Andy Beal wanted to see if had what it took to play poker – and win -- against the game’s greatest players for the highest stakes imaginable.

In the process of finding out, the billionaire Texas businessman learned a lot about the game, had an unforgettable experience, shook up the poker world and gave one writer enough fodder for a fairly entertaining book that chronicles the whole ordeal.

Veteran gaming writer Michael Craig captures the fascinating tale of one of the country’s wealthiest men catching the poker bug, and the madness that ensued, in “The Professor, the Banker and the Suicide King.”

Much has been made about the ambiguity of the book’s title, in part because Craig refuses to publicly to disclose to whom the Suicide King references. The first two are easy enough; Howard Lederer is the Professor and, of course, Beal is the Banker. But if you ask me, the debate over who is the Suicide King is largely pointless and somewhat irrelevant.

A popular theory among poker pros and some media is that the character is Ted Forrest. The more likely explanation, in this reader’s view, is that the Suicide King simply is a symbolic reference to the author’s own poker experiences. If you pay close attention, you’ll see that Craig twice mentions the famously morose card in reference to poker games in which he was a participant.

Not that any of it matters, though it seems discussion over the book’s title overshadows the more intriguing character studies that lie within its pages. Among them: why would Beal, whose keen business sense and financial discipline led to his amassing fortunes untold, dump tens of millions of dollars trying to beat a game in which he had little experience, and no discernable edge other than his unlimited bankroll?

Conversely, why would a team of top professional pros, who make their living out of exploiting games where they have a decided advantage, agree to take on Beal for such ungodly stakes when, even if they were to run bad for just a few days, the fiscal ruin could threaten each of their livelihoods?

Motive always is a fascinating X factor for gamblers. Most of them will tell you it’s about money. For Beal, a real estate magnate whose assets make fellow Dallas entrepreneur Mark Cuban look middle class, the cash clearly was not an issue. For the poker professionals, money probably was their first consideration. But they continued to take on Beal even after the amateur improved his game to the point where his winning sessions put a serious dent in their bankrolls, and the prospect of losing a few more big bets to him might have serious ramifications.

One thing is certain: once Beal laid the challenge, neither side backed down, and the fireworks that took the place on the Bellagio’s felt, and the agonizing moments that went with them, have become the stuff of poker legend.

Upon taking up poker, Beal quickly decided he wanted to play heads-up against the world’s best players for the highest possible stakes. The pros, of course, oblige, and the book starts with a compelling tale of Forrest sitting down at a table with Chip Reese and Beal. Unbeknownst to Forrest that they were trying to play a heads-up match, Forrest quickly took $1 million off Beal, and the pros feared Forrest might have scared off their well-financed fish for good.

They couldn’t have been more wrong. Beal wanted more poker, for more money, against more of the world’s elite. In order to meet his demands, a team of pros including Doyle and Todd Brunson, Jennifer Harman, Reese, Lederer and Forrest was formed. They combined their funds to play Beal and shared in the profits. Other players bought shares, like stocks, in the team’s bankroll.

Beal had strict demands and, for the most part, the pros met them. They played against him in heads-up sessions for hours on end. Some players, such as Todd Brunson and Lederer, destroyed him. Others, such as Reese and Barry Greenstein, struggled.

One of the book’s drawbacks is that it’s difficult choosing whom to root for. Craig paints Beal as somewhat of a contradiction among the extremely wealthy; he shuns media attention, flies coach, looks for cheap hotel rooms, eats at low-cost diners and drives used cars. He is unfailingly polite to strangers, even drunken degenerate gamblers who see him as their next prey. But there’s something unsettling about a guy who, without thinking twice, has his bank wire a sum of money to the Bellagio that could feed every third-world country on the planet for 10 years. All in the name of feeding his new poker habit.

Equally disturbing is the impenetrable egos and brash arrogance of some of the pros who, even with clear evidence that Beal had improved enough to be a real threat, refused to acknowledge – with the exception of Reese and Greenstein – that continuing at Beal’s stakes could be a mistake.

What’s more, Beal’s insistence on clobbering the pros with nothing but his wallet and his will underscores his effort to master poker. Even top pros know there is a limit on the stakes they can handle. If Beal really wanted to assess his skill, why not learn the famous 4,000-8,000 mixed game that so many pros prefer? In other words, why not compete on a level playing field?

If there’s one lesson that can be taken from “The Professor, the Banker and the Suicide King,” it’s that poker greatness can’t be bought and, moreover, the game can’t be mastered in a short amount of time based on pure determination. And the pros might have learned that an aquarium as large as Beal’s might be better left untapped.

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