Barry Greenstein was born in Chicago in 1954 and stayed in Chicago for most of his life. He attended Bogan High School which he graduated from and then moved onto the University of Illinois where he finished with a bachelor degree in Computer Science. After his schooling Barry started working with Symantec where he worked until he was thirty-six and which point he retired to become a professional poker player. Greenstein learned how to play poker at a young age with his father, but was a late bloomer when it came to making the move to become professional.
Barry is known as the Robin Hood of Poker because he donates a lot of his poker winnings to charities. He takes from the rich and gives to the needy and this makes him a modern day robin hood which has earned the respect of many poker players and fans around the world. Not many poker player would even consider donating there winnings to charity, but Barry had no intentions not to donate most of his winnings.
Throughout Barry’s career he has won three WSOP bracelets and two WPT titles. He has also won money thirty-seven times in WSOP events plus another five times on the WPT. Barry has also own titles in two special WPT events which were the Father & Sons Tournament and the WPT Poker by the Book. Barry has been just starting to heat up lately as well and finished second place in 2008 for the WSOP Player of the Year finishing just behind the winner Erick Lindgren. He managed to finish second in the standings for best player of the year by winning money in six events including one bracelet in a Razz tournament.
Greenstein has already won almost seven million dollars from live tournament play and even more money at the cash tables. Barry plays on www.PokerStars.com often under the alias “barryg1” and has seen some great success playing online whereas some professional poker players couldn’t keep up with the fast paced action. Barry is one of the nicest people you’re going to meet on the poker circuit and he is known to autograph his book for you if you knock him out of any event. The book that Barry wrote was titled “Ace on the River” and it has helped many professional poker players learn how to play poker better.
Barry now lives in California and has two children plus four step children including one step children who Barry taught to play poker. Joe Sebok is one of Barry’s stepson and he is also a PokerStar now and opened up a strategy website with Barry for other up and coming poker players to use. Barry is always giving back to the game whether it’s through teaching other players how to play the game or through donating his winnings to charity. Barry is sure to continue his winning ways throughout the next few years and I wouldn’t be surprised to see him win the player of the year very soon.