The Ongoing Ellix Powers saga part 12

I ducked out of work yesterday around two, and after swinging by the apartment right quick, I went straight for the Rio. I got to the poker area around quarter of three and headed for the Limit Tournament. When I got to Ellix’s old table, I saw that the seat next to Annie Duke was now vacant, and I feared the worst. I tapped one of the players who was out of the hand on the shoulder and asked him if Ellix had been busted out, which he confirmed. I surveyed the floor, and saw the documentary crew filming him at an empty table.

Needless to say Ellix was beside himself, and I wasn’t sure whether I could ask the questions I wanted to without setting him off, so I tried to take it as easily as possible. I asked him what happened, and he began. “Pocket aces man, pocket fucking aces. Cracked by Queens. I was going to triple the fuck up, pocket aces man.” He still couldn’t believe it had happened to him. “I was in the big blind, it got raised, and McManus called. I looked down and saw those two aces, and I knew it was all or nothing this hand. I made it three bets, and they both just called. Flop came queen, blank, blank. Fucking Queen had to come. I was getting three to one on aces, would have had like 20 grand in chips, and Id be right back in this thing. Motherfucker. Had to flop that fucking queen.” We talked back and forth in front of the camera crew, but there was nothing particularly interesting said, just Ellix cursing his luck. “I hadn’t seen aces in 14 hours, and when I finally do this fucking guy has to catch a queen.” The only time he really perked up is when I asked him about playing in the 1500 dollar razz event which is happening tomorrow. I asked him about who could potentially put him in, but he was pretty sure he couldn’t get anything more out of his previous backers and he didn’t know who was going to help him out. I offered him a ride, but he just wanted to stay there and see if he could hustle up some money. Defeated in the battle, Ellix was not ready to concede the war, and hopefully he will fight another day.

Even with the eventual fallout, I can not stress enough how sweet it was to see Ellix in action the previous day. I wish I had a tape recorder on me, because in the 45 minutes I watched him playing at the table drunk, he was a spectacle. I tried to remember as much as I could and put it in part 11 of the saga, but I am now convinced that if I can get him drunk and playing low limit, it will be worth every penny of his stake win or lose. I will need to see how depressed he is when I meet up with him this weekend, but if he’s up for the challenge I’m going to put him in a 4-8 game with a triple shot of tequila and watch the fireworks.

Post Script: About 30 minutes after I posted this, I got a 10 minute phone call from Ellix. He said he’d been asleep since 8PM last night, and that he just couldn’t get those hands out of his head. “I had aces, kings, and ace king and I couldn’t get lucky on none of them. Best hands in poker, I was playing patiently, and I lost millions of dollars. You understand what I’m sayin, there were millions of dollars at stake. If I could have just won this thing I had things worked out with websites and clothing companies. I would have made millions of dollars.” He said he was still going over to the Rio because that’s what he had to do and gave me a strict warning, “Don’t make poker your life. Enjoy it, and play it when you want to for fun, but don’t make it your fucking life. I wasted thirty fucking years. I can’t do anything else, I have to go back to the Rio and play whether I want to or not.” He did have some good news, in that he thinks he’s going to play in the main event now. He found a website that will back him 50% if he will wear their stuff because they are pretty sure ESPN will show him at least once. He also is thinking about playing the 3000 dollar limit event this Sunday, so things could be looking up, but then he got back into it about the tournament he had just lost. “I don’t know why all those motherfuckers came out of the woodwork. Last year, you didn’t see all these motherfuckers out there. I have to sit next to Phil laak or Annie duke or whoever the fuck else. Even Amir came out of the fucking woodwork. The best poker players in the world. I could have made fucking millions of dollars.”

The Ongoing Ellix Powers saga part 12

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