Posted by Steve Rosenbloom
LAS VEGAS -- David Williams saunters into the Bodog.com suite outside the Rio Hotel poker hangar where the World Series of Poker main event is being played. On one wrist is the WSOP bracelet he won a couple weeks ago, and around his neck is a massive ace of spades pendant that came last weekend.
"A friend of mine, Jacob the Jeweler, a prominent jeweler from New York, wanted to make me something special for the World Series,'' Williams said.
Oh, it's special, alright. I mean, what 4-by-3-inch ace of spades filled with black diamonds could be anything but?
Thing is, it's a work in progress. There's another ace -- the ace of hearts, all rubies -- and Williams wants the frame to hang from a point instead of a square so the baubles fan out the way they do when you squeeze your cards.
But wait. There's more. These weighty bullets hang in a holster, so they slide in and out and can be switched and used as card protectors.
Some card protectors cost $5, some cost five times the amount of the buy-in for the main event.
"Life is good,'' said the 2004 main event runner-up, and it's only going to get better because Williams' next appointment was at a Bentley dealership to see if he could trade in his primitive '04 ride for a snappy black-on-black '07 model, don't you know.
Who says nobody remembers who finished second?
"It depends on who finishes second,'' said Williams, who lost heads-up to Greg Raymer two years ago. "If the right guy finishes second and makes the most of it, you can make sure people know who you are, not just in poker talent, but what you do about marketing yourself.
"I've done what I wanted to do to be remembered lately.''
Has he ever. When Williams finished second to Raymer in '04 when he was just 21, he was regarded by some as a typical young, no-limit hold 'em player caught up in the pokerpalooza craze. Well, try this:
Recently, he won a $2,500 buy-in H.O.R.S.E. event at Caesars Palace, a tournament demanding a player's mastery at hold 'em, Omaha, razz, seven-card stud and seven-card stud eight-or-better.
Earlier in this World Series, he nearly made a final table in pot-limit Omaha, then just before the main event, he finished second in the $5,000 buy-in no-limit 2-7 lowball event, a game where the old pros think they are kings. And in between, Williams roared to his first bracelet in -- get this -- the $1,500 buy-in seven-card stud tournament.
One-trick pony, nothing.
What's more, only a year ago at the same seven stud event, Williams motioned me over on the first hand and whispered, "Don't tell anyone I've never played this before.''
Said Williams just 12 months later: "I'm a fast learner.''
You think?
Williams, who survived to play Day 2 of this year's main event Monday, is one of the many gamers who have invaded the poker world because, well, poker is a game and it's what they do.
Gaming for Williams began seriously in the eighth grade when he picked up the card game Magic: The Gathering. Within four years, he was one of the best in the world, and he actually travelled around the world to compete on a tour.
It was on those tours that his gaming buddies found hold 'em because, well, hold 'em is a game and it's what they do. They introduced it to Williams when he returned home to Dallas after a miserable year attending Princeton.
"I jumped in, I did well, I liked it,'' the friendly and wonderfully conversant Williams said. "They had just seen 'Rounders,' too, and they really liked it. They got more into it and we started playing hold 'em more and more on the side of the Magic pro tours.''
Williams got so into it that he began frequenting card clubs in the Dallas area, including a notable place called The Redmans, run by the brother of one-time main event runner-up Byron "Cowboy'' Wolford and once the joint where Doyle Brunson, Amarillo Slim and T.J. Cloutier bluffed at big pots.
"I was in there and it was a big part of history,'' Williams said. "I was 18 or 19, seeing pictures and hearing these stories and being around the environment got me fired up about the competition. I was only playing limit hold 'em, but I wanted to learn more. It was cool being raised by the people who had these poker ties.''
Williams began playing a lot of pot-limit Omaha after getting staked by a local bookie. Got to love that. That is so poker.
"He put me in the pot-limit Omaha game,'' Williams said, "because he said I had a lot of gamble in me and he liked it. 'You got some gamble, kid. I don't have time to play because I have to man the book. I'm going to put you in the game and I'm going to save what you win after we split it, and if it gets big enough, I'm going to put you in the World Series.' I said, 'That'd be cool.' He said we'd split it 50-50.''
Williams did OK, but not main-event-buy-in OK. He started practicing no-limit hold 'em online and won a seat to the World Poker Tour event in Aruba, his first live no-limit hold 'em tournament.
"I wished I could've played more than two hours because I loved it,'' Williams said. "I wanted to give it another shot.
"So I started practicing more online for the World Series, playing in satellites and I won a seat to the World Series just before I was going to go down there.
"I called up my bookie friend Danny and said, 'I won a seat online. What do you want to do? You can give me the $10,000 and I could just pocket it and you'd still have your piece of me.' He said, 'Ah, it doesn't matter. I don't care really.' I said, 'OK, I'll just play for myself. The expectations aren't high, I don't really know what I'm doing. The pressure would've been on me if you put up the money.' He said, 'Don't worry about it. Just go there and knock them dead.'''
He almost did, finishing second to Raymer and winning $3.5 million, meaning his friendly neighborhood bookie blew a $1.75 million payday.
"He called me to say congratulations,'' Williams recalled. "I called him back to say I'm sorry. He said, 'Hey, I'm a gambler. I gambled all my life. I'm a bookie. I play poker. I gambled.' I think he's got millions anyway. He didn't seem too torn up about it.''
Four months after that main event, Williams lost another major tournament when it got down to heads-up, this time finishing behind Daniel Negreanu at the World Poker Tour's Borgata event.
"The Borgata was important to me because after the World Series, I really felt like a one-hit wonder,'' Williams said. "I felt like I didn't know if I was in the right place, if this was what I was supposed to be doing or I got lucky. I was unsure about my abilities. I had a slump right before The Borgata and I was really torn up about it.''
To correct his play, Williams brought a notepad and pen to the table to write down every hand he played and its outcome.
"People like to lie to themselves,'' Williams said. "I just wanted to make sure I couldn't lie to myself afterwards. I wanted to face the music.
"Writing it down didn't actually help me with every hand. But it helped me to know I would have to look at it, so I played smart. I played smart, I didn't get out of line, and I validated myself.
"I may have to get back to the note-taking if I get out of line here.''
Williams hardly seemed out of line when he entered Day 2 with $36,000 in chips. Thing is, he was only second in the Williams family after the first day, because his mom, Shirley, was at $50,000.
Yes, $50,000 for the woman who got so much face time on ESPN in '04 as she watched and cheered and anguished and supported her son.
During last year's World Series, Shirley Williams wore a shirt that read "David's Mom.'' This time, she's wearing a jersey from the Absolute Poker online site.
But her son is one of the Bodog pros. What gives?
"When I told ESPN she was playing, they said, 'Great, What day? We're going to film you both,''' Williams said. "I came to Bodog and said, 'Look, she's going to get a lot of coverage. They're going to make a huge story out of this. I don't want to put up $10,000 if I don't have to. There are plenty of [online poker site] rooms here where I can go and they'll put up $10,000, but I think it's stupid for her to be wearing a different logo than me.'
"They said they'd look into and came back with a 'no.' The first place I went to was Absolute because Grinder [Michael Mizrachi, newly sponsored by the site] is a good friend of mine and Mark Seif [Absolute's first resident pro] is a good friend of mine. Mark Seif didn't even have to listen twice. He heard two seconds of it and said, 'Deal, lock it up, don't go anywhere else,' and shook my hand.''
Wonderful story, right. Young kid makes good. Mom's right there. Wholesome stuff.
Which is why much of the poker world talked incessantly about a piece of what was believed to be an adult video that surfaced last April featuring a young black man that resembled Williams.
Is there a career as an adult film actor in Williams' past?
"No,'' he said, "but I would if I could. If I wasn't in a role-model position like now, I wouldn't care. Porn is porn. I like chicks. I've been seen around with some hot chicks. But I'm in the public eye. A lot of people have kids coming up to me. I don't have the option to do those kind of things. I would if I wasn't in kind of a role-model position.
"They say it was me. And if it was me, I'm not shy. All my friends who know me say, 'If that was Dave, he would've said it was him.'''
So, OK, was it you?
"Nah,'' he reiterated, "I was in school in Dallas. I had a girlfriend. I played poker live. And I came out here.''
Some people might resent the questions and the insinuations and the talk.
"I think any press is good press,'' he said. "If I'm a villain, whatever. People are talking about me. It must matter if they're mentioning me. I'd rather hear some news about me than not hear anything at all.''
The kind of news that Williams had hoped to make got wiped out Monday when his A-K ran into pocket kings. He was busted, and who'd have thought it would be the son who was the first member of the Williams family to go out of the main event.
"I have to go find my mom,'' Williams said.
Poker
