Poker Interviews

"I Beat The Odds"
An Interview with Paul Darden

I met Mr. Darden at Foxwoods, the monstrous mega-casino owned by the Mashantucket Pequot tribe of southeastern Connecticut. When I arrived, he was playing in a "small stakes" $75-$150 Seven-Card Stud game. He excused himself, and we found a table in a public dining area, which was relatively deserted due to nearby construction.

Mr. Darden was wearing jeans and a fresh sky-blue longsleeve from Ecko Unlimited. Darden is known for his stylish hip-hop apparel and jewelry. One of the game's few prominent African American players, Darden is unique among poker's new wave of telegenic stars. His hip-hop style and ghetto roots have made him wildly popular with poker's younger fans.

Darden was born on October 27, 1968, and grew up in the ghetto of New Haven, Connecticut. "I don't have no outstanding background," he begins. "I grew up in the inner city. My parents divorced when I was seven. For the most part I can't really complain about my life. It's just, there wasn't no silver spoon. We didn't have servants, you know? It was a struggle. My father always had a pool hall, and they had a poker game in the back room, so I grew up on poker, learning from all the older guys."

The city of New Haven has a troubled history of poverty and violence. Located halfway between the drug distribution centers of New York City and Boston, New Haven is the hub of a drug trafficking network known to law enforcement as the New England Pipeline. Most of the illegal drug traffic in the northeast flows through Connecticut, primarily along Interstate 95, which connects New York City to Boston. New Haven is located at the intersection of Interstate 95 and Interstate 91, another major highway that extends directly to the Canadian border. The city's centrality and highway access make it a primary waypoint for the northeast drug trade.

The drug trade provides the income for New Haven's organized gangs, who constantly battle one another for supremacy. The gangs recruit their members from the city's impoverished youth. New Haven is one of the poorest cities in the country - in 2003, the per-capita income was $16,393 - although, paradoxically, Connecticut has the highest per-capita income of any state ($43,173). One quarter of the city's population lives below the poverty line.

Many New Haven youths, who suffer from poverty, poor education, and broken families, have given up hope of succeeding in the mainstream economy. In the despair of the ghetto, the illegal-drug business can seem like salvation to a desperate teenager. A drug dealer can earn thousands of dollars a week. Work is always available, and it doesn't require good grades, work experience, or a clean police record. Gang and drug culture is glorified in popular culture, and many kids admire the local dealers, who ostentatiously display flashy cars, clothes and jewels.

During the 1980s, when Darden was a teenager, conditions in the projects deteriorated. The Reagan years were especially difficult for the poor - particularly black families, who suffer disproportionately from undereducation and structural unemployment. New Haven also experienced an alarming increase in gang violence. The city's cocaine industry was booming, and the additional dollars intensified the competition between the drug posses. Sophisticated rapid-fire weapons, like 9mm semi-automatic pistols and Uzi submachine guns, became easily obtainable on the street market. By the end of the decade, New Haven had become a battleground for warring drug gangs. In 1989, rival gangs had a shootout on the marble steps of the New Haven Superior Courthouse. And in 1992, a six-year-old boy was shot in the head when his kindergarten bus drove into the gunfire of another gang battle.

By 1992, the city was so threatened that the federal government intervened. A massive collaboration of federal agents and local law enforcement was assembled to fight the gangs. The task force united the FBI, DEA, ATF, U.S. Marshal Service, U.S. Attorney's Office, Department of Housing and Urban Development, CT State Attorney's Office, the CT State Police, the CT State Corrections Department, and local law enforcement. The task force succeeded in subduing the gangs, but New Haven's poverty and drug trade remain. It is, in short, a difficult place to grow up.

"Growing up," Darden recalls, "I hung out with the wrong crowd. They robbed people at times. Some of my best friends were drug dealers. You know, it's the 'hood... wasn't nothing too much good in the 'hood. Hanging out with the wrong crowd, you get steered in the wrong direction. But I never was a bad kid, although I did do like any other normal kid, like have fights, and this and that."

