What Are Friends For?

Joe Bartholdi is the new World Poker Tour Champion. After perusing the article by Richard Belsky about him in the latest Cardplayer Magazine, I've discovered that his main talent is in borrowing money: “I’d be broke, then get $100 from Dad" "I’d have all of this cash, and then I’d go broke in a big game." "I’d sit down and play well, but lose $1,000. Then, not being used to that kind of loss, I’d tilt out and blow another $4,000." "Dutch(Boyd) took his $80,000 winnings from the WSOP and funded (the crew, a team of players including Bartholdi), and Bartholdi was on board." "I just basically tilted off all that money. I felt sick about it.""Few things are worse for a professional poker player than going broke. Despite Joe’s familiarity with the experience, losing the $250,000 was a tough pill to swallow...Joe Cassidy was that angel investor who got Joe back on his feet." I've heard this story many times, of a star player losing hundreds of thousands of dollars and then getting a loan enabling them to recover. Frankly, I'm not impressed when a guy makes a few WPT final tables and then loses all that money in a cash game before the year is out. They say these guys are able to play like the money doesn't mean anything. Well, if you can get a pal to put you in the next $10,000 event as soon as you go broke, why should it mean anything? Show me a guy who had to get a job when he went broke and then won a million dollars, not a guy who hit up Doyle Brunson five or six times for cash. This does not stop these players from talking like they're the greatest poker players ever and everyone else is a donkey of course. But hey, if their friends have this much faith in them, why shouldn't they? It really dilutes my impression of some of these guys. That having been said, if anyone out there wants to be part of my personal cinderella poker story, now would probably be a good time.