Five-Deuce Pickup

When I met Annie Duke last fall after reading her book, I described my brilliant idea for an article about her, which I would title, "Win a Date With Annie Duke."



After registering her horrified expression – we had known each other for about 10 minutes – I explained that the object wouldn't be for someone to win an actual date with Duke. The article would reveal the challenges of re-entering the dating scene with four young children, money, celebrity, and poker fame.



"I'm not really dating," she told me. In the time since she and her husband split up, she had no interest in meeting anyone, much less bringing some other man into her children's lives. But after more than a year, following her move to Los Angeles, her agent introduced her to Joe. They had become serious enough that she introduced Joe to her kids.



Annie Duke lives in L.A.? I thought she lived in Portland. In fact, I didn't even know she was divorced until I read it in her book. Instead of impressing Duke with my article ideas, I moved on to Plan B: trying to avoid looking dumb.



I did some research on Joe Reitman, an actor, director, writer, and producer with more than 60 credits stretching back to 1990. I also saw pictures of him – beard, goatee, long hair, heavy-metal look – and heard that he was the lead singer in a metal band named Acid Reign. They were, I was told, very big in Europe. After meeting Joe, I saw a tour poster and one of the group's gold records.



I even got to ask Annie about the poker celebrity and the single woman. "Joe let me know that he didn't have any interest in poker, but I wondered. Then, right after we started dating, we were in a celebrity tournament and he was so bad. He got eliminated on the first hand with five-deuce offsuit.



"I thought, that's so awesome! He's not dating me for poker."



Joe Reitman has slowly, reluctantly gotten sucked into the poker world. He and Annie are co-producing Annie Duke Takes on the World, a pilot that will air on the Game Show Network on May 1. He has watched her DVDs, accompanied her on speaking and teaching appearances, and even played a little on UltimateBet.com.



They had talked about Annie backing Joe in UltimateBet.com's big Jan. 15 online tournament, the $1 Million Guarantee. "I did so much to set up that tournament," Annie said, "and I couldn't even play in it because I was doing the webcast commentary. I thought, I want a shot at that million dollars. I'm going to buy in my boyfriend and take a piece of him." But the matter hadn't been resolved, and Joe had trouble sleeping the night before, so he forgot about it.



That is, he forgot about it until Annie woke him up by shoving a notebook computer in his stomach and told him he was getting in as an alternate. It didn't matter that Joe had never played an online poker tournament, or that he was just waking up. He joined the field, one out of 2,774, competing for more than $1.3 million.



After a slow start, Reitman began accumulating chips. Meanwhile, Annie was working on UltimateBet.com's business, though not hard enough for Joe's taste. She kept yelling from other parts of the house for updates. When his status was good, and it usually was, she would shout, "What are you going to buy with the money when you win?"



"You're on crack," he would scream, and try to maintain his focus through the afternoon. It was evening by the time Annie had to leave.



Good, Joe thought. She's making me nervous. There were 100 players remaining, and Joe was near the chip lead. "I started realizing," Joe told me, "that I can't play crazy." He even started thinking about making the final table, which would win him entry into the 2006 World Series main event.



That's when he lost more than a third of his chips. He called an all-in reraise with two jacks and got outdrawn by A-K. Would he fade and console himself with a nice finish in the money, or would he rebuild?



Annie's absence did nothing to reduce his anxiety. She was calling from the car for updates, frequently because she had been given the wrong address for the studio.



"Stop calling me!"



Even that didn't work. Duke resorted to calling friends for updates, and those friends began peppering Joe with calls.



When Annie arrived at the studio near LAX – finally – Joe was back in the chip lead.



Despite holding that lead all the way to the final table, he didn't feel like he was in the dominant position. "I kept looking at the payouts, seeing how much more I could make if I wasn't the next eliminated." He hoped someone at the final table would raise the question of a chop, but knew it would be an inexcusable sign of weakness if he, the chip leader, brought it up.



With eight to go, action stopped to discuss a deal. Again, Joe tried not to seem too anxious, but he was frustrated when one player held out. (Eventually, as one of the last three, he was part of a chop, though it mostly concerned the division of second- and third-place money.)



Finally, more than 14 hours after Joe Reitman began his first online tournament, he dispatched the last competitor and won $258,000.



Actually, he won half of $258,000. His backer was probably more excited than he was.



"Between this and someday winning a second bracelet, this has to be more cool." At times like this, even though Annie

Duke doesn't play much poker, it is easy to remember that she is a professional gambler.



"For putting him in the tournament, I get half. Plus, because the win got him a seat at the main event, I'm in for half of what he wins there."



Two days later, when I met the couple for breakfast at the Griddle Café on Sunset and Fairfax, the gravity of the achievement was beginning to set in.



"Annie's always talked about getting me ready for the World Series this year, and I went along. But now I really have to study up."



That sounded ironic, coming from a man who just beat out a field of more than 2,700 and has spent 15 years on both sides of the camera in TV and movies, not to mention singing above the screams at Acid Reign concerts worldwide. But then I remembered the context. Annie Duke is one of the most competitive people on the planet. No matter how laid-back this amiable rocker seemed, the pressure to keep up with Annie was inevitable. And now he had to do it in poker.

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