I was fortunate that when I was lucky enough to make the final table of the WSOP MAIN EVENT  in 1999 The Discovery Channel were making  a quite decent documentary about the event. Dara O’Kearney wrote in a blog a couple of years ago that the Irish humour and the fact that I was obviously having a great time rather than looking like I was sitting in a dentist’s waiting room accidentally opened a lot of doors over the years that led to a lot of fun. For me anyway!

The first door opened when I got a call from a guy called Jonny Natas who was a marketing guy from 888. Jonny is a great guy if you overlook the fact that he was an Arsenal season ticket holder. Noone is perfect. He told me 888 would pay me to wear their logo at the upcoming World Heads Up event in Barcelona. Wearing a logo didn’t sound too difficult so I agreed and it led to a fun  relationship that lasted well over a decade. 888 and I were a good fit. They were smart  and their ideas on creating a community were similar to mine (mine were borrowed from my friend Mike Sexton but he didn’t mind!) My dealings with them didn’t prevent me from promoting The Irish Open in the US and hosting and commentating on the event for Paddy Power. I also got involved in Fintan’s Irish Poker Championship when Party Poker sponsored the iconic Galway event, assembling a field of international stars to make distribution of the tv programmes easier.

The noughties was an exciting time as poker exploded onto our TV sets being dragged from the backrooms to our living rooms. Of course bigger isn’t necessarily better but that’s a discussion for another day.

I had a front row seat as all this change came about. I was doing TV and radio, writing and promoting as well as playing. It wasn’t as lucrative as playing poker in Paris every day but it was great craic! I loved it. I am finishing my book YOU COULDN’T MAKE IT UP and while working on it recently I remembered how cool it was to have met, worked with and hung out with lots of sports stars and seeing what sets winners apart.

888 used to sponsor The UK Open, a tv poker tournament filmed in Maidstone over a couple of weeks played by players who’d qualified online, professionals and celebrities. The first time I played it I was asked to commentate on a few heats with Mike Carlson, a man better known as an NFL expert. He is a proper pro and nursed me through this new and frightening experience. People have been cursing him for that ever since.

One of the celebs playing that first event was darts superstar Phil The Power Taylor, winner of sixteen World Championships and everything else as well. There’s endless amounts of sitting around at these things so, having figured out Phil was a lovely guy and good company, I spent some of it slugging beer and being taught how a champion wins and stays on top. He told me he had a dartboard in his bedroom and wouldn’t allow himself to get into bed any night without going through a routine of throwing so many 180s and various checkouts. Jesus! He eventually surprisingly finished third in the tournament.

It was only on the way home I realised I should have been looking through the keyhole of his room to see what poker practise he was doing before bed.

Another superstar I met through poker was Georges St-Pierre, a Canadian World Champion cage fighter. He had some deal with 888. They took him to the WSOP one year and asked me to interview him for 10 minutes for their website. I’d never heard of him but had five hours to get a few questions to ask him, organised. No problem there. Except I got into a poker game and it took ages to get myself out of trouble so preparation time for Mr St-Pierre was cut a little short. I arrived in the room where I was supposed to conduct the interview. One of the 888 guys pointed me towards where two guys were standing. I approached them and, assuming the large black guy built like a brick shithouse was the cage fighter, grabbed his hand and told him I was delighted to meet him as I was a big fan. Then it all went pear-shaped. The 888 guy was shaking his head, the large gentleman was looking shocked, my fellow ambassador Shane Warne was laughing so much there was genuine concern he might have a seizure and the large gentleman’s companion also seemed to find it all very funny and eventually introduced himself as Georges St-Pierre. Jesus! At least he had a sense of humour.

What a lot of the Champions I’ve met have in common is a huge competitive streak. I was playing the WSOP Main a number of years ago. Multiple snooker World Champion Steve Davis was playing two tables to my left. Another multiple winner Stephen Hendry was three tables to my right. After a couple of hours Davis came over and asked if I’d mind checking out how Hendry was doing. I did. Later Hendry asked me to check how Davis was doing I did. A few hours later Davis again asked me again how Hendry was doing. I told him to go see for himself. Or words to that effect. Amazing how years after their snooker rivalry was dead the competitive energy was still there. Food for thought!

A few years ago I was due to meet ‘The Darling Of Dublin’ snooker’s Ken Doherty for breakfast in Terenure. Before going to meet him I saw on the TV news that Ken had been one of the ‘important’ people invited to meet the Queen at a function to mark her visit to Dublin the previous night. Over breakfast he told me about how the event had gone. He said the highlight for him was finding his Mammy with the Lord mayor of Limerick ‘in a headlock’. Turned out that was a slight exaggeration as it was a verbal headlock but fair play to her anyway. I rang our friend ex Leinster and Ireland rugby captain Reggie Corrigan and asked him why he didn’t get invited. He quickly replied that when he used to play the English he won!! Ouch.

There it is again. It’s never over.
A few paragraphs ago I mentioned Australia’s favourite son, cricket legend Shane Warne. He was indeed a superstar.

I spent lots of time with him at the WSOP and 888 UK Championship over the few years we were both ambassadors for the company. What a laugh! He was great fun to be around.

At the last WSOP we both attended representing 888 we played different Day 1s. When he was playing his I dropped by to wish him luck and hung about on the rail chatting with his lovely girlfriend the lovely Liz Hurley for a while. Cameramen kept coming over to the table to take his picture. The Americans couldn’t figure it out until Keith The Camel Hawkins told them “He’s cricket’s answer to Michael Jordan”. Perfect.

Sadly he passed away suddenly a couple of years later. Australia wept. They say that the good die young. Maybe it just seems that way because they are missed more.