AN INDEPENDENCE DAY TRIBUTE TO ONE OF THE MOST INDEPENDENT AND UNIQUE AMERICANS WE EVER BEFRIENDED -- THE LATE, GREAT BOB STUPAK 1942-2009
Editor's Note: In 2000, we abruptly changed careers by our own design. Before relocating from Ohio to Miami, we toured the nation -- interviewing legendary characters. Bob Stupak, the Casino King, stood out more than anyone else.
But he agreed to an interview only on the condition that it be published after he died. Though he was more than 20 years or senior, he had recently beaten the odds by surviving a horrific motorcycle crash. He was always lucky, so he probably figured the story would never see the light of day -- because he would somehow beat the house odds and outlive an interviewer young enough to be his son. He lost this wager, succumbing to leukemia less than a year ago.
So now his cantankerous soul can mutter in his Pittsburghese accent from the great Stratosphere in the sky "dat SOBing reporter got nothin' right about me and now that I can't sue 'eem, he's gonna print the whole #$%@ing story without recourse." The following is the whole bleeping story, frozen in Las Vegas in the year 2000:
PART 4: DEGENERATE GAMBLERS AND LOVE AFFAIRS
That’s great, I thought. But a life that includes winning a million dollar Super Bowl bet, hobnobbing with Frank Sinatra, surviving a horrific motorcycle crash, romancing Phyllis McGuire and starting all variety of casinos from scratch deserves more than a two-word kiss-off.
Then came the silent treatment and a scowl that said Stupak wished I’d disappear as quickly as his bank roll did at Caesars in ’64, or his $100 million stake in Stratosphere stock vanished when the place went bankrupt shortly after opening.
Oh he’s a character, I thought to myself. A rattlesnake of a character. A grumpy, contrarian, intimidating old cuss who is going to bat me around the way a cat plays with a cornered mouse. The more questions I asked, the more I would prolong my agony.
“Regrets?,” I asked, breaking the silence.
“Sure,” Stupak replied, fidgeting with his glasses, then fumbling with his cell phone.
“Examples?,” I requested.
“Relationships,” was the next one-word answer from the man whose life could be explained with two words.
“Specifics?,” I pleaded.
Stupak rolled his eyes, snuffed his cigarette.
“Hey, I regret ways I played certain poker hands. I have a lot of regrets, but I don’t look back on them, I don’t obsess on them,’’ he said. “The past is history, the future a mystery and now is now.”
Finally more talkative, Stupak admitted that he regrets not selling his Stratosphere stock before it plummeted.
“Of course, if you blow $100 million, that means you had $100 million to blow,” he blurted out with typical Stupak bravado.
Struggling to find some common ground, I talked about growing up in the Midwest. Stupak came of age on Pittsburgh’s South Side and I am a product of suburban Cleveland. His late father, Chester, made a living running illegal crap and other games in the family’s gritty, working class neighborhood.
Although he often ran afoul of the Nevada State Gaming Commission, Bob Stupak made his fortune through legal gambling. And he made it with an eighth grade education.
“The world is full of educated derelicts,” he observed.
This is a common Stupak theme. He lives to show you up, to prove he’s better than you and your college degree. Once, I began a question saying “I assume” and he blistered me the rest of the night with the old “when you say assume, it makes an ass out of you and me” axiom.
I asked about his house and Stupak said it’s the house he used to have years ago. He moved back into the seedy neighborhood after his $600,000 house on swanky Rancho Circle burned. The base of operations in the old neighborhood was filled with antique slot machines, a gallery of photos with Stupak in them and a library with thousands of video tapes of Stupak’s appearances, like the time he appeared on CBS’s 60 Minutes.
In the foyer, a Boomer Esiason jersey is on display. It’s a souvenir from Super Bowl XXIII.
Stupak bet $1 million on the Cincinnati Bengals in the 1989 NFL championship. The underdog Bengals lost, but covered the point spread, making Stupak a winner. At the time, it was the biggest sports bet in history.
No comments:
Post a Comment