Konik - Telling lies and getting paid: more gambling stories

Other books by Michael Konik

The Man With the $100,000 Breasts and Other Gambling Stories

Nice Shot, Mr. Nicklaus

Stories About the Game of Golf

Telling Lies and Getting Paid

More Gambling Stories

Published by

Huntington Press

3665 Procyon Street

Las Vegas, Nevada 89103

(702) 252-0655 Phone

(702) 252-0675 Fax

e-mail:

Copyright 2001, Michael Konik

ISBN 978-1-935396-13-0

Cover Photo: Jenna Bodner & Bryan Haraway

Author Photo: Stephen Simons

Design & Production: Laurie Shaw

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be translated, reproduced, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without express written permission of the copyright owner.

To T, who taught me more than I was supposed to know.

Sometimes I stumble upon a compelling gambling story accidentally; I get lucky, like a guy trying to make a flush who catches two perfect cards for a backdoor straight. But more often I discover a tale worth telling thanks to a suggestion or hint from friends or colleagues. People like Duncan Christy, Jim and Susan Albrecht, and Steve Forte have steered me toward potential subjects, and Im thankful for their wisdom and their taste.

Im also thankful for the consistently good publishing work done by the crew at Huntington Press: Anthony Curtis, Bethany Coffey Rihel, Len Cipkins, and Laurie Shaw, who let my words live in print long after Ive typed them. I reserve my greatest thanks and admiration for Deke Castleman, a sublime editor who knows when to raise and when to fold, when to dive headlong into the fray and when to merely watch. (I should be so smart.)

To all of youand to all those interested in risk and reward, professional and amateur alikeI appreciate your contributions.

Michael Konik

February 20, 2001

Los Angeles

Sister Jean Picks the Winners originally appeared in Delta SKY. The Worlds Greatest Backgammon Hustler, Big Gin, The Line Mover, The Poker Flower, and Holy Macau!, in Cigar Aficionado. Home Poker in Poker Digest. High Roller in Where. Gambling Around the World in the Robb Report.

He doesnt have a permanent address. But Simon Jones isnt hard to find.

The Presidential Suites of the worlds better hotels. The finest restaurants in Paris, London, and New York. The first-class cabins of trans-Atlantic airplanes. These are his usual domains.

Whether in a dark Moscow nightclub or on a technicolor Balinese beach or upon the pulsing streets of Rio de Janeiro during Carnaval, you can pick Simon out of the crowd. Hes the one with the beautiful woman holding one hand and a little black briefcase in the other. The woman is, hell admit, a frivolous accessory, one of the delightful spoils of being rich and generous. The briefcase, though, is another thing altogether. That briefcase is his life.

It contains a couple dozen polished ivory diskscheckers, Simon calls themtwo leather cups, four dice, and a cube with various exponents of the number 2 on each side.

Simon is the worlds finest backgammon hustler. And aside from the knowledge he stores in his head, his briefcase contains everything he needs to subsidize a life that seems shorn from the pages of an Ian Fleming adventure.

Simon Jones [his name and some identifying details have been changed] is in many ways a cipher, a phantom who occupies an all-cash shadow world that shields him from the scrutiny of inquisitive tax collectors and customs officials. But he is by no means obscure. Among the jet set, the preposterously wealthy businessmen and royalty for whom no luxury goes wanting, he is a regular fixture, as common a sight as a Bentley parked in the circular driveway of a European mansion. Simon is One of Them. And this, it seems, is the secret of his gambling success.

In To Catch a Thief, dashing and debonair Cary Grant plays a dashing and debonair burglar, a charming con man who mixes easily with his unwitting victims. Some years ago, I interviewed a man named Albie Baker, the international jewel thief whose story inspired the Cary Grant movie. The thief insisted his lock-picking and safe-cracking skills were only averageThere were hundreds of guys who could do what I did, he told mebut his people skills were unsurpassed. Dukes and Duchesses welcomed him into their social circles; politicians and city planners revealed their most secret confidences. All the while, the thief was relieving them of their precious metals. Nobody suspected me, of course, the thief explained. You dont suspect a member of your country club of burglary.

Simons strategy is nearly identical. He has slept in the royal palaces of several Middle Eastern nations; he counts among his acquaintances the young (and reckless) scions of one of the worlds largest distilleries and a major Italian bank; Hall of Fame athletes and Academy Award winners know his face. And all of them have sat across the backgammon board from Simon and happily watched him relieve them of their excess cash.

All of these people, they like to be entertained, Simon remarks in the hushed clipped tones of a well-bred British school-boy. Im an absolute treasure to them. And, I suppose, they to me.

Simon is handsome in a non-threatening kind of way; he doesnt smolder, he comforts. His manners are impeccable. And though hes careful not to make a spectacle of himself, he is often considered the life of the party, a well-bred Dionysus who happens to be quite splendid at an ancient board game.

The son of a career diplomat, Simon was born in Maryland, near Washington, D.C., but spent most of his youth in European boarding schools, reading James Bond novels instead of studying Latin. (We should all be Bond, he is fond of saying.) After a nomadic year trekking through Nepal in search of something (I can no longer recall exactly what), Simon attended Cambridge, where he studied economics and psychologydisciplines that have prepared him well for his career, if you can use such a common word to describe the life Simon has made for himself. He never took a degree. But it was at Cambridge that Simon discovered his talent for backgammon, a game thats ridiculously easy to learn, but ridiculously difficult to know.

I played for fun, with a roommate, and I paid his rent every month with my losses, Simon remembers. Somehow I found out that there were books written about the game. This struck me as something of a revelation, the fact that there might actually be a way to master the game beyond rolling a lot of good numbers. Without my friend knowing, I went to the library and read all the books on backgammon. Shortly thereafter, I was making more money in a day than most people make in a week of honest work.

In only a few months, after several profitable forays into private London clubs, Simon believed he could earn a living playing backgammon. I knew I was the best player in Cambridge, and probably in the top ten or so in London. And since I had always harbored these juvenile Bond fantasies, I thought it appropriate to do something utterly irresponsible and impulsive and attempt to live by my wits.