Calistri's Corner

It was in Tunica in January 2006 where Gavin Smith informed me that Bill Edler wanted to be called “The Stunning One.”  I believe it was World Championship Wresting combatant, Disco Inferno, who was responsible for coining, what seemed like, the unlikely moniker for the mild mannered and humble Edler.  But Edler has lived up to his name.  He’s been stunning.

So far in 2007, Bill Edler has had the kind of year every player dreams of.  He started out in January with a 13th place finish at the Borgata’s Main Event.  He followed it up with a first place finish in the PokerNetCast Heads-up Challenge in February.  In March he made TWO final tables in championship events; one in the LA Poker Classic and the other at Bay 101.  He apparently slacked off in April and May :).  He won his first WSOP bracelet in the Short Handed NLHE event in June.  He finished 23rd in the WSOP Main Event in July.  August was a slow month for poker, so you can’t hold a blank against him.  Last night, Bill Edler won the WPT’s Gulf Coast Poker Challenge.  

With 17 players left, Bill Edler had just two $1000 chips; one of which had to go into the ante.  It was then that I was reminded of a dinner I had with Bill, Gavin, and Peter “Norberg” Feldmen.  It was their Day One of the Main Event.  They were on dinner break and we high tailed it over to a good Thai restaurant.  Well it might have been good if the AC was functional.  At any rate, none of the boyz had much of a stack yet.  There was some debate as to what their chip stacks should be at the end of Day One in order to consider paying the $10,000 buy-in at the Bellagio as a back up.  (As an aside, all of these players finished Day One in good position and all of them went on to cash in the Main Event).

During dinner, one of the topics that came up was what it meant to have “game.”  I thought with this crowd, I might hear a lot of talk about aggressive play and taking risks.  But ”game” to them meant never giving up in an event; to always keep your head in the game, no matter how low your stack got and no matter how far away you were from the money.

Edler has always had “game,” but perhaps never demonstrated the concept as handily as he did last night.  He was positively stunning.              

This entry was posted on Monday, September 10th, 2007 at 7:23 am and is filed under Uncategorized.