, not by a long shot.