He started out playing online under the moniker fourUhaters about 7 years ago and now 25 year old Noah Schwartz is out on the tour, working on his game and constantly getting confused for a Hollywood actor.
KL: Where are you from?
Noah: I was born in Miami Beach and now I just live a little north of there, like 2 minutes away in a small community. I have a condo in Bal Harbour so I am living there right now. I am getting married October 10th of next year, so we are working on the wedding and the set up. I have been keeping myself busy with all of that.
KL: Where did you screen name, fourUhaters, come from?
Noah: When I started playing I was 18 and I really didn’t know the game too much. I was just a newbie and I saw it on TV and was trying to get used to the game. When I played online people were critical of my play, the way I played, and I really didn’t have any idea. I lost a lot of money in the beginning and I got in debt with student loans and I didn’t know what I was doing. A lot of people said I wasn’t good enough. People were hating on me, saying I would never be good enough, I can’t do this, I can’t do that. So then I came up with that name.
KL: And you showed them…
Noah: I’m getting there, I’m getting there. I want to take my game to the next level. I have only been playing live for a little over a year now. I have had some success and come close to some big victories, but I just need to get over that last hump and get a bracelet or a big win.
KL: How do you take it to the next level?
Noah: I think you have to constantly be able to learn. Every day I listen to a lot of people that tell me hands. I have played millions and millions of hands and so have a lot of other guys but you see a lot of different situations and being able to really understand those situations helps improve your game. When you make it deep too, in the $25,000 buy-in I made it 32nd. It was a big spot I had Q-Q versus A-Q for 750,000 chips and he hit an ace. Things like that. You have to be lucky, no matter how well you play, there is luck involved. Luck and a little bit of skill, I think that’s what you need to get to the next level.
KL: Are you still playing a lot online?
Noah: I have really taken a step back. There are a lot of really high stakes cash games in Miami that I have been going to. I will typically play all the big Sunday tournaments, but I am not doing the volume. Nowhere near the volume of tournaments I used to. I play 7-8 tournaments a week.
KL: What is your affiliation with Poker Battle?
Noah: I’m one of the original people involved with Poker Battle. Philippe [Rouas] and I have a long standing relationship. I have been there from the get go, and I am just taking part in a lot of the aspects of Poker Battle, from player relations to helping Philippe with whatever he needs help with.
KL: What exactly is Poker Battle?
Noah: It’s a new company. We just did a soft launch in the south of France, where we had a big tournament in Cannes as a part of the Partouche Poker Tour. I was out there, Chris Ferguson was out there, David Benyamine. It was a lot of good players and that was just our soft launch. I can’t divulge exactly what Poker Battle is all about just yet, but it’s going to be a poker tour, plus high end apparel, and we will have a site that will be a networking site. It’s going to allow people to stay connected. It’s going to be great for poker; it will open up a lot of doors. It’s going to be really neat, and the concept is amazing.
KL: Tell us about the McLovin thing, how did all of that start?
Noah: The first time it ever happened, I was in Foxwoods playing a single table satellite. A cop came up to me and said, ‘I loved you in the movie.’ I asked him what movie and he says, ‘you know you are Mclovin,’ I said I wasn’t he kept saying, ‘no you are just lying to me you don’t want to admit it.’
Since then I have been approached on numerous occasions with people saying I’m the real McLovin [from the movie Superbad.] It’s funny, I wasn’t even aware of it and when I made it deep in the LAPC last year there was this huge thing going on that this person playing was actually the real McLovin. Pokulator did an article on it saying that it was confirmed that it was McLovin, not poker player Noah Schwartz. Allen Cunningham’s girlfriend, Melissa Hayden, came up to me and said, ‘McLovin I love you’ and it has sort of stuck. I get it all the time now and I just go with it.
KL: What do you have coming up?
Noah: The wedding and just playing poker. I’m in Australia for the Aussie Millions, then the LAPC and who knows after that. I will be all around.
Like a wheel, the Round Table is a circle of adventures and victories, beats and stories, and life as it unfolds with a cast of characters that may, or may not, have joined you in your home on a local TV program. There's so much more to poker than what you see on TV. Although I won't use canvas, I will paint the full picture for you as I follow the lives of some of your favorite (and some unknown) players. The Round Table is an ongoing series of life, viewed full circle.