After yesterday’s blog entry featuring some famous quotes I decided to look a little deeper into the man behind the name, Amarillo Slim Preston, and it has to said, this guy is one helluva character. No surprises then to discover that there have been plans for a film to made about his eccentric and colorful life, starring Nicholas Cage, for several years now. The last I heard it was going to be released end of 2009- hmm.

Notoriously awesome things that Amarillo Slim did:

-          Beat Minnesota Fats at pool with a broom

-          Won $300.000 from country music legend Willie Nelson playing dominoes

-          Played poker with presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon

-          Played poker with drug lords Pablo Escobar and Jimmy Chagra

-          Played a highly publicized poker game with porn king Larry Flynt. Mr. Flynt lost a $1,700,000- yowza!

-          Wagered that a cat could pick up a Coke bottle.

-          Rafted down the River of No Return in winter in a wetsuit made by Jacques Cousteau–a bet that earned me $31,000 from Jimmy “the Greek” Snyder.

-          Rode a camel through Casino El Mamounia in Marrakesh, Morrocco

-          Bet a prominent politician that George W. Bush would win the 2000 Presidential election.

-          Won 5 WSOP bracelets, including the main event in 1972

You can’t beat that.

Amarillo Slims Famous Quotes

“Poker is a game of people… It’s not the hand I hold, it’s the people that I play with.”

“Look around the table. If you don’t see a sucker, get up, because you’re the sucker.”

“They anticipate losing when they sit down and I try my darndest not to disappoint one of them.”

“I never go looking for a sucker. I look for a Champion and make a sucker of him.”

“The population in Amarillo has stayed the same over the last fifty years. Every time some woman gets pregnant, some man leaves town.”

“It never hurts for potential opponents to think you’re more than a little stupid and can hardly count all the money in your hip pocket, much less hold on to it..”

The above quote is sadly not my own brilliance but that of the philosopher, H.F.Henrichs. Yes it’s time for some of my favorite poker quotes from some of my favorite players and characters. Here goes:

• ‘Guessers are losers’ Amarillo Slim
• ‘If we shoot him, we won’t have anyone to play with.’ Jimmy Stewart, actor, as Wyatt Earp in conversation to Doc Holiday about what to do with a card cheat in the film Cheyenne Autumn
• ‘Poker is as indigenous to America as Jazz, and full of just as much improvisation’ David Carr, writer, The New York Times
• ‘In the long run there’s no luck in poker, but the short run is longer than most people know.’ Rick Bennet, author, King of Small World
• ‘The cardinal sin of poker, worse than playing dead cards, worse even than figuring your odds incorrectly, is becoming emotionally involved.’ Katy Lederer, author, Pokerface
• ‘Whether he likes it or not, a man’s character is stripped at the poker table; if the other players read him better than he does, he has only himself to blame. Unless he is both able and prepared to see himself as others do, flaws and all, he will be a loser in cards, as in life.’ Anthony Holden, author, Big Deal