Poker in NBA (interviewee Phill Helmuth voor de kenners)
Well, I think that that’s wrong, because I think I will be playing forever. But you’re right, I set up my home life so that it’s amazing. You know, I’ve become really good friends with Joe Lacob who owns the [Golden State] Warriors. One of my friends invested $44 million in the team, and I kind of walked him into that meeting and was thinking, “Maybe I’m supposed to make some money from this.” I said, “Maybe I’ll just take floor seats for life,” and he said, “You already had ‘em!”
So it’s nice. I sit next to Joe at the games. I sit with Jed York, the [San Francisco] 49ers owner, in his box. These guys are both very intense — it’s like me at a final table. They like having me around, partly because I understand what they’re going through, the intensity of it. And so my world’s opened up. I’ve become a big 49ers fan and a Golden State Warriors fan, and some of the athletes play poker with me.
Yes, is David Lee any good? I’ve seen you tweet about that.
David Lee’s an excellent poker player. [Andrew] Bogut’s an excellent poker player — man, Bogut is really, really tough! And Bogut and Lee have introduced the game to some of the other stars on the team, and we did a huge event for them. They’ve been playing on the plane, much like the San Antonio Spurs play hold’em on the plane, much like a lot of other teams, a lot of baseball teams, a lot of football teams. A lot of them play Bourré still, but hold’em is a game that’s been played by a lot of sports teams around the planet. It’s competitive people playing a competitive game.
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