Tennis player turns pro

DEmeant0r

Not sure if this has been posted already, if it has apologies. Apparently ex tennis star Boris Becker is turning poker pro is now part of the pokerstars team.

http://pokeronamac.com/news/boris-becker-joins-the-pokerstars-team/

Boris Becker, who some people know him as Boom Boom and other people call him Baron von Slam, is bringing is considerable poker talent to PokerStars.com.

After many years of playing poker recreationally, Becker is becoming part of the PokerStars team with the intent of bringing his game to the next level.

Becker has said that when he was still playing tennis professionally, he started learning to play poker casually in-between games because he said that it helped him improve his concentration. He went on to say that now he wants to make his poker skills better and he also wants to challenge himself to become really competitive at the highest levels that poker has to offer.

Becker is joining the best team to accomplish those two goals. PokerStars team has some of the most elite poker talent in the world, which includes Joe Hachem, Daniel Negreanu and fellow German Katja Thater. So, Becker will learn a lot about poker from all of these pros.

It will be seen if a strong tennis game can be translated into poker. Becker has already pointed out though that the strategy, psychology, and decision-making under pressure in tennis could definitely be seen as very good skills to have when it comes to poker. These skills could be very big assets for Becker.

Becker has already gone through a very intense poker training regiment that of course featured some of the best poker teachers that anyone could have, which were Barry Greenstein and the Negreanu, who was mentioned earlier. Now the German is looking forward to his first stop on the European Poker Tour. Becker is planning on playing at the European Poker Tour Dortmund in his home country of Germany and then the European Poker Tour Grand Final in Monte Carlo next spring. Becker hopefully will be ready for both of those stops.

Becker is known to be one of the greatest players in tennis history. He is a six-time Grand Slam singles champion, an Olympic Gold medalist and he also has the record of being the youngest-ever winner of the men’s single title at Wimbledon at the age of 17.

We will keep you informed on how Becker performs in the poker world, so stay tuned.

I don't think I can take him seriously now

Flushdraw

I was expecting to see Yevgeny Kafelnikov

mewso

McEnroe would be great crack. You cannot be serious my chips were not over the line.

Flushdraw

musician wrote: »

McEnroe would be great crack. You cannot be serious my chips were not over the line.

LMAO.......THEY WERE ON THE LINE..ARE YOU BLIND!

cardshark202

musician wrote: »

McEnroe would be great crack. You cannot be serious my chips were not over the line.

rofl very good

BigCityBanker

Pokestars see the german market as being largely untapped so they are gonna use Becker as their key to the door.

Personally if i was gonna try crack the German market id hire The Hoff

Imposter

In my opinion things are pretty much at saturation point here (Austria and Germany) with regard to poker. Way too much poker on TV, loads and loads of ads. Back when Pokerstars signed Katja Thater that was when things were kinda starting here. Now it's beyond ridiculous. I guess it's already at the stage where Ireland was last year.

RoundTower

In fairness I don't think even Stars will try to market him as a "pro".

zuutroy

wrote:

It will be seen if a strong tennis game can be translated into poker. Becker has already pointed out though that the strategy, psychology, and decision-making under pressure in tennis could definitely be seen as very good skills to have when it comes to poker. These skills could be very big assets for Becker.

What a load of crap.

connie147

zuutroy wrote: »

What a load of crap.

Might not be. Lots of sports people are quite natutally good at most sports they turn to. (that is of course if you consider holdem a sport). I'd know quite a few of the snooker pros pretty well. The ones I know are all single handicap golfers and reasonably good holdem players.(I'm not saying they'ed make it as a pro texas holdem player), but definately,some of the attributes that they use to keep them at the top of their sport, as in patience,body language,will to win, strength of mind are all good atributes for people who play holdem seriously.

PS: I have no idea if Mr Becker is a capable player or not. What I'm trying to say is that IF he is a decent player,some of the attributes he had as a professional sportsman will benefit his holdem game.

zuutroy

Golf and Snooker are slow deliberate sports where your frame of mind is much more important than action sports like Tennis or Football where talent is much more important imo

robinlacey

there are a lot of poker players who played tennis at a high level though,as far as i know antonious and hansen were both professionals and i believe benyamine is meant to play to a very competitive level too..

it would be interesting if the hype in the press release is true and he has decided to make a genuine effort to get to the highest levels in poker,of course its more likely that he is just playing for a laugh because he's rich and bored...

luckylucky

zuutroy wrote: »

Golf and Snooker are slow deliberate sports where your frame of mind is much more important than action sports like Tennis or Football where talent is much more important imo

Well Boris has got too great predecessors from the Tennis world, Patrik Antonius and cough cough ahem luckylucky were both former tennis coaches

Sparky1808

Well they're marketing him as some type of pro, because they have marked for the EPT in Prague, and no doubt every other EPT event for the rest of the next 13 months and on top of that the WSOP i'm sure.