Earlier I posted about Wanda Sykes’ table banter on the Celebrity Poker show. It started me thinking about interesting table chatter I’ve heard watching the WPT. The one that seemed to spring to my mind was an exchange between Phil Helmuth and Antonio “Magician” Esfandiari. The two of them had been going at it on the table all day and Antonio had an almost scary read on Helmuth. If Phil had a weak hand Antonio put him to the test by coming over the top. If Phil was strong Antonio got off the hand and cut his losses. Antonio finally got Phil all in and as the last card fell eliminating Helmuth, Antonio jumped up and started celebrating. I guess you can debate whether or not celebrating a big win is appropriate but enough players do it that you can’t really say that it’s out of place. Anyway, Phil wants to get out of there. He doesn’t want to be standing around with the loser label on him so he walks over to Antonio and says to him, “Hey, show some class here. I’m trying to come over here and shake your hand and you’re leaving me hanging. ”
To me, that just seemed funny. Phil Helmuth telling someone else to show some class.