Rite Goes from Last to First!
By Max Shapiro
Frank Rite
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When the final table of the final event of Legends of Poker 2000 was
down to four players, Dr. Frank Rite had only eight percent of the
chips and was more than happy to make a deal chopping up most of
the remaining prize pool by chip count. But it turned out that Rite
made the wrong move because afterwards he caught fire, moved into
the chip lead and ended up winning the $100 limit hold'em event.
Just missing the cut was Carlos Ruiz when his Q-3 lost to a queen
and bigger kicker. A few minutes after the finalists assembled at 1 a.m.,
Michael Rider was asked to take a 20-minute vacation after one of his
cards took a ride off the table. In early action, truck driver Frank Davis
ran low on fuel chasing a flush draw. When the flop came 8-A-2 and
two spades, Davis, with K-2 of spades, bet the flop and turn and then
bet the river with nothing. Michael Wang, retired from the drug business
(legal drugs, he emphasized), ran him down with a paired ace, leaving
Davis with only $600.
Davis stayed alive on the next hand with pocket eights, but busted right
after limits were raised to $3,000-$6,000. He went all in against Wang,
Barbara Enright and Rite, who also went all in. When Wang bet $6,000
into a board of 6-Q-A-J, Enright folded. The cards were turned up. Wang
was the leader with K-Q against Rite's K-10 and Davis' K-9. But a river
nine gave Rite a straight and the main pot. Rite went all in again immediately after. Wang raised with A-10 and then bet a flop of 7-Q-5, forcing Rite
to call with his last $1,000. But Frank had A-J, and it held up.
Three more players then went out in quick succession. Joe Chiricosta,
a retired film actor, pinned his hopes for his last chips on pocket sixes.
But Anahit Galajian, a professional player, held K-7 and paired her cowboy
on the flop. Barbara Enright, the Legends all-around points winner, was
making her seventh final table appearance. With a board of 4-8-J, Don
Swan bet out with pocket tens. Enright held A-K and called with her last
$5,500. Rags fell and Enright climbed into the new Chrysler PT Cruiser
she had just won and drove home. Swan, incidentally, is a salesman and also
a world champion "foosball" (table soccer) player. Earlier this year he won
a doubles championship at a tournament in Charlotte, North Carolina.
On the next hand, Lou Elkus, operations manager for a children's apparel
manufacturer, raised $1,600 with A-Q and went all in. Galajian called with
A-J and relegated Elkus to sixth place when a jack flopped. Rider, back
from his hiatus, quickly went all in too but survived with an ace-high hand
against Rite. A few hands later, Rite, with Q-10, raises and puts Rider in
for $4,600. Rider, a hotel employee, turns up 8-4 of clubs. "I need a miracle;
I want to get out of here," he says contradictorily. He doesn't get a miracle,
but he does get to get out of here when the board comes A-K-Q-A-3.
Four-handed, Swan the foosball champ has the chip lead with $71,000.
Galajian is second with $63,400,Wang third with $33,500 and Rite trails
badly with $14,800. Rite immediately goes all in again on the flop with
pocket jacks to beat Galajian's K-J and start to build up his chip position.
Later, in a hand against Snow and Galajian, when she bets on a flop of
8-2-4, Wang raises, saying, "What the hell?" Not exactly a "what the hell"
bet: he had three eights. Later, when his wife says something on the sidelines,
he jokingly cautions her to use English only. "Don't get me a 20-minute
penalty," he pleads.
With limits raised to $5,000-$10,000, Swan asks if the game can be changed
to no-limit, but is told that isn't allowed. Rite begins to go downhill again
after losing a pot to Wang that's capped on the flop. Both have paired their
queen, but Wang has a higher kicker. But he recovers after Galajian puts him
all in when she flops K-J-7 to her J-8. But he has A-K and makes aces and
kings. On the next hand, Swan raises and Wang calls, but drops when Rite
re-raises. And when Rite bets a board of 5-9-2-Q, Swan drops also. "The
worm is turning," says Rite, now taking the chip lead.
Then, Rite and Wang get in a raising war. A flop of 3-8-9 is five-bet. When
a queen turns, Wang, with A-Q, bets all in. But it's too little too late because
Rite, with pocket threes, had flopped a set. By now, the doctor has performed
several chipectomies and has amassed about $120,000 of the $182,000 on the
table. Soon after, Swan, who has been keeping his chips nestled inside his visor cap, goes all in and wins a small pot with pocket aces, but it hardly dents
Rite's stacks.
Finally, when Swan raises, a very short-chipped Galajian thinks so long that
Rite finally calls for a clock. Anahit calls with all her chips, inadvertently
adding a $1,000 raise. All she has is 7-5 against Frank's K-3. He has her
until the river and then nails it when a king falls.
Heads-up, Frank has a better than 2-1 chip lead, and it looks like Don's
Swan song. They play one hand, which Rite wins. He then makes his opponent
an offer to end it, because "I have to go to work soon." After some back-and-
forth negotiating, they finally reach a settlement, and the event ends, and so
does a successful and exciting Legends of Poker 2000.
Biography - Frank Rite
Frank Rite, who lives in Newport Beach, California, is 62 but looks about
20 years younger thanks to his rigid regimen of healthy eating and exercise,
and is a living testimonial to his profession. The doctor of holistic health
has been preaching and practicing the art of natural healing for 10 years
now. He lectures and has been writing a book about holistic medicine.
In this tournament, he got aces and kings cracked right at the opening bell
and was down to $200 within a half-hour. But he hung on, not playing
another hand for a long time until cards started coming his way. As for his
unfortunate four-handed deal, he shrugs and says, "It looked like the right
thing to do at the time." Rite plays tournaments frequently, and has won
five so far this year, three at the Bicycle Casino. His best score came when
he won $35,000 in a no-limit tournament at Hollywood Park's National
Championship of poker a couple of years ago.
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