Poker Star Walks Line Between Shy and 'Jerk'

LAS VEGAS (Nov. 6) -- Perched on the fringes of a crowd packing a wind-swept balcony facing the Strip, the man almost universally regarded as the greatest poker player of his generation would be easy to overlook just days before what could be his greatest victory yet.

He looks innocent, at least until his huge brown eyes begin darting here and there, examining, assessing, calculating. Soon, a placid stare is replaced by a million-dollar smile, the kind of flash that shows why so many are betting that he will be the global icon the young sport so desperately needs.

If you've never heard of Phil Ivey before, brace yourself. The 33-year-old is often referred to as the "Tiger Woods of Poker" and, if he wins this weekend's finale of the World Series of Poker, he will have fulfilled similar promise. To be where he is -- he survived a field of 6,494 during two weeks of playing No-Limit Texas Hold 'Em in July to be in seventh place among the nine left vying for an $8.5 million top prize beginning Saturday -- is a feat that many of the biggest poker stars didn't think was even possible now that the tournament draws thousands of amateurs.

"You'll never see a real pro win the tournament again -- a recognized pro, let's put it that way," the elder statesman of poker, Doyle Brunson, told The New York Times last year. "The magnitude of the numbers makes it impossible."

Indeed, because unknowns regularly win this most prestigious and richest of poker events -- a lumberjack from Oakland, Md., is the chip leader heading into Saturday's action -- what poker has in short supply are transcendent cultural figures.

Enter Ivey, who many hope will, as with Tiger Woods and golf, fuse elegant good looks with flawless talent to give people a sense of being in the presence of greatness. He's already second on the all-time list of tournament earnings with more than $10 million and has won seven World Series of Poker titles, albeit smaller ones than the No-Limit Texas Hold 'Em Main Event considered the game's apex. He's finished in the top 20 three other times, a consistency that astounds his peers.

Part of the Ivey mystique is born of his reticence to speak to journalists. He declined interview requests not just from Sphere but also from The Associated Press, The Washington Post, The New York Times and every newspaper in Las Vegas in advance of the tournament's finale. His biggest splash to date is a current story for ESPN: The Magazine -- obligatory given that the sports network has a contractual stranglehold on the World Series of Poker. A forthcoming Fortune magazine piece represents a first significant step beyond the sports and poker press, but his coyness is worrisome to those who hope he can become a figure beyond the game.

"I know Phil is very private and they think that this is a smart tactic, but there's a reason why mainstream America knows who Annie Duke is," said a former World Series of Poker champion who asked not to be named. "There's being elusive and then there's being a jerk."

Either way, the World Series brass are thrilled at the prospect of his winning this year's tournament.

"Phil Ivey can help poker launch deeper into the pop culture," said Jeffrey Pollack, the World Series of Poker commissioner. "Having Phil Ivey win would resignify that poker professionals do shine, that it is a game of skill."

Ivey's gambling career started in Roselle, N.J., where his grandfather taught the young boy poker. There was always some sort of gambling game or moneymaking scheme going on, said childhood friend Ryheem McCutchen, who shot dice in the high school bathroom with Ivey and would join him on 18-hour poker benders in Atlantic City casinos when they were still teenagers.

"He always had a knack for making money," McCutchen said. "We used to go into New York City and buy clothes and shoes and resell them at school. We'd buy $4 sweaters and sell them for $20."

Ivey mocked McCutchen's college plans, asking him why he would go to school "when you can make so much money gambling?" Instead, Ivey worked as a telemarketer to earn enough cash to fund his poker habit and eventually moved out west to Las Vegas, playing high-stakes games at the Bellagio and elsewhere and burnishing his bona fides.

Other poker players tell tall tales of Ivey's constant itch to wager huge money. Phil Hellmuth, who has won the most World Series of Poker titles, said Ivey will bet $10,000 on a hole of golf or per pin in bowling and recalled how he beat Ivey for $32,000 in a high-stakes game of Chinese poker on golfer Corey Pavin's private jet last year as they were flying together from California to Tunica, Miss.

But McCutchen paints a more sedated image of Ivey, noting he married his high school sweetheart and rarely talks poker away from the game. He's more likely, McCutchen said, to be banging on his Ms. Pac-Man at home. Ivey's high-flying lifestyle, glamorized in the ESPN report recently, is somewhat for show, McCutchen said.

"I think it's like that when he's around those people," said McCutchen, a software engineer. "If you're around a bunch of people who gamble, then it's like, 'Oh, they want to play for money, OK.' He wouldn't say to me, 'Let's bet on this or that.' He's just a normal guy."