World Poker Tour

John Stolzmann “Johnny Blinder“

Birthplace
Sheboygan, WI

Birthday
August 23

Total Winnings
$1,511,282

John Stolzmann was born in Sheboygan, Wisconsin. His father is a firefighter and one of his biggest supporters in the game of poker. John majored in philosophy at the University of Wisconsin. His nickname is "Johnny Blinder," because of an unfortunate accident involving a paintball gun and his friend's eye.

John Stolzmann has been playing poker for several years now. He honed his skills on the internet, but he's played some big live tournaments as well. When he first started playing poker, his father was skeptical. He didn't think his son could make money playing poker since there were no casinos in Wisconsin. However, John proved his father wrong and even got him interested in the game.

Now, they play together all the time. If you were sitting at the table with the two of them, you might not know they were father and son, judging from how hard they play against one another. "People that know he's my dad kind of are surprised when we're playing at the same table because we're check-raising each other and it's really a competitive thing," John said.

John's first big cash came in 2004, when he placed fourth in the Caribbean Poker Classic. A month later in early 2005, John Stolzmann made poker history when he won his first World Poker Tour event. He beat out some of poker's biggest legends in the 6th Jack Binion World Poker Open. Five top poker pros were seated at the final table with Stolzmann, including Daniel Negreanu, Scotty Nguyen, Chau Giang, and Michael Mizrachi. The top prize was more than $1.4 million, which Stolzmann ended up sharing with his father who backed him.