In 2003 the ESPN cameras were fortunate enough to find a 26 year-old accountant from Tennessee with a great back-story a perfect name, and they rode him all the way to the 2003 WSOP Main Event title. The Moneymaker effect was instant for online poker, and completely changed the image of poker on television; taking poker from a game of grizzled old card-sharps to the mainstream phenomenon it is today.
Since 2003 televised poker shows have been clamoring to recapture the magic of the 2003 WSOP Main Event, and up until a recent episode of the PokerStars.net Big Game they have all failed.
I’ve written in the past about how highly I feel about the PokerStars.net Big Game format and innovations, and now the broadcast finally came through with its own version of Chris Moneymaker in the form of an Arizona State University math teacher by the name of David Fishman.
Fishman was staked $100,000 by the show –as are all the amateur players who make the show—and was able to turn an impressive $129,600 profit after 150 hands. But what makes the Fishman story so interesting is that the husband and father of twins had to make a choice between shutting down completely with over 50 hands still to play, or risking even a small amount of his profits in future hands –and boy was he ever tempted!
Fishman chose what I would call the hard route, and folded every single hand pre-flop –although he did try to limp in with pocket Kings but folded to a raise and re-raise—this get up bug and fold every hand strategy was something the PokerStars Big Game production team was hoping to avoid, and enacted certain rules to curtail this strategy. What they got however, was one of the most dramatic stories ever witnessed at a poker table!
Fishman had to make the gut-wrenching decision to not only fold those Kings, but also to simply open-fold Aces! Fishman showed just how important his family was, and how he wasn’t even willing to risk a few thousand dollars of his winnings –or take the chance that catastrophe could hit, which it would have in the Aces hand.
Fishman, who remained fairly calm throughout the entire session, was visibly emotional when the final hand was officially over, and when Amanda Leatherman asked him if he wanted to return next week –which is an option for all winners—Fishman merely said, “All I want to do right now is go home and give my wife and kids the biggest hug, I’m outta here.” Amanda then asked David to describe his emotions and all he could muster was a nervous giggle and an “I just want to go home” in a choked-up voice.
Not only was Fishman able to win, but he was such a likable person it would be hard not to root for him. The other players, and the announcers, were adamant that he was doing the right thing by folding every hand, and they were 100% correct.
We often lose sight of just how much money is on the line in these high-stakes poker games, frankly because the players don’t need it, but when a man like David Fishman wins what would merely be a nice session for a poker pro, it’s enough money to literally change his life. There is no more worrying about things like how will we pay for college? Or, will we be able to take that vacation? In a single hand against Phil Hellmuth David Fishman’s life changed, and the PokerStars Big Game cameras were there to capture the whole thing.
This is precisely what televised poker needed, another Moneymaker type hero to root for, who could rekindle the drama of poker that was first seen in the 2003 Main Event coverage, and sadly we haven’t seen it since. As more and more televised poker shows focus on the big stars of the game it was the online poker room that sent Chris Moneymaker to the 2003 WSOP Main Event after a $39 satellite win that got it right; just as movie directors will take a flyer on a little-known lead, but surround him with an ensemble cast, PokerStars put the amateur poker player back in the spotlight, and surrounded him by a strong supporting cast of top poker talent.
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