Unlikely high roller turns poker stud with big finish

Westminster man pockets $6.1 million in Vegas event

James B. Meadow, Rocky Mountain News

Published October 16, 2006 at midnight

Text size

More Local News

More stories »

College dropout, ambivalent restaurant manager, video-game junkie, feverish gambler - yes sir, Paul Wasicka would seem to have all the makings and résumé of a massively underachieving ne'er-do-well, except for one minor detail.

Dude's, like . . . a multimillionaire.

In August, the 25-year-old Westminster man - who calls himself "obsessive, but not obsessive-compulsive" - outlasted 8,771 high-rollers and high-roller wannabes to finish second in the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas, walking away with a hefty $6.1 million in his ring-wrapped fingers; not bad for someone who had been playing the game for scarcely 2 1/2 years.

Then again, Wasicka's emergence as the next-to-last man standing at the end of that 14-day marathon is what you might expect of someone who craves pressure almost as much as oxygen; a guy who can dispatch European pickpockets and Vegas card sharks with equal aplomb.

"It doesn't matter what the circumstances are, Paul is completely calm under pressure," says Truman Bradley, a friend for 13 years. "The higher the stimulus, the more focused Paul is."

Of course, the corollary to this is the lower the stimulus, the more likely Wasicka's self-admitted "short attention span" will kick in.

"Paul's either 100 percent focused or zero percent focused," says Bradley. "If there's nothing going on, he'll go to sleep. He can sleep in any position at any time."

Right now, in fact, Wasicka looks suspiciously comfy, sprawled on the couch of the Westminster home he owns with two friends. Sure, he's two days away from a big tournament with a $100,000 buy-in. And, yes, he's on the verge of closing on a nifty house in Vegas, but, well, that's a month away. And, as Bradley insists, "Paul lives in the moment."

'You can't play scared'

At this moment, a supine Wasicka (WAH-sick-uh) is providing a lickety-split bio. How he was born in Dallas, moved to Boulder with his parents and two sisters when he was 11, and became an honors student and varsity athlete (track, cross country, wrestling) at Fairview High School. How his college experience was a brick wall of frustration.

He yo-yoed between the University of Wisconsin, the University of Colorado and Front Range Community College, shifting from engineering to biology to business, growing increasingly more aimless, increasingly more disenchanted. His path seemed . . . uncertain.

He was 23. No clue. Moved in with his parents. Bummer. Began working at his brother-in-law's Louisville restaurant. Ho-hum. Then one day in February 2004, a friend was heading down to a poker tournament in Denver. Even though Wasicka barely knew a royal flush from a toilet flush, he tagged along.

On the drive, his friend explained the rudiments of strategy. Got it. Wasicka finished ninth and won 200 bucks.

That night, his friend introduced him to online poker. Wasicka played from midnight until 8 a.m. When the sun came up, he was ahead another 100 smackers. At that point, he thought, "This is something that's worth getting good at."

He had always excelled at chess and backgammon, board games where his competitive streak and ability to strategize paid dividends. But now a new moment had arrived - an epiphany even - and Wasicka threw himself into it with a passion.

Or maybe a frenzy.

He began playing online poker. Every day. Sometimes for four hours, mostly for six hours, occasionally for 18. Sometimes he wouldn't leave his house, the empty pizza boxes piling around him. He won and lost. Mostly he won.

He formed a synergy with a friend and the two of them would play together, six games at a time. He was learning a lot about strategy. Learning that "skill always outweighs luck." Learning that "if you're afraid of losing the money, you're definitely going to lose it. You can't play scared." Learning that while he had the "skills and the fundamentals," he had to stop going "on tilt" - losing his temper, his cool, his money.

He quit the restaurant and announced he was turning pro.

"It's not what every parent wants to hear," his mother, Carol, would recall. "We figured, 'It's just a phase. He's doing this now. It'll pass and then he'll go back to college.' Were we worried? Well, yes. A little bit."

'Kwickfish' is born

Their son wasn't. He was good. Good enough to win more than he lost. Good enough to develop the swagger the good ones have. When one ticked-off online competitor got tired of losing and disparagingly called him "Kwickfish" (a fish is a bad player), Wasicka gleefully adopted it as his online moniker.

But he wasn't good enough yet. The pressure of having to support himself - and maintain a bankroll to gamble with - was getting to him. He was living in the moment and the moment was swarming with worries.

He quit playing - cold turkey. Moved back with his parents. Went back to his brother-in-law's restaurant. Even promised he'd stay a year on the job. He was serious.

Five months later, rejuvenated, he began playing poker again. He'd play online for, say, four hours and make a couple of grand. Then he'd go to the restaurant, work a shift and come home with $100. Insane.

But he knew what he was doing; he wasn't going on tilt so much. Sure, his poker account was "volatile" - up and down, up and down - but he wasn't gambling with the rent money now. The bad pressure was off. The good pressure - the thrill of competition, the pressure he reveled in - had taken its place.

That winning feeling

In January 2006, he woke up to another epiphany. He'd just lost $4,000 online the night before. But, he says, "I didn't feel that bad. I woke up feeling like I couldn't lose. I felt so mentally focused. I felt so ready to play."

Perhaps Wasicka was feeling the same way he had felt a few years earlier when he was on a European holiday with Bradley. There they were on the coast of Spain, having a fine old time. The only thing missing was some beer. So they stopped and asked a group of guys if they could buy some. But then, stealthily, one of them tried to pick Wasicka's pocket.

As Bradley remembers, "It was a very stressful situation, at night, on the waterfront in a foreign country. We didn't know what these guys might do. But Paul - he's completely calm under all this pressure."

Wasicka squeezes the guy's hand and then slowly removes it. Then he puts his own hand in his pocket to protect his wallet, makes small talk. Then, quickly but coolly, Kwickfish and friend get the hell out of there.

"It was," says Bradley, "unreal."

"Surreal," however, is Bradley's word for what happened Aug. 10.

For it was then, 14 days after the World Series of Poker had begun, that Paul Wasicka, former college- dropout-without-a-plan, sat with eight other players. Each had made the $10,000 buy-in, each had emerged from a crucible of chips and bluffs and long hours to reach the final table. Many, like Wasicka, had seen their fortunes rise - and fall - hundreds of thousands of dollars in a single day.

As he sat there among the poker elite, with 60 of his friends and family rooting him on, with the unblinking eye of TV cameras fixed on him, what was Wasicka - he of the modest 2 1/2-year résumé - thinking? About the "roughly 980,000 hands of poker" he had played in his life? About the dough? About going to the bathroom?

No, he was "free rolling. I looked around the table and thought, 'There's nobody I'm scared of.' I had nothing to lose, everything to gain."

It finally came down to him and Jamie Gold, a 36-year-old former Hollywood talent agent, for "the most coveted prize ever." It was 3:30 in the morning, 13-plus hours after they had started. Some in Wasicka's cheering section were falling asleep. Not Wasicka. Eyes wide open, he made his play. He was confident.

But Kwickfish got out-kwicked.

He went with his gut

Sure, he lost to Gold, who held a pair of queens to Wasicka's pair of tens. Sure, he knew that Gold had won $12 million, twice his own take. But, funny thing, "the disappointment wasn't there. Well, it was, but it wasn't. It was in the background."

What was in the foreground was the way Wasicka manned up.

"I thought he was bluffing," he said then. "But against a player like that it makes it really difficult. You kind of just have to go with your gut. That's what I did and it was wrong."

Soon he did something very right.

He gave 5 percent to his mom and dad "just for being mom and dad." He gave 5 percent to friends who stuck by him. He gave a wad to charity. He gave a chunk to the government.

That left about $3 million. Big dough. What kind of delicious splurges did Wasicka go on?

"I bought a new car," he says.

A Porsche? Ferrari? Maserati?

What - a Subaru?

"But it's an STI, a limited edition. I love that car," he says. "It's perfect for me; not flashy, but really fast."

He also bought that house in Vegas, which makes sense because he'll be living there mostly. At least for a few years - about as long as he figures he'll play professionally.

"I could walk away from it all now," he says, before adding, "If it weren't for the endorsements."

Like what?

Well, he got $400,000 for wearing a baseball cap with the logo of an online poker game while playing in the World Series. And there will be other offers, sponsors willing to pay his buy-in fees for tournaments, making whatever he wins pure profit.

But no matter how much he wins, Wasicka doesn't see it affecting him.

"Winning really hasn't changed me all that much," he says. "I still wear the same clothes, still hang out with the same people."

Besides, as he's quick to point out, "You know, I still haven't ever won a tournament. Maybe I never will."

Then again, there's always "bowling, skiing, foosball, ping-pong, movies, wine and eating out."

Whatever it is, it won't involve sitting still because "I'm an adrenaline-seeker, a risk-taker, y'know?"

Paul Wasicka a risk-taker?

Bet on it.

Poker pointers

When asked if he had a few tips for aspiring poker champs, Paul Wasicka resisted at first. "It's hard to give generic advice," he said, pointing out that players of different skill levels require different kinds of counsel. Pretty please?

Stop bluffing. Most people bluff too much. If you cut down on your bluffing, you'll be surprised at how much you'll win. Remember, people don't play poker to fold.

Play within your means. You have to be comfortable losing what you've brought to the game. You can't be afraid to lose.

Don't rush into being a pro. There's a lot to be said for keeping a regular job and paying your bills with that. Use your poker winnings to build up your poker bankroll.

meadowj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2606

Subscribe to the Rocky Mountain News