Ropin' in a Big Bet With Jesse in Corpus

In 1960 when I retired from rodeoing, I went home to Tyler, Texas, and barned my roping horse at Daddy's ranch for the last time. I had been playing poker around rodeos since I was 10 years old, so it seemed natural to me to start playing cards for a living. I already knew a lot of the regulars on the poker circuit – men like Johnny Moss, Doc Ramsey, Morris Shapiro, and Mac McCorquodale – because I had played with them in the '50s at the Elks Club in Tyler or Waco during the winter when I came home from rodeoing.

I had heard about the good games in Corpus Christi, so just after I quit the rodeo circuit, I went there to play. When I walked into the Corpus Elks Club, I flashed my membership card from Tyler to Jesse Alto, who ran the joint. "Sure, you can play in our game," he said. It was a good game – I mean, it was a good game, a high game. They'd gamble with you. One Friday night the guys asked why everybody called me Cowboy.

"Oh, hell, it's just a nickname. I used to rope calves out on my uncle's ranch and hog-tie them," I explained, wrapping my arm around a certain way to show them how I did it. That's the way a sucker would've described it, you know.

"Say, you think you could still rope one?"

"I don't know; I don't even remember the last time I was on a horse, but I probably could."

"Well, every Saturday night they have a rodeo out at the fairgrounds, and there's one tomorrow night. If you think you can rope one of them wild calves, why don't we enter you?"

"Well, OK, but hell, I don't even have a horse; I'd have to borrow one." Of course, I could ride any horse in the world; it was just like driving a car after you haven't been at the wheel for a long time.

"What kinda time you think you could hog-tie one in?"

"Hell, I don't know, maybe a minute."

"A minute?! There ain't no way that you could tie a calf in a minute."

"Yeah, I believe I could."

"Well, how much do you wanna bet?"

"All I've got." They thought I was bluffing at them.

"How much you got?"

"I don't know, lemme see." I counted about $2,000 in front of me, another $1,400 or so in my pocket, and my buddy Jerry had about $200 on him. "Guess I can bet $3,600."

"OK, we'll take that bet," they said, laughing. "If you want to bet more than that, just put up the cash." I wish I'd had a lot more money on me, because I could've doubled it. In 1951, I'd set the all-time speed record of 11.03 seconds for roping a calf at Madison Square Garden – something that I sorta "forgot" to tell them about.

Fifty ropers showed up for the rodeo, which started at 7 p.m., but Jerry and I got there at about 5:30 p.m. The first guy I ran into was Burley Fellows, a cowboy I had roped with on the circuit. "Byron," he said (none of the cowboys called me Cowboy), "what the hell you doin' here?"

"I bet a bunch of gamblers everything I have that I can tie a calf in less than a minute. They don't know that I'm a real cowboy." He just hollered at that. "I'll give you 20 percent if you'll loan me a horse," I added. "Reckon I'll have to borrow your rope and piggin' strings, too." Hell, 20 percent of $3,600 was more than the calf roping paid that night, since with 50 ropers at a $20 entry fee apiece, first place was only about $400.

Just before the rodeo began, here came Jesse and about eight other poker players. They sat right by the roping chute at the far end of the arena, thinking they had the nuts and were really gonna take this sucker off, the one they called "Cowboy."

I was the fifth roper up. The calves weighed about 200 pounds, which seemed like lightweights to me, since I was used to roping those 300-pounders in the big rodeos. Hell, I could tie those little calves blindfolded. About the only way that I could lose the bet was to have a heart attack – it was just like finding a bird's nest lying on the ground.

With all the gamblers watching, I walked out the side gate of the arena, threw the rope around above my head to get the kinks out of it – kinda like practicing your golf swing before you hit the ball – and put the piggin' string in my mouth. I didn't want to take any chance of breaking the barrier and getting a 10-second fine, so I just let the calf get to the line; the horse jumped right out there, and I roped the calf cleanly around the neck. The horse stopped and I ran to the calf, legged him down, strung him, eased his legs up, and did two wraps and a hooey in 11 seconds flat, a fast time in a little rodeo like that. I won the thing just as easy as drinking a glass of iced tea.

Those gamblers were sick. They didn't watch another roper or another event; they just got up and headed straight to the Elks Club before I could even get to them to say hello. I went back to my hotel room and showered, put on my slacks, silk shirt, sportcoat, and alligator shoes, combed my hair nice, and headed for the Elks Club.

"Damn, we're lucky, boy!" Jesse said when I walked into the club. They had the money waiting for me in an envelope with all the bets clearly written on the front of it.

"Whaddaya mean?" I asked.

"Hell, you coulda won $50,000 off of us!"

"I just wish I'd had that much on me," I replied. I know that they'd have bet me that much, because those guys would bet big on anything – they usually had $40,000 to $50,000 on the table.

That was the first time I met Jesse Alto – 24 years later we met at the final table of the $10,000 championship event at the World Series of Poker. But I'll save that story for another day.

Editor's note: Byron "Cowboy" Wolford is the author of Cowboys, Gamblers & Hustlers, which is available through Card Player. For more information, visit the web at www.pokerbooks.com.