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The basic reason for why Mr. Ungar switched from gin rummy to poker was that he was a little too good at it. So good in fact, that no player possibly could stand up to him. Even the apparently experts who were supposed to be the best at gin were demolished when they competed with Mr. Ungar. One such gin rummy professionals was Harry Stein, nicknamed, "Yonkie". Harry was handed such a crushing blow at the hands of Stu Ungar that he allegedly quit participating in it professionally and never showed up at a gin rummy tournament.

Accordingly, with a honor like that it wasn’t long before people became afraid of betting against Stu Ungar. He could not find any matches and in his boredom he started doing something no one had performed before. He issued beginning handicaps to potential opponents with the wish that they might compete with him if they thought they had an edge. He deliberately started from a bad position and one account has it that he even played against a regular absconder. Mid game, he received a few words of wisdom that the bad egg was at it one more time but mr. ungar guaranteed that he deduced of the dishonestly and he would still come away with a win, which he did, of course.

The same trend followed Stu Ungar into sin city. He won so much that the poker rooms began asking him not to gamble on their rooms anymore. The reasoning behind it was that other casino clients refused to be seated at the table if he were seated.

Stu Ungar is remembered more for his achievements in holdem poker but he himself always maintained that he was a whole lot better at gin rummy.

He defeated Doyle Brunson in the World Series of Poker in 1980 and became the youngest world champion. Because of his looks that made him appear far younger than he actually was, he was nicknamed, "The Kid".