At some point, all of us have to make life changing decisions
““ some choose to go to college, and some choose to go to Las
Vegas.
Professional poker player John Murphy chose the road to Vegas,
and placed 13th out of 2,650 players in the 2004 World Series of
Poker at only 23 years old. A similar choice was made by an
underage gambler who began supporting himself by playing poker as
soon as he graduated from high school. These two poker players are
part of a young generation of gamblers who have chosen to forsake a
college career and enroll themselves in a different kind of school,
the school of poker.
Sitting on a plush couch, amid a multicolored assortment of beer
bottles, fast food wrappers and a half-empty bottle of single-malt
scotch, John “Murph Dog” Murphy stared intensely at his
laptop computer, playing a round of high-stakes online poker.
In his dimly lit West Los Angeles apartment, he told me he only
started playing serious poker three years ago, but in that short
time he has certainly come a long way.
“When I first started playing poker, my wins were small
and inconsistent,” he told me. “Whenever I did have a
big win, I would usually blow the money on whatever the average
college kid blows his money on.”
After a bit of serious playing, he moved up the ranks. By the
time he was 21, he was able to support himself on his poker
winnings.
“I called my father up and said that I could basically pay
my own rent from here on out, and I started supporting
myself,” he said.
Being self-sufficient and doing something you love to do is a
dream many people share. For most, college is a means to achieve
this dream, but what happens when you are good at something other
than school? What if you are really good at acting or painting or
playing poker?
Should you take the risk and just dive in, regardless of your
parents’ dreams of Ph.D. progeny? As Murphy told me, in
poker, “You have to be willing to lose it all.” This
axiom holds true in life as well.
Although Murphy completed two years at Santa Barbara City
College, he couldn’t see himself getting a bachelor’s
degree.
“To me it just sounded too far down the road to continue
going to college and then work for some company, making someone
else money, and not being happy with what I’m doing,”
he told me. Because of his choice to pursue poker as a career,
Murphy is living a life most college slackers could only dream of.
He doesn’t have to worry about going to class or dealing with
a boss, and he doesn’t have to worry about money.
“Most good poker players have absolutely zero respect for
money,” he said. “This allows them to make decisions
without thinking about the $10,000 dollars that is in the pot and
what it could be used for. Most people in the world would be able
to give you a big list of what that money could buy them ““ a
poker player will tell you that it’s just a tool for his
betting.”
At an age when the average college student is just graduating
and looking an entry-level, grunt-work position in some corporate
monster, Murphy has carved out a place for himself in the lucrative
world of professional gambling. When I asked him how he felt about
his chosen profession, he said he loved poker, but quickly added
with a smile, “As the saying goes: It’s the hardest way
to make an easy dollar.”
I was also put into contact with a confident young poker player
who spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing a recent IRS audit
of another gambler who disclosed information of his untaxed
earnings to the press.
“I can personally guarantee you that I’m the best
underage poker player in the world” he told me, and I believe
him. In a phone interview, this secretive individual went on to
say, “this year, I am on pace to make half-a-million
dollars.” And he isn’t even 21 yet.
The background story of this mysterious 20-year-old gambler
sounds like some crazy poker movie. In fact, the whole thing starts
with a poker movie.
“When I was 14 I saw the movie “˜Rounders’ and
the next day I went out and got a bunch of poker books,” he
said, telling me how he got started playing poker at such a young
age.
When he was still in high school, he had already realized the
potential of his poker playing skills and would cut class to go to
casinos or play online.
“I wasn’t even old enough to drive when I was
playing ““ I had a job making $6 an hour and I was making more
playing poker,” he said.
Online poker has changed the poker world, providing an
accessible and friendly place for anyone to play at any time. One
of the major differences with playing online is that you
don’t have to wait for a dealer and you can play multiple
tables at the same time, not to mention the fact no one checks IDs
in the virtual poker room.
And that’s how this young gambler learned to play, sitting
at home on the computer and reading books, honing his skills and
waiting for the day that he could unleash them on the gambling
public.
“I could play at 10 or 20 times the speed of a normal home
game, and I was just soaking up information,” he said.
He moved out of his parents’ house and became completely
self-sufficient at the age of 18; now he rents a luxury apartment,
drives a luxury car and lives the luxury life.
“I have no boss, no schedule, I make my own hours and I
play when I want to,” he said to me, but quickly added that
as a poker player, “you can go to work and actually lose your
salary.”
He doesn’t think he will ever go back to school, and why
would he want to? With about $100,000 invested in the stock market
and a job he loves, a pedantic university education seems
useless.
“I went to college for one week,” he told me,
“and every minute I was in class, I had this itch to play
poker.”
The luxury lifestyle these successful poker players live and
their relaxed, no-schedule days makes me more than a bit jealous. I
would love to live that life, and I wonder if I’ve really
wasted the last five years, grinding away with books on Shakespeare
and how to interpret Chaucer, when I should have been grinding away
with books on tournament strategies and how to calculate pot
odds.
Murphy could obviously see that wistful sparkle in my eye (a
testament to his ability to read his opponents) and he was quick to
remind me that “poker is not for everyone.” But then
again, that confident, mysterious voice on the telephone keeps
echoing in my head: “This year, I am on pace to make
half-a-million dollars.”
The options are out there, I guess you just have to choose your
path and stick with it. The only advice I can give you is to find
something you’re good at.
Maybe you’ll strike it rich in the end.