21
The Ellix Powers Story
There are a couple stories that capture the essence of my experience at this year’s World Series and then there’s what happened to me yesterday, which does that and a little more. After learning, chatting, and playing with the pros all day, I decided to do a little investigative reporting at a low-limit no-limit cash game.
There was a young punk at the table with Mickey-Appelman hair who didn’t stop talking the entire time he was at the table and never folded a hand, both perhaps for the benefit of his acid-washed girlfriend who was sweating him from a chair two feet behind him. When the table tired of his blather, Young Punk hollered at Ellix Powers, inviting him to take over a seat that just opened up at our table.
You remember Ellix Powers, right? He gained notoriety for having made the final table of the $5,000 Limit Hold’em event at the 2004 World Series of Poker. He arrived at the table extremely drunk, tilted T.J. Cloutier with his table talk, and started working on James McManus before he got knocked out in seventh place. Ellix earned $40,000 that day, which was like winning the lottery for him—he had spent the better part of two decades living on the streets and spending time behind bars. That, it would appear, is going to be the highlight of his poker career, as he’s now back to walking the seductively fine line that lies between rags and riches. While trying to explain his attraction to Ellix, Young Punk called him “a loose cannon,” which begged the question I was too mystified to ask: Why would you want this guy at our table?
There had already been several Ellix Powers sightings earlier in the day. According to various reports he had spent the better part of the day trying to hustle up enough cash so he could play poker in the manner to which he grew accustomed in 2004. See, Ellix has a bankroll problem, as in he doesn’t have one. His panhandling was especially persistent in the satellite area where he was actually hitting up players while they played. “Why won’t you lend me money?” Ellix yelled at one guy, who raised his hands in the air and brushed past him saying, “No. Nope. No way.”
He must have found an easy mark somewhere because when Ellix sat down at my table he managed to produce a hundred-dollar bill. With chips on the table he confidently ordered a shot of Absolute from a passing waitress and started verbally sparring with the Brazilian woman sitting at the far end of the table. At one point he called her a “smart ass” just as I got dealt queens under the gun. I raised to $20 and a tight old man to my left made it $50. Ellix then moved all in for $90. The tight old man asked if he could reraise, which told me what he had, aces or kings, but when I heard that he couldn’t reraise I decided to call, hoping to make a set and bust him. This obviously wasn’t a great call, but, remember, I’m just a writer.
The flop came 9-8-2. I checked to the tight old man, and he confidently pushed $100 into the pot. Any hope that he only had A-K vanished, but I started jawing with him just to make sure. Seeing that he was up against two players for what very likely was all the money he had in the world, Ellix went nuts. He started screaming at the Brazilian woman about the cocktail napkin on the table in front of her, claiming, “You been hiding cards under there.” No matter that he also had a napkin on the table in front of him. When this was pointed out to him, he threw the napkin on the floor and continued berating the woman. She immediately called for the floor as the dealer, some guy trucked in from Natchez, was too confused to intervene.
Meanwhile, I was trying to decide what to do with my hand. This is an easy fold for a pro but a tough one for everyone else. It’s brutally hard to get off big pocket pairs when the board comes small. The tight old man finally called a clock on me and by that point the dealer was practically screaming for help from the floor. Finally, three floor guys arrived at the same time. I mucked my cards and, just as I thought, the tight old man showed his aces, which had Ellix’s pocket sevens beat from start to finish. Ellix went nuts again and had to be escorted away from the table.
[Side note: A half hour later, I got dealt queens under the gun and raised to $20, and the tight old man made it $50, prompting me to turn to him and say, “This is déjà vu all over again.” I was pretty much telling him exactly what I had… but he obviously wasn’t listening. I called and the flop came queen high. I checked and tight old man, just as he had before, confidently pushed $100 into the pot. There were a bunch of different ways I could have played this hand, and I picked the most aggressive, immediately raising him $100 more. Whereas I was able to fold my big overpair, this guy couldn’t. He reraised me all in with pocket kings and I called and busted him.]
An hour after leaving my table, Ellix was spotted arguing with one of the girls at the Absolute Poker booth whose job it is to sell popcorn and smile. Evidently, Ellix didn’t want to pay the dollar “donation” that is required before one can eat Absolute popcorn. He just picked up a bag and started eating from it. When the Absolute girl called him out on it, Ellix had found another victim of his anger. “Fine,” he yelled, “here’s your fucking dollar,” which he slammed down on the table, “and here’s your fucking popcorn,” which he tossed back into the barrel from which it had come the popcorn from his bag tumbled out and intermixed with that from all the other, as yet unsold, bags.
