Champion of Poker

In all of poker, you will not find a quieter man at the table than Erik Seidel. Seidel does not look the part of the typical poker player. He is usually well dressed, polite, and incredibly quiet while playing. He almost comes across as anti-social. Some people will mistake him to be a mouse of a player, until they lose all their chips to him.

Erik Seidel was originally born in New York, NY. He started taking up gambling by playing backgammon while at Brooklyn College. He eventually dropped out of college to take up playing backgammon professionally. It was during this time that he started taking up poker. His primary game was still backgammon while he was learning poker. This continued until 1985 when he decided that he wanted a regular job. He worked as a stock broker for a couple of years and played poker recreationally.

Seidel lost his job in 1987 when the stock market crashed and he returned to his home card room of the Mayfair Club. By this point many of the greats from that room including Howard Lederer, Dan Harrington, and Jay Heimowitz were regulars. Seidel worked on his poker and then decided to take a shot at the World Series of Poker in 1988.

His events up until the Main Event did not go as expected. He had zero cashes in 9 attempts. The Main Event, Seidel made it through the field and found himself head-up with the current World Champion at the time, Johnny Chan. In a final that made the movie Rounders, Seidel eventually lost to Chan, but the seeds of a future great was planted.

For the next few years Seidel split time between working as a stock broker and playing high stakes poker. Even after winning bracelets in 1992 and 1993, Seidel still did not pull the trigger and turn pro. In 1994, Seidel won the $5,000 Limit Holdem bracelet and $210,000. At this point, he decided to turn pro and him and his wife moved to Las Vegas.

This turned out to be the best decision Seidel could make. Overall, Seidel has won eight World Series of Poker bracelets, which ranks him 5th all time. He has 2 bracelets in No Limit Holdem, 2 in Limit Holdem, 2 in 2-7 Lowball, and one each in Pot Limit Omaha and Omaha 8 or better. He has won over $9 Million in tournaments earnings. In April 2008, Seidel took down his first WPT title, winning the Foxwoods Poker Classic for $967,390. He also has titles at the former Diamond Jim Brady, Four Queens Classic, and Fiesta Al Lago events.

Seidel is part of the design team at Full Tilt Poker and is known to be a music fanatic. He is frequently seen at the table sporting a huge pair of headphones that he uses to listen to music while he plays.

Overall, Erik Seidel is an atypical man playing an atypical game. He has used his background and experience to set himself up to become one of the greatest poker players of all time. At 48, Seidel has many years ahead of him in the game, and when he finally steps away from the table, don’t be surprised if he is the all-time money winner in poker history.