The Poker Writers Hall of Fame

I very much enjoyed attending the second-annual induction ceremonies of the Women in Poker Hall of Fame back in June, when Jan Fisher, June Field, and Cyndy Violette were welcomed as the newest members. The ceremonies were spectacular, with Susie Isaacs delivering the best line of the night. When introducing Field, Isaacs listed her numerous contributions to poker, and then emphasized that her most important one was publishing my book.

And everyone was impressed when keynote speaker Mike Sexton announced that Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman had issued a proclamation declaring that June 5 would henceforth be known as “Women in Poker Hall of Fame Day.” (I wonder if the banks will be closed on that date.)

Unfortunately, a damper was thrown on the festivities. Security had to be tightened and guests strip-searched at the door because Windy Waggy, furious at being bypassed for induction two years in a row, had been overheard making bomb threats.

Afterward, I ran into Oklahoma Johnny Hale. “Y’know, Max,” he said, “I been thinkin’ that we need another poker Hall of Fame.”

“Another?” I asked. “Aren’t three sufficient — the original Poker Hall of Fame, the Women in Poker, and the Seniors? What else did you have in mind? A Railbirds Hall of Fame? A Bad Beat Hall of Fame? Or, how about a Curse Word Penalty Hall of Fame? John Bonetti would own that category all by himself. And what about a Tightest Poker Players Hall of Fame? Aberdeen Angus McTavish, who plays only suited aces, would be the first inductee into that. And how about …

Oklahoma Johnny wasn’t amused. “Y’all ain’t writin’ a column now, boy. This here’s a serious discussion. I was thinkin’ ’bout a Poker Writers Hall of Fame.”

That got my attention. “Hmm, not a bad idea. Only thing is, offhand, I can’t think of anyone who’d be really qualified, other than me. And there are so many poker writers out there, columnists, tournament reporters, bloggers; how do you decide who gets in?”

“Well, what ah had in mind was people who more or less write full time about poker. Folks whose words made a real contribution to the game. Y’all know, someone like me.”

“You? But all you ever write about is yourself.”

“Maybe, but it’s an honor to do so.”

“Look, Johnny, why don’t you form your own Poker Writers Hall of Fame and just induct yourself, like you did for the Seniors?”

OKJ reacted indignantly to my remark. “If ah hadn’t inducted mahself,” he declared, “it would have been a shameful injustice, an’ ah’d have demeaned the Seniors WCOP/Poker Players Hall of Fame. Now, y’all just give this here some thought, OK, boy? Remember, ah still have y’all on the short list for the Seniors once y’all quit pickin’ on me.”

I did give it some thought. Why shouldn’t gifted poker writers like me have their own Hall of Fame? I tried to think of other possible inductees. The first one coming to mind was Jim McManus, whose riveting and comprehensive “History of Poker” ran for what seemed like 5,000 chapters in Card Player magazine.

Then I remembered that he copied the idea from me. Years ago, I wrote a column titled “The Real History of Poker,” in which I revealed many previously unknown facts, such as the time that William Shakespeare was in a poker tournament, trying to raise money to stage Hamlet, and looking for a great line. Then, holding the nuts in a huge pot, he suddenly had to go to the bathroom, and, not knowing what to do, cried out in agony: “To pee or not to pee.” Sorry, copycat Jim, you’re fired!

Then my mind went way back to Rex Jones. He was writing a poker humor column (“The Railbird”) in Poker Player newspaper even before I started doing mine, and he was really funny. He wrote largely slapstick, self-deprecating humor, how he was always being harassed by his wife and family, getting loaded, and so on. I later discovered it was all true. I remember him once being paged for a phone call at Commerce Casino. Someone yelled out, “Try the bar.” Sure enough, that’s where he was.

But Rex’s main claim to fame was being the first to get me into print in a poker publication. On two occasions, I had sent him column corrections. One was the correct and much quoted line from my favorite comic strip, “Pogo”: “We have met the enemy and they is us.” Rex’s answer: “Things like facts, figures, and footnotes are what drove me from academia. I chose the world of poker because it is a world in which you can lie and get away with it. As a matter of fact, the bigger the lie, the greater the success.”

I was ready to put Rex in until I realized that two humorists in a Poker Writers Hall of Fame was one too many. Sorry, Rex, you’re also fired.

Nolan Dalla sprang to mind. Nolan has had a remarkable career. After holding several U.S. State Department positions, he embraced gaming for a living. Among other things, he wrote his highly regarded “Tales From the Felt” column in Card Player for years, devised the original “Player of the Year” criteria for the magazine, wrote for numerous other poker and sporting publications, wrote the best-selling biography of Stu Ungar, One of a Kind, and now, as the media director for Harrah’s, somehow manages the Herculean feat of covering all of the World Series of Poker events.

However, Nolan’s main claim to fame was asking me to split the tournament write-ups for the WSOP Circuit events with him. The only problem was that he kept all the exotic locations like Hawaii, Macau, and Paris, getting to stay in 12-star hotels, while I was shunted off to Iceland and the North Pole to cover freezeout tournaments and sleep in an igloo. Forget it, Nolan, you’re fired.

I briefly considered David James, a poker player who single-handedly wrote, produced, and directed a poker movie called The Big Blind. There were two things wrong with the film, though: Nobody ever saw it, and it featured Dirty Wally in his first movie since he played a corpse in Birth of a Nation back in 1915.  You’re fired, David.

I kept going down my list, but found problems with every name. As I got close to the bottom of the barrel, I came to Mike “Bigfoot” Paulle, who has done tournament coverage and written numerous poker blogs. He also once told me that he was the one who invented Internet reporting. (That’s funny, I always thought it was Al Gore.) Then I remembered that he once wrote that when I did tournament reports, I was unable to see or remember the cards. Sorry, Mike, you’re fired, too!

Well, that doesn’t seem to leave much — other than me, of course. Just as well. Why settle for anything less than the best? Now I’ll have to ask Johnny how I go about inducting myself.

Max Shapiro, a lifelong poker player and former newspaper reporter with several writing awards to his credit, has been writing a humor column for Card Player ever since it was launched 20 years ago. His early columns were collected in his book, Read ’em and Laugh.