Listening Back to Back in the Day

There’s a lot that’s interesting swirling around with regard to online poker and where it’s going these days. (Or not going, if you’re here in the U.S.)

But that’s standard -- that is, for there to be all sorts of stories, scoops, sensations, and scandals associated with the online version of the game. Has been the case ever since I started writing this blog more than eight-and-a-half years ago.

In fact today I took a break from reading the latest to look back a little at some of the issues being discussed not long after I started this sucker, thanks in part to my having randomly happened on a folder on an old computer full of poker podcasts.

The shows are all from late 2007 and early 2008, back when I remember having to download podcasts in order to hear them. That above is a crude screenshot of the folder -- if you’re curious you can click the pic to enlarge it. Looks like more than 40 different shows represented in the folder. Just by chance I decided to dial up one from exactly seven years ago today -- the 12/2/07 episode of “Big Poker Sundays” hosted by Scott Huff and Haralobos Voulgaris which aired on the now-defunct PokerRoad site.

The show covered various topics of the day, including a story about an infamous instance of “ghosting” involving the soon-to-be-let-go Managing Editor of BLUFF, Chris Vaughn, and Sorel Mizzi. Shane “shaniac” Schleger called in, too, to talk more about the state of online poker including current worries about multi-accounting, ghosting, and what was then a recent development regarding cheating on Absolute Poker. (I was even surprised to hear a quick reference to Hard-Boiled Poker in there, something I hadn’t remembered at all.)

Listening to the show sent me back to some articles online as well as some old posts here, including this post written the day after the BPS show that mentions some of what was discussed. Think I’ll probably next have to back up a few weeks with these and listen again to the first discussions of the Absolute Poker cheating scandal as it was just starting to break.

Speaking of, during my clicking around through some old HBP posts I landed on this one from February 2008 compiling lots of early articles about AP. Talk about a rabbit hole.

I’ll spare you all the little twists and turns I’ve been clicking my way through tonight, though will say I had a chuckle over this article (from mid-September ’07) from someone expressing utter disbelief that any cheating could have happened on the site, as well as this follow-up (written a week later) adamantly confirming that position, then adding the following:

“I've also spoken with an anonymous source who has had contact with individuals at Ultimate Bet and a few other sites, who notes that no such super user exists on those sites, either. Why, then, would Absolute Poker be the lone site that finds a need to create a super user?”

Rounders and Roundball

Just enjoyed listening to poker player, sports bettor, and good storyteller Haralabos Voulgaris do a turn on the Dan Le Batard show this afternoon. Been listening more and more to Le Batard, whose show is based out of Miami and becomes increasingly interesting (and fun) to follow the deeper the Heat go in the playoffs.

Voulgaris was on to talk NBA Finals, and he gave his reasons for favoring the Spurs to win. He was then asked to tell some poker stories, and “Haralabob” obliged.

Voulgaris shared an interesting story about playing poker with former NBA player Antoine Walker at the Bellagio who apparently showed up with a bag full of cash ready to play. Voulgaris actually paid someone $15K to give up a seat for Walker, who then proceeded to sit down for 14 hours or so and lose a fortune -- perhaps $400,000 or $500,000, Voulgaris estimated.

“Everyone at the table was like looking at each other thinking ‘Is there anything left in the bag?’” said Voulgaris. “He actually wasn’t that bad, now that I think of it,” he added. “He just wasn’t as good as the other players in the game.”

Fascinated, Le Batard and his co-host, Stugotz, asked for another poker story. “Who else have you taken money from in this kind of setting?” asked Le Batard, and Voulgaris proceeded to recall an instance of having once played in a game with another former NBA star, Charles Oakley.

“He was pretty cool, actually,” explained Voulgaris, “but I remember I bluffed him in a pot... he was like ‘You had it, right? You had it?’” Oakley wanted to see Voulgaris’s hand, and when he wouldn’t show Oakley actually reached over and grabbed the cards to turn them over.

“He saw that I was bluffing and he then started laughing. Then he picked me up by my armpits and carried me all of the way across the poker room and like slammed me against the wall. He was joking, but I was like scared out of my mind!”

The hosts were cracking up, as you might imagine. A hilarious picture to imagine -- Oakley hoisting Voulgaris up and carrying him across the room.

Bluffing him back, you might say.

From the Front Row

Kind of a crazy day filled with various tasks and obligations that carried me past the dinner bell without even having stopped to eat anything. Looking up and realizing night had fallen, I remembered having agreed to go see a Charlotte Bobcats’ preseason game with my friend, James, a season-ticket holder who had asked me earlier in the week about going.

I raced down the highway to arrive shortly after tip-off, then was pleasantly surprised to discover James had in fact scored us a ticket upgrade that put us courtside, right on the first row just a few feet from the baseline. Even better, the ticket got us into a buffet -- free through the first quarter! -- and before we got comfortable in our seats I’d had the chance to fill my empty belly with some good eats.

Like I say, the day had been filled taking care of a number of different tasks, all done while I had the WSOP Europe €25,600 High Roller final table streaming, eventually won by Daniel Negreanu who also clinched the WSOP Player of the Year for his finish. That’s two WSOP POYs for Negreanu after having one before in 2004, and caps a fairly remarkable year’s worth of tourney finishes dating back to his WSOP APAC Main Event win.

Was kind of interesting to hear it reported early on during that final table that those remaining had made a “gentleman’s agreement” not to collect any information from live stream which came with a half-hour delay and with hole cards shown after the hands had completed. (For more about the delay and players utilizing such info, see last week’s post “The Blessing and the Curse.”)

I think my favorite comment regarding that agreement came via Twitter from Mike “Tîmex” McDonald who tweeted “Just a headsup if I’m ever part of a gentleman’s agreement to not utilize hole card info from a live stream. My word is worth under €725,000.”

Actually I stayed away from Twitter for much of the day, especially once the final table got going in earnest, as I didn’t care to have results reported ahead of time. That delay starts to work on you after awhile, I think, so much so that once I finally tore myself away from work to go to the game it was a little disorienting suddenly to be back in “real time” so to speak.

Sitting so close to the action was a little jarring, too. I would say I felt like Haralabos Voulgaris, who whenever he sees an NBA game live he invariably sits courtside. But it was preseason, and the Bobcats and the Cavs, and, well, that ain’t exactly “high rolling.” But it was fun to pretend. The Bobcats won tonight, though it will probably be another long season.

Was also in very close proximity to lots of sideline reporting going on, and glancing over shoulders I saw people blogging and tweeting not unlike what I do when live reporting from poker tournaments. Indeed, it took me a few years to figure this out, but that sort of work resembles sports reporting more than anything else, and thus when people ask me what I do these days I find myself often quickly bringing up reporting on sports as the easiest way to explain writing about poker all the time.

Speaking of NBA ball, I’m contributing to a roundtable over on Ocelot Sports that will appear soon in which some of us are picking over/unders on all 30 teams, so check over there for that.

Now I’m back home and settling into some more sports-watching in real time, flipping back-and-forth between Game 2 of the World Series and my Panthers playing Tampa Bay. Will slide back into the delay again tomorrow, though, I imagine, to see that WSOPE final table play out, again taking a front row seat... on my couch.

Ambient Noise

“Well, I’ve been to one world fair, a picnic, and a rodeo, and that’s the stupidest thing I ever heard come over a set of earphones.” --Major T.J. “King” Kong, Dr. Strangelove

I’ll admit that while I’ve been busy with other things this week, I’ve continued to linger some over that Travis Makar info dump from last Friday regarding the UltimateBet insider cheating scandal, in particular those two lengthy audio files chronicling two meetings involving Russ Hamilton, Dan Friedberg, Sandy Millar, and (on one of them) Greg Pierson.

Been snooping through the files some more, reading various articles and postings, as well as listening to still more audio regarding it all in the form of podcasts.

The most recent episode of the Two Plus Two Pokercast with Haralabos Voulgaris provided some interesting discussion, with Voulgaris providing some interesting tidbits from his experience with UB and some of its principals. However, the lengthy guest spot of Scott “ElevenGrover” Bell mostly had the effect of confusing rather than clarifying (for me, anyway).

I better liked Todd Witteles’s partial breakdown of the recordings on his Poker Fraud Alert show this week. “DanDruff” played clips (mostly from the first part of the first recording) while commenting along the way, which seemed a more constructive exercise.

Finally I heard Witteles’s ex-cohort Bryan Micon’s latest Donk Down show on which appeared both Pokerati’s Dan Michalski and the man in the middle himself, Travis Makar. A mostly maddening hour-and-a-half, I’m afraid, with neither of the hosts having listened to the audio and even Makar saying he wasn’t completely up on what the recordings contained.

Makar expressed a willingness to answer any questions from Micon and Michalski, but neither seemed able to come up with any and thus the show failed to add much of value at all other than to remind us that Makar has still more information (and audio) which may or may not be revealed at a later date.

All of which is to say, the actual significance of the recorded discussions as well as all of the other newly-publicized data obviously remain in need of cogent explanation. And probably will for a good while, I imagine.

I mentioned on Monday how the recordings uncannily recall the Watergate tapes, what with the secretive nature of the recordings being made and the discussants’ talk of covering up previous scandalous behavior while making decisions that will subsequently affect the lives of many others. The ambient noise and interruptions occasionally obfuscating certain exchanges adds further to the similarity.

Every now and then I’ll dig around and listen to those tapes Richard Nixon had made, part of my hobby-like fascination with reading and learning more about the complicated figure. Of course, I almost never do so without also looking a transcript and usually having some sort of additional annotation to help guide me regarding who is saying what and what it all ultimately means.

Given the historical importance of those recordings and the fact that they were made so long ago, it’s easy to locate various aids to understanding that can help make the experience of listening all the more worthwhile. Not to mention even more compelling. (By the way, if you’re curious about the Nixon recordings, the “Nixon Tapes” website is a good place to start.)

* * * * *

Speaking of private meetings conducted during times of crisis, I wrote a new “Pop Poker” column for PokerListings regarding Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, the 1964 darkly-comic satire directed by Stanley Kubrick that is mostly taken up with a U.S. president and his advisors meeting in a “War Room” to discuss and try to deal with the surprise launch of a nuclear attack on the Soviet Union by a deranged general.

The film actually has a couple of significant connections to poker, including the character of Dr. Strangelove (one of three played by Peter Sellars) being partly based on John von Neumann, the Austrian-born mathematician often credited with having written and co-written the works that helped inaugurate the study of modern game theory. Von Neumann wrote about poker in those seminal works, and during the Cold War especially game theory played a particular role when it came to decision-making regarding nuclear weapons.

In fact, as I note at the end of the piece, in Dr. Strangelove the War Room itself features a large circular table around which the president and his advisor sit that was deliberately meant to look like a poker table.

Check out the article, if you’re curious to read more.

Heroes, Villains, and Haralabos Voulgaris

Way, way, way back when I first started this blog, Haralabos Voulgaris was one of the very first poker pros about whom I wrote a post. It was a short one, just praising him for being so friggin’ funny on an episode of the old Circuit podcast with Scott Huff, Joe Sebok, and Gavin Smith. The post was titled “Hilarious Haralabos.”

In fact, looking back I think that was probably the very first post in which I tried to write about something other than my own play or to pretend to offer some kind of pseudo-strategy-type talk. This was late May 2006. Over the next few months I’d write about other things happening in the poker world, including that year’s WSOP. Then in October came the UIGEA, and that’s when the blog really started to focus more on the poker world at large with my own little poker stories only occasionally appearing as part of the overall mix.

Voulgaris would go on to co-host a podcast with Huff, Big Poker Sundays. That show was very well liked, I recall, in part because of Voulgaris’s readiness to share opinions and not pull punches regarding things like the insider cheating scandal at Absolute Poker and other knotty matters. (People also liked BPS because Voulgaris is a funny dude, as is Huff.)

More of a sports bettor than a poker player, Voulgaris kind of receded from the poker scene a bit over the next few years, although he did turn up on High Stakes Poker and also participated in the “Big One for One Drop” at the WSOP this past summer. He also has kept contributing now and then to certain conversations in the poker community via Two Plus Two posts and his Twitter account (@haralabob).

Back in March of this year, when the extent of Erick Lindgren’s gambling debts became public and inspired one of those conversations in the poker community, Voulgaris shared some details of “E-Dog” owing him considerably (i.e., millions) and his six-year struggle to get paid. I wrote some about all that here in a post titled “Hero Call.”

There I discussed (in part) the idea of “heroes” in poker. “I can’t really say I ever thought of any players in such a way,” I wrote, “although perhaps that says more about me and my (modest) aspirations as a poker player than anything.” I went on to suggest that when it came to identifying heroes among professional poker players, it was perhaps best not to choose from those who are the biggest winners (see Phil Hellmuth), but rather to look at “those who are best able to promote and preserve the game -- the ‘ambassadors’ or others who actively work to keep the game going (so to speak) for the rest of us.”

Anyhow, I was reminded of that post and the issue again this week when Voulgaris published a post on his blog titled “Heroes and Villains in Poker.” (Apologies for having a similar title for this post, but really, the alliteration was too alluring to avoid.)

In the post, Voulgaris primarily addresses “Black Friday and the FTP fiasco,” although additionally shares more about his dealings with Lindgren. He also has some things to say about Daniel Negreanu’s calling out of certain figures (e.g., Howard Lederer) while omitting doing so with others (e.g., Lindgren).

“Black Friday turned the poker world on its ear,” writes Voulgaris. “People who were heroes (as much as a poker player could be I suppose) have since been cast as villains, and it has actually become quite difficult to discern (aside from a few obvious choices) who the heroes and the villains in [the] post Black Friday poker world are.”

Voulgaris makes an excellent point, and his post provides still more food for thought, too. And for those wanting more details regarding Lindgren and his debt to Voulgaris, he’s added a lengthy addendum in a contribution to a Two Plus Two thread discussing his original blog post.

While offering some criticism of Negreanu, Voulgaris also praises him for mostly being what I’m describing above as a worthy “ambassador” of the game. That is to say, a “hero” (of sorts), although like Voulgaris I share that urge to add qualifiers when using such a term in the context of poker and poker players.

Anyhow, check out Voulgaris’s post which offers some genuine insight and goes well beyond just dishing more dirt on another now-fallen poker “hero.”

It’s not nearly as hilarious as that appearance on The Circuit, of course. Unfortunately those old shows have all disappeared from the CardPlayer site, although as I was talking about a few weeks ago, I have a number of old poker podcasts saved and in fact do have that very show. (I’d post here, but am sure CardPlayer would object.)

Gonna go listen now. Seem to remember something pretty good in there about Freddy Deeb....

Hero Call

I had already decided on both the topic and title of this post when I saw the latest cover of BLUFF Europe featuring Gus Hansen as some sort of superhero (the March 2012 issue). Kind of a funny image, made more so by our knowledge of the many wild ups and downs Hansen has had as a player over the years, especially online.

Speaking of ups and downs, most readers of this blog probably at least heard something about Erick Lindgren’s troubles of late with regard to gambling losses. He became the subject of a much viewed and discussed thread on Two Plus Two in which some to whom he owed money called him out, then others joined in to form a loud chorus of voices that together effectively drowned out echoes of former praises sung over the years for the charismatic and talented poker player.

With over $8 million in tourney winnings, a couple of WPT titles, a WSOP bracelet, and a deep run in last year’s WSOP Main Event (finishing 43rd), Lindgren has well established his credentials as a top tourney player. Winning those WPT titles in 2003 and 2004 helped ensure him landing a central spot amid the cast of new poker celebs featured during the “boom” and heyday of televised poker, making him a star in our little poker world.

Those following either the thread on Two Plus Two or other reports about Lindgren’s considerable gambling debts are familiar with that story’s main theme, namely, that while E-dog had successfully crafted a very likable image of himself to the larger public, those in the know understood the reality much better, including his degen tendencies to gamble it up big and apparently not consider paying off debts a very high priority.

Probably the most compelling and thoughtful contribution to the hubbub came from Haralabos Voulgaris in a post detailing his six-year quest to get Lindgren to settle debts owed to him. There Voulgaris notes how Lindgren not only owed (and still owes) him money but also owes “a bunch of people spread all around the gambling world.” The amounts and number of people owed have increased over several years, the result of Lindgren’s being (in Voulgaris’s estimation) “basically allergic to paying his debts.”

Also worth noting is Phil Galfond’s latest blog post, “Lindgren, Loans, and a Little Advice,” in which he steps back and provides a lot of great food for thought regarding the poker community as a whole and the complicated, mutually-dependent system by which it sustains so many.

Hearing about Lindgren’s troubles reminded me of his WSOP bracelet win back in 2008. It was early in the Series, a memorable $5,000 Mixed Limit/No-Limit Hold’em event in which Lindgren outlasted Justin Bonomo heads-up for the win. I believe it was the first final table I’d ever covered at the WSOP, with Steve Horton and I reporting every hand for PokerNews.

Looking back, I see I wrote a post here afterwards noting the “genuine sense of joy and even a kind of weird camaraderie in the arena as everyone seemed to share in Lindgren’s triumph.” Most did seem to pull for him to win and thus shed the “best-without-a-bracelet” tag, and while I didn’t necessarily care one way or the other, his being there and winning the sucker did make for a fun, exciting story for a new WSOP reporter to tell.

So yeah, I guess remembering that night did make this recent story a tad more disappointing to hear. Indeed, one aspect of the story of Lindgren’s gambling debts that has cropped up is how it parallels what seem to have been a number of “falls from grace” that have occurred among that generation of TV poker stars with whom we all became familiar during those first couple of years after Moneymaker’s 2003 Main Event win. We could quickly construct a lengthy list of once-revered pros who over the last few years have been involved in various controversies, some much more serious and image-damaging that others.

Got me thinking a little about the whole idea of “heroes” in poker. I can’t really say I ever thought of any players in such a way, although perhaps that says more about me and my (modest) aspirations as a poker player than anything. I’ve heard some players -- serious players -- talk of other players as being “heroes” to them and I don’t doubt their sincerity when they do. But while I’ve been fascinated by certain characters and their stories, I can’t really name any player whom I’ve thought of in that way.

Was writing yesterday about poker being in part an “antisocial” game -- in other words, a necessarily self-interested endeavor in which the idea of having friendly attitudes toward others or even just admiring or respecting them is diminished. That may in part help explain why the idea of a poker “hero” is hard for some of us to imagine. The best, most obviously-skilled players all have their haters, too, right?

Where, then, might we find heroes in poker, if we can’t simply choose among the game’s biggest and most consistent winners? Probably among those who are best able to promote and preserve the game -- the “ambassadors” or others who actively work to keep the game going (so to speak) for the rest of us.

Certainly easier to imagine villains than heroes in that regard, too, I’m afraid. That is, it is easier to think of people who have clearly hurt the game of late than to list the helpers. But there are a few whom we might say are presently trying to improve things, in different ways.

Perhaps this rash of less-than-heroic seeming actions and characters that have given us so many negative stories in poker recently might inspire more to start acting in ways that help poker rather than hurt it.

Hilarious Haralabos

Was catching up on some podcasts and finally got to the most recent set of shows from CardPlayer's The Circuit (from the 2006 Mirage Poker Showdown). Of the poker podcasts that focus on the pros, I enjoy The Circuit the most, primarily because its hosts (Scott Huff, Gavin Smith, and Joe Sebok) are all very likable, witty, and knowledgeable about poker. Smith and Sebok also routinely avoid the sort of belittling commentary some pros offer whenever asked to comment on low limit games.

If you haven't heard it already, check out the show from Day 3 at the Mirage, particularly the second half when they interview Haralabos Voulgaris. The Canadian part-time tourney player's explanation of his career as a sports bettor is interesting enough, but his account of his much-publicized run-in with Freddy Deeb at the WPT Championship is priceless. As Sebok says at one point -- I paraphrase -- this is some of the funniest shinola I've ever heard (on a poker podcast, at least). The bit about the waitress with oversized hands is up there as well. I suppose some (e.g., Freddy Deeb fans) think Voulgaris an ass, but this’ll have you cryin’ regardless.