Poker Hollywood Style

Can celebrities play poker card games ? Yes. In fact, their acting skills, and certainly their money, give them a competitive edge. Tobey Maguire, Leonardo DiCaprio, Ben Affleck, David Schwimmer, Larry Flynt, James Woods, Norm McDonald, and other top acts play in major tournaments, and many have their own weekly game of cards.

In 1992, basketball’s Dream Team had a regular high-stakes no-limit game featuring Michal Jordan, Magic Johnson, Charles Barkley, and Scotty Pippen. Another Hollywood holdem poker game features Chevy Chase and Johnny Carson. Carson. Los Angeles Lakers owners Jerry Buss Frank Mariani can be found on any given night at a card club in-Los Angeles.

Right now, celebrity advanced stud Poker Showdown (on Bravo) and Hollywood Home Game (on the Travel Channel) showcase the skills (and nonskills) of some of the stars. (Of course, some of the play I’ve seen on those shows is suspect.) Did you know that Gabe Kaplan (Welcome Back Kotter) and Larry Flynt (of Hustler are two of the best celebrity poker players in the world today? From what I’ve seen, it won’t be too long before Leo, Ben, and Tobey become three of the better stars in the game. Here are a few hands featuring some of these celebs.

An l.a. Lakers Hand

The setting for this hand is much better than the hand itself-especially in my eyes, because I lost the hand! In 1996, Jerry Buss and Frank Mariani, the owners of the Lakers, invited a few of us high-stakes poker players to the Lakers training camp in Hawai. Huck Seed and I were pretty eager to attend. Can you blame us poker 1999?

Unfortunately for Huck and me, we were up all night long before we flew to Hawaii, and instead of sleeping on the plane ride, we played high-stakes Chinese Poker all the way to Honolulu bluff! When we arrived dead tired at the Hawaii Prince Hotel in Waikiki, we spotted Johnny Chan even before we got out of the car. Johnny told us that the Lakers players-only dinner was about to start, and that we were invited. Cool! So naturally we went right to the players’ dinner-having not slept in 30 hours.

At Jerry’s request, a poker game was arranged to begin after the players’ party. The game would series poker be held in Jerry’s suite-the honeymoon suite! Believe me, the honeymoon suite at the Hawaii Prince Hotel is something to see. It’s at the top of the hotel and looks out over the beach, the docks, and the ocean. We watched the sunrise from up there, and it was amazingly beautiful.

Johnny Chan, Yosh Nakano, Jerry Buss, Huck Seed, Phongthep “Tab” Thiptinnakon, and I were the participants in a $400-$800 limit Holdem game. By the way, Jerry prefers texas Holdem poker, and he recently finished second in a World Poker Tournament invitational event. Former NBA star Cedric Ceballos (I’m not sure who he plays for now) watched us play for a while. Such a nice setting. It’s really too bad that Huck and I got massacred for over $30,000 apiece in the game!

During the course of play, the following great hand came up between Jerry and me. I raised it up by making it $800 to go with 10s-8h in the second position. Jerry reraised and made it $1,200 to go with Ks-10d on the button (last position). The flop was 7s-9h-Ad. I checked, Jerry bet $400, I check-raised to make it $800 to go, and then Jerry called the $400 raise. The turn card was Jc, and thus the board was 7s-9h-Ad-Jc. I then bet $800 with the nut straight; Jerry raised it up, making it $1,900 to go; and I reraised, making it $2,400 to go. Jerry called.

The “river ran swiftly” when the Qd became the last card, making the final board 7s-9h-Ad-Jc-Qd. I bet $800 with my queen-poker high low straight, Jerry raised it to $1,900 with the nut ace-high straight, I raised it $2,400 to go, Jerry raised it to $3,200, and I made the out-of-my-mind raise to $4,000. assuming (I’m sure ) that we both had the nut straight at that point, Jerry just called me.

It’s painful for me even to recall this hand, and the $4,000 I lost on the last card. First of all, I made a bad raise with 10s-8h. Why play that “ garbage” (weak hand), especially in the second position? Since Jerry knew I was on tilt, he made a good reraise before the flop with Ks-10d. On the flop, I made a good check-raise with an open-ended straight draw. Jerry made a good call, although a fold here would have been equally wise. After all, I could easily have a pair of aces here, in which case he would have been in really bad shape.

On fourth street, I made a good bet with the nuts. Jerry made a questionable raise with the double-belly-buster straight draw (he needed a queen or an eight). Why raise when I had shown so much strength? On the river, I love my raise to $2,400. Jerry easily could have had A-Q or even just A-K (not to mention a lot of other hands). But I was really out of my mind to reraise to $4,000. When Jerry made it $3,200 to go, I should have known better. When I made it $4,000 to go, I was committing to putting in another $1,900 on the end if Jerry did have K-10 (which was very likely), because I would have had to call his last reraise wpt 2003.

Speaking of which, why didn’t Jerry make it six bets to go ($4,800) with the best possible hand? Was he feeling sorry for me? Yeah, right! No, he just couldn’t believe that I could put that much money in without the same hand that he had. He really did think it was a tie hand. After all, what reasonable player would put in five bets on the end without having K-10? Sometimes, assuming that your opponents are “reasonable” can cost you a bet money poker!

During the poker game that night, I asked Jerry why he didn’t sit on the floor at the Lakers games. He told me it made him nervous to be so close to the action. I told him that I loved to sit on the floor. I’ll never forget watching Michael Jordan play while I was seated courtside-the energy that he put out was amazing. Or watching Derek Harper talk trash all night with, of all people, the opposing fans!

When Huck and I went to the concierge the next day to pick up a package, it turned out to be a white envelope with two floor tickets for the exhibition game between the Lakers and the Nuggets.

Thanks for the seats, Jerry. It’s too bad beat poker that they cost Huck and me over $30,000 each!