With a Million Bucks at Stake, Barny and Ross Boatman Leave Family Loyalty Behind

by Catman

“Are they cooked in garlic – how do they come?” enquired Ross.
    “They are cooked in chilli,” replied the stunning waitress in her low-cut dress.
    “Sounds good to me,” replied the deep voice of Ross Boatman. For here I sat with two ‘right old’ (cockney for pukka or genuine) Chilli Peppers of European poker, old-school boys who are sweet and silent in presentation but deadly opposition.
    Yeah, just like a pair of chilli peppers.
    Normally, I interview players where and when they want, not often at the dinner table, sometimes between games – it is a bit sad when poker players think they are too big to have time for the public, like my last punter…come meet Isabelle Mercier at The Vic and alas she couldn’t be bothered to turn up.
    But there was going to be none of this superstar bollox today, as I was going to meet a couple of real pros. Two right Julius Caesars (cockney for geezers=salt of the Earth men) who would not only make me laugh silly, but would thank me gratefully for my time. Like a good poker hand, Ross and Barny are always understated, Barny with $1,251,000 from 77-odd cashes and Ross with $1,259,000 million from 55 cashes odd to their names.
    The Boatman brothers share a very special talent to win. To quote Mike Caro: “If you play the game well, it is not when but only a matter of time before you win big.”

New Venue on the Menu
So if like me you thought Ross Boatman was more an actor than a poker player, read on.
    Recently I have been playing poker at a new haunt, the Paddington Casino, a stunning poker room next door to Paddington Train Station. The restaurant boasts fine cuisine and the casino director, James, is an absolute diamond who happens to love poker, too. So without further delay I asked James for a comp for dinner and the mention of the Boatmans was enough to seal a bottle of Dom Perignon thrown in, although we opted for mineral water instead.
    The poker room manager is a beautiful young lady named Carla and this tied in so well with the Boatman interview, because as a young dealer, she was around The Vic and had dealt to us all in the good old days. Today, the good old days of live poker have turned into the delicious super-global worldwide game of TV and Internet poker.
    In the Boatmans’ early days, winning the British Championship or appearing on Late Night Poker was a little akin to winning the biggest EPT whilst taking a million-dollar pot on High Stakes Poker. The game has changed, and the Boatmans have moved with the tides, big time. Let’s think Saville Row Bespoke suits, apply this formula to poker players and you get the Boatmans, old style but untouchable class.
    If you can’t fathom that one out, then you can bugger off now.

Double Shot
The Boatman Bros have achieved a double whammy, a double chance to play for the big one, the big first prize that has so far just eluded them. Having both won early heats, R&B will now tee off against each other – brother against brother – in the semi-final of the Ladbrokes Poker Million VII, one of the mothers of all TV events with a prize of (you guessed it) a million stenching filthy sexy dirty bucks. There are 14 six-seater heats with the winner from each going through to two eight-seater semis. The top three players from each semi will go through to the six-seat final for a shed load of wonga. For the Boatman brothers – two of the UK’s best-known players – this game might very well lead to their biggest and most important cash in their sparkling careers.
    “How does it feel to be here with two poker legends,” I asked Catgirl, the poker rookie.
    “Don’t ask me the questions, I am here to learn, not talk,” was the curt response, and learn she would.
    Ross and Barny Boatman are both Full Tilt Poker sponsored pros and of course members of the quintessentially British institution known as The Hendon Mob. So with the big game on, I thought it might be nice to give you a psychological profile that might assist in your betting on this event, or give you a little edge should you ever be at their table.

Here We Go
What’s your favourite animal?
    Ross: Chimpanzee – cuddly playful and like me.
    Barny: (Laughing) I love all living creatures on Earth, especially edible ones – let’s make it an elephant.
    Is their choice of animal how they see themselves?

Playing Style – Do you play poker like the animal you chose?
    Ross: Lately, every time I play, someone is making a monkey out of me.
    Barny: Elephants are thinkers. If either of us has a problem, it is that we tend to think too much. My style of play sometimes relies on people doing what I expect them to. It’s supposed to be tricky, unpredictable.
    Analysis: Their play will be a cross between a muted Dostoyevsky and a cannibal.

What is the best thing you have ever done?
    Ross: I had three children.
    Barny: Taking care of my sister when she was ill might be the only important thing I have ever done.

Your Biggest Mistake?
    Ross: Having children.
    Barny: Buying the flat upstairs from Ross.

Would you rather have a WSOP bracelet with no money or sponsorship, or £100,000?
    Ross: All the cool poker players would say give me the £100k. It depends where I was financially. I would probably take the bracelet.
    Barny: In poker, you are measured by money. If you were a doctor, you wouldn’t say the doctor around the corner is rubbish – there is an intrinsic value in what they practise. Poker is a game, a very competitive game. You set goals. If you don’t achieve them, you feel let down. A bracelet is forever. I will take the bracelet as long as I can get it before Ross.
    Catman’s Analysis: Bollox, take the money.

Do you prefer to travel by Sunseekers or Learjet?
    Ross: I don’t know what a Sunseeker is, so LearJet.
    Barny: Trouble with a Sunseeker is you might bump into a Russian oligarch and get into bother.
     Analysis: Neither needs the million; they are both minted.

You’re in the Ladbrokes Poker Million on TV and you are dealt A-3. All-in or pass – four players, medium stack?
    Ross: Stack in jeopardy, all-in, any position.
    Barny: Barry Greenstein said questions like that are blackjack questions. Having said that, I have never played A-3 in my life. And I don’t intend to play A-3 with a million dollars at stake.

Any poker player you would like to punch?
    Ross: Where do I start? Roy ‘The Boy’ Brindley or Cassey Castle. Roy Brindley knows why; well, he doesn’t know why.
    Barny: I want to hold Ross’ coat while he hits Roy Brindley.

How It Began
Barny let me know where it all started.
    “I was born into a huge old house in Summerstown near St Pancreas, four floors with a family on each floor. We then moved to another house in Summerstown, where Ross was born. We were always being chased by a bulldozer, trying to knock the houses down.”
    Barny and Ross were obviously not born on the soft side of town.
    The age difference between the two brothers is eight years. “Yeah, and I am 52 years old,” jokes the actually much younger Ross. “Eight years is a big age gap. Nick, my other brother, and Barny were always great brothers. As we got older, age difference shrunk, but Barny was always protective,” said the ever-smiling Ross.
    “Barny taught me the rules of poker. I played three-card brag, penny up against the wall, etc.”
    Ross went to Ackland Burley in Tuffnell Park. Was it tough? “Skinheads, punks, soul boys, rockers and greasers.” Everything he could want in assisting him to develop his tough-guy acting character for later life and a life in poker. They say no game reflects life like poker, and it seems that the Boatmans were getting a special taste for both.
    Big Brother Barny interjected: “I stopped going to Hampstead School (a very un-posh school in Cricklewood) for the last two years. I was expelled ’cause I hardly went. I was always a games player; I played everything at school. Poker came along seriously a long way later, when our games merged together.”
    Barny’s strength is often represented by action without warning, but study Ross playing poker and you will notice the powerful and imposing table presence of a man who has spent many years acting the ‘hard man’.
    “At school, I knew from ten years on that I wanted to be an actor,” said Ross. “I knew early, but games playing was part of the family.”

Brother Act
“I have been a teacher, a journalist, a barman, a builder, worked in a law centre, I’ve done, err…,” Ross interrupts, “your bollox!”
    Ross and Barny are a double act – virtually every other sentence is a wisecrack – and this humour is something that has seen them through thick and thin. Barny’s wit is something very, very special, not as in special school but in the form of a genius of Pier Promenade wit. He is the funniest man in poker second to a man with the nickname BB (Andy). Barny’s amusing commentary on Cult TV’s Late Night Poker series of the ’90s was one of the reasons so many new players started playing poker, myself included.
    Laughter is a major part of what is obviously a very rare and caring brotherly love.
    “Ross and I make each other laugh so much, you know when you get that pain in the back of your head from laughing; we destroy each other,” says Barny.
    Is your dad a big tough man, Barny?
    “He makes a noise like a big tough man.”
    Our beautiful meal was interrupted only by a waiter attempting to change the room lighting for Anne, our photographer, who had been clicking for the last 30 minutes while we ate – now, that is dedication.
    Poker got serious when the Boatmans furthered their poker knowledge playing in cash games.

Dealer’s Choice
Ross and Barny started a home cash game that has lived on in the play Dealer’s Choice.
    “The famous game was at Archway – this was the Dealers Choice game. I lived upstairs, he lived downstairs – mid ’80s. Players included Jessie Birstall a famous actor in Quadrophenia, Alan Rafaport who still plays at The Vic, Ashtray Al, Brixton One Hand, Johnny Stretch Morris. It was pretty serious’ people could get hurt and did their bollox. Award-winning playwright Patrick Marber came into the game, then Patrick went off and wrote the play Dealers Choice. The game broke up as it got too big. And broke…” recollected the brothers, looking at each other with huge smiles.
    This play not only graced the West End way back then, but was also revived this year, with Ross in a lead role, yet again.
    Catgirl interrupts, “Let’s order a main course.” I am not surprised: She was with two of the biggest talkers in poker, Barny and myself. A lavish array of beef in horseradish case, stroganoff, Dover sole and other delights arrive. It’s a right little party and unlike many other interviews I have done, I am totally relaxed and enjoying the company around me.
    Ross met fellow Hendon Mobster Joe Beevers in the Satkis in 1984. “We went to The Vic and found out how good we weren’t. I met Joe and he thought I would be a lovely guest at the late night Hendon game, a big private game of Joe’s, and he found out I was a lovely guest,” said Ross with possible reference to him not quite being the punter expected.
    The Mob was formed. You weren’t gangsters, were you? I enquired. No Mafia connections?
    I had stunned Barny and Ross into ten seconds of wind-up silence. “Define connections,” Barny finally quipped. “We will take the fifth on that – we are pussycats, maybe excluding Roy the Boy.”
    Ross Boatman was famous in the UK for his TV appearances and as an actor. “Acting, I am waiting on a Sky series called The Take. I was in Hardmen, London’s Burning, Wall of Silence, and I am up for a West End play.”
    Barny, what was that film you were in?     “The Boatmans on Holiday in Skegness Super 8,” replied the funny man. The thing is, like many others, I really had thought Ross was more actor than poker player, but it is obvious his acting has only helped him in achieving a ridiculous 55 cashes in live events and I repeat a staggering $1.29 million. All figures compliments of The Hendon Mob database.

Competitive Instinct
Were the brothers competitive?
    “We played so many games, it was a real home game in the early days, we were no more competitive with each other than with other people. Ross came second in one final of Late Night Poker, I made three finals and two third places. We both made our names in poker on TV. I think in the poker scene people know what a good player Ross is. We play hard against each other, we get a real buzz out of getting late into a tournament together.”
    Both the Boatmans have made history by being the only two brothers to make the semi-finals of the Ladbrokes Poker Million, but there is a little more than history at stake: pride and, of course, standing in the community. For winning this eight-seater would not only make life substantially more comfortable, but would also seal the Boatmans on the professional pecking order. Made men, yes, but the Boatmans are both striving for that very big first-place finish.
    “Ram [Vaswani, the fourth Hendon Mobster] and Joe didn’t make it, so we are flying the flag for the Hendon Mob and Full Tilt [they are now sponsored by Full Tilt Poker]. Getting through was a fantastic day,” said Barny, almost off in a dream of sorts, and I for one don’t blame him.
    You are both through to the semi, both in the same eight-seater, three players going through to the final.
    What’s going to happen – any team tactics?
    Ross: “No team tactics, a lot of people don’t know that. Let’s put any of that to rest.”
    Barny: “Look around when we clash, cameras or not. In Vienna, Ross knocked me out on the final table bubble. You have to play hard and win it yourself. I want to go through with all the chips and Ross to go through with one chip. Slow-play is cheating and we would not do it. If I get in a big pot with Ross, then at least I know it goes to a Boatman. It is 7 or 8 to 1 to pick two out of three to come in the first two places. It is unlikely, but we will both make it.”
    Barny, if you were commentating, how would you have it?
    “The format suits us both. We aren’t all-or-nothing players, but neither would we try to sneak in there. Ross always keeps a cool head, he won’t be worried by a slow start, he doesn’t stop assessing situations, won’t put his chips in from behind but knows when to gamble. I don’t think any player will have any edge against him.”
    Ross then gave his thoughts: “Ditto, apart from getting chips in from behind – Barny has a lot more balls than I have. Barny will get his chips in from behind, not ace-king. Barny does not need to think he has kings and I have jacks. He doesn’t need a big hand, but it is not reckless aggression. Barny is a great thinker, has imagination – he knows what is going on in the game. He makes reads, then acts on them. If he thinks someone has missed or is making a move, he will get his money in without any hesitation. Barny acts on those situations. Some of us will wait for a better spot, but Barny has the bollox to act.”
    Barny replies, “Fair comment, sometimes people don’t do what you want them to do. A guy who never bet, someone who didn’t raise and stories like that, may make you look passive, but people don’t always cooperate. I wrote tips recently for Full Tilt about ‘knowing when to take your hands of the wheel.’ Poker is all about control, but you can’t be in control just waiting for cards, specifically in tournament situations, because of relative chip stacks and blinds, when you are forced to gamble, and only by gambling you can seize control and play when you haven’t cards.”

So Close but Yet so Far
For me it seems that the Boatmans are almost in a state of self-denial. They appreciate their position, how lucky they are, what they have gained so far, but both are in a state of limbo that will only be solved by a big win. Barny, by the way, came a fantastic 16th in the 2000 WSOP Main Event.
    “One of us deserves to win. I don’t think the $1.25 million reflects where we have been,” said Ross. “We have hit at least 20 huge event crossbars. Our biggest result is $168k.”
    Barny: “This would be the most overdue result. WSOP Bellagio in April and December both so close and so deep. Last two tables I got a million-dollar pot with my K-K vs. A-K. The odds are not that long but when it happens at that point, that makes it bad. Ross with Q-Q vs A-Q. Everyone has his stories. I know how good Ross is. If I see him at the rail, nothing is more painful. Life will be so much easier if we win.”
    We all laugh hysterically.
    “It is so unfortunate that only one of us can get it, so Barny will have to wait till next time,” says Ross.
    “I would rather do it in a real tournament than a Mickey Mouse crapshoot,” blasts back Barny, laughing.

Full Tilt Poker Sponsorship
What is the deal with Full Tilt like?
    “It is perfect for us, a perfect fit with the ethos of The Hendon Mob, Full Tilt and the Boatmans,” said Barny. Full Tilt is all about approachability, the best standards and educating. They don’t take themselves too seriously and we certainly take ourselves with a pinch of salt. Full Tilt is the best site; it is run by players who know how it works. I was very proud of the first sponsorship deal ever in poker (with Prima Poker, five years ago), but that is nothing in comparison to our deal with Full Tilt. At the time when Full Tilt was expanding in Europe, we were around and available. We get the freedom to be ourselves with them.”
    Barny, I heard you were raping the $50-$100 on Full Tilt?
    “Well, all I can say is I am walking funny and playing in the $1-$2, so I don’t know who is telling you that. I don’t know who got raped, but I was going well for a