At age 15, Darden's choice of friends got him into big trouble. He was arrested and tried for murder. "I was wrongly accused of a crime I didn't do. It was total mistaken identity. I wasn't even nowhere around involvement, but like I said, being around the wrong crowd, I guess I was almost guilty by association." He was acquitted, but the event motivated him to turn his life around. "Right then and there, I said 'I will get on the ball. I'm not doing this no longer.' But afterwards, school was hard, and people looked at me differently. I ended up dropping out in 11th grade. I always regret leaving school, because I was on the honor roll, I was smart, I did pay attention. That's what I tell my kids now is so important, to make sure you have the education. I paid the price by not finishing school, and I always keep saying once I slow down I'm gonna go back."

After dropping out, Darden went to work for his cousin, who owned a production company. "I started out as a flyer runner," he recalls, "putting up the flyers on posts on streets, goin' to clubs and handing out flyers, and meeting all kinda celebrities at the time: Heavy D, Salt 'n' Pepa, and all them." Eventually, he began booking rap artists and stand-up comics, and he acquired a New Haven dance club named Platinum 2000. "I was lovin' it," he says wistfully. "It's just great to see everybody partying, and knowing they getting their party on partly 'cause of you." (In January of 2000, New Haven mayor John DeStefano Jr. vowed to shut down Platinum 2000, calling it "...an abusive and negative presence in that neighborhood." According to police, the club had been the origin of several violent altercations which had escalated into street shootings. Platinum 2000 had also been the site of a recent dance-floor shooting. The club shut down in March of 2000.)

When Foxwoods Casino opened in 1992, Darden began playing casino poker. He started at $1-$5 Seven-Card Stud. The style of play he encountered at Foxwoods was different than the "back room" style he had learned at his father's pool hall, but he adjusted his game and escalated rapidly to higher limits. Within three years, he was beating $75-$150. Darden would occasionally travel to Atlantic City to play, where he met a young player named Philip Ivey. "We used to always go at each other in $75-$150, and became real close and friends. He put me under his wing."

Darden began to get into tournament poker. He did well in Stud tournaments, placing second in at least four major events, but he could never "pull the trigger" and finish first. "My coach Phil Ivey said they're gonna start calling me 'Number Two'. He used to always grill me on that, always coming in second. I think once I got heads-up, I got anxious, and I didn't know how to adjust my game. So, for a while, I had to get that out of me." With Ivey's help, Darden refined his heads-up game, and finally scored his first major tournament victory at the 2001 WSOP. He won the $2,500 Seven-Card Stud event, taking $147,440 for first place.

Although Darden was a very successful Seven-Card Stud player, he wanted to make a name for himself, and he understood that remaining a Stud specialist would essentially guarantee permanent obscurity. Phil Ivey encouraged him to learn No-Limit Hold 'Em. Darden often credits Ivey for correctly predicting the rise of No-Limit. "My buddy Phil Ivey, he got ESP. He saw the future before I did, before a lot of us did. He told me this is the game of the future... wow, look at us today! You know what I mean?" In 2000, Ivey persuaded his friend to enter the Main Event at the WSOP. Initially, Darden was reluctant, since he was inexperienced at No-Limit, and hesitant to risk the $10,000 buy-in. "But Phil Ivey said with my aggressive style, he could teach me how to do really well." Ivey was confident in his friend's potential, and loaned him the $10,000 buy-in. Darden busted out early that year, but he dedicated himself to improving his No-Limit game. For experience, he played in one-table satellites and super-satellites. He studied top players and refined his natural aggression into an effective style.

Darden has since won two major No-Limit tournaments. He won the main event at the 2002 New England Poker Classic (1st place - $72,590), and in 2003, he won the televised WPT Gold Rush tournament (1st place - $146,000), prevailing over a tough final table that included Phil Hellmuth and a then-unknown Antonio Esfandiari. Esfandiari stole the show, delighting viewers by fiendishly antagonizing (and eventually eliminating) Hellmuth. But the broadcast also introduced viewers to the cool, stylish Darden. Hip-hop culture is enormously popular, and Darden's street credibility has translated into a strong following among young poker fans, who have given him endearing nicknames like "American Thug".

"Young college guys always recognize me, and always aks questions. I always been a people person, so you know I'm always like 'What's up?' It's unbelievable the way that people look at me and say 'I know you!' 'cause of TV. TV is something else, you know? I never knew TV would make a person so popular. I mean, it's incredible. I love it. 'Cause I'm just doing this for a living, but I really don't consider myself a star or a celebrity. I'm just me, Paul Darden, know what I'm saying?"

This modest, laid-back attitude plays well with his fans. Many of today's well-known tournament players self-consciously play to the cameras and promote themselves as poker celebrities. Darden, however, isn't preoccupied with seeking attention.

"I'm more happy that someone really know me and recognize me for something that I'm doing. I'm flattered, know what I'm saying. I'm just trying to earn a living, you know, I'm just trying to be me. I'll never change, don't care how much money I make. I'll always sign autographs, or take a picture. (But I'd rather a picture than an autograph, because I got so ugly handwriting! I just hate it!) I'm not trying to make myself be something I'm not. I like nice cool clothes, I like necklaces, I like nice things, and you know I'm not trying to show off or impress. I'm just trying to be me."

I asked Darden if he was friends with any players besides Ivey, and his eyes lit up. "Lots!" he exclaimed. "Daniel, Antonio, Phil the Unabomber... I'm good friends with Men the Master, Scotty Nguyen... I'm cool with Layne Flack... I hang out occasionally with all of them. A lot of them like to party. I'm married, so I ain't too much into the party scene, 'cause they like to go to the strip clubs. Then it's hard to come home, 'cause my wife's like 'Where ya been?' But, at times, I hang out. My wife is understanding. I love her too much to mess up that."

Darden hasn't shown up in any recent tournament results, but contrary to popular belief, he hasn't been forgoing the tournament circuit. In fact, he's played in nearly all of the major tournaments, including the WSOP. A series of early knockouts have kept him out of the results and made him practically invisible on this year's tournament circuit. When I asked him if he'd been skipping the tournaments, he said emphatically "No, I was in every last one of 'em! I mean, it was like... [punches palm for emphasis] THAT! First round: knockout! Knockout! Knockout! Knockout! Every time I'm up at bat! And that's how it is, you know? The last year, I been in a cold spell. That's the thing about poker, is you're gonna have hot and cold spells. Like Daniel Negreanu: he's having a super year so far. Once a good player gets on a rush, the money is like WOW! Know what I mean?"

"It's funny. Lately, there's one guy, Stan Goldstein, who just holds over me, where as I can't wait to bust him, and I'm hoping it be in a real big one! Like, for a time I was holding over Phil Hellmuth, and he finally knocked me out of the World Series, and he loved it. It made his, like, decade. But Stan Goldstein, I'd just love to give him a nice good payback. But we friends, and we joke about it. Once I get up from the poker table, all is forgotten. Well, it's not totally forgotten, but it's forgotten 'till we get back on that table. It's like, no love lost at the table, you know? I'm a competitor. Even against Phil Ivey, even though he taught me the game, when we sitting at a table he's trying to bust me as bad as I'm trying to bust him."

Despite his recent slump at the tables, Darden has remained visible on the poker scene. He's featured in a current WPT commercial, and he'll appear in upcoming episodes of the novelty shows Hollywood Home Game and Bad Boys of Poker.

Before I met Darden, I imagined him as some sort of outlaw street gambler. I envisioned him at some illicit back-alley dice game or junkyard dogfight, throwing wads of cash on the hard concrete. In reality, he is extraordinarily prudent and responsible with his finances. He is confident in his poker skills, but realistic about the game's inevitable swings. He discussed at length the importance of establishing an adequate bankroll before moving up in limits, minimizing losses during bad luck spells, and avoiding craps (a common weakness of many poker pros) and other forms of gambling. He also discussed plans to diversify his income. "I'm not quite where I wanna be yet. I'm starting to get into real estate here in Connecticut, just try and stabilize so that I never have to really depend on poker. I got three properties in New Haven, rehabbed 'em, fixed 'em up and rentin' out. I figure to try to get ten by the end of the year, and then I plan on relocating and getting a home in Vegas. I'm also planning on hooking up, start playing on the Internet, so I can spend even more time at home with the family. My ultimate goal is to keep laying a good foundation for my four kids, and help them grow up, and make sure they finish college and get a good career and everything. And just sit back and really live more so through their eyes, enjoy life even more through them, know what I mean?"

"You know," he adds thoughtfully, "I beat the odds. A lot of guys that I grew up with in the inner city ended up in drugs, and all kinds of violence. Although I dropped out, I was smart enough to do something positive, rather than negative."