Poker Pro/Golfer Dusty Schmidt Drops “Milion Dollar” Lawsuit

In an earlier posting here at the Holdem Review blog we told you of golfer turned poker pro Dusty “Leatherass” Schmidt, who got into a bit of trouble with the U.S. Golfing Association for publicly posing a challenge that involved a million dollar wager on a combined golfing-poker challenge. The USGA, of course, objected to the golfing part, as it forbids its members from gambling on the sport. Schmidt’s Amateur Status was revoked and Schmidt, riled up, decided to have his day in court.

Until recently, that is. The new word on the USGA-Leatherass front is that Leatherass has decided to drop his suit against the USGA, though he is still committed to improving his golfing game (and not just his poker game), currently working with 2-time PGA tour winner Brian Henninger in Oregon.

Dusty Schmidt was one of Southern California’s top junior golfer’s until 2004 when, at the age of 23, he had a sudden heart attack. Online poker helped Dusty through his recovery, and he now makes as much as $100,000 at the game in a single month, with career winnings over $3 million.

His Million Dollar Challenge which he offered back in March of this year on his website (and is oddly reminiscent of Tom “durrrr” Dwan’s challenge of the same name) involved besting the multi-talented competitor in eight 9-hole rounds of golf and 10 heads-up poker bouts.

So Schmidt lost his amateur status and the saddest part is that nobody even took him up on his poker/golfing Million Dollar Challenge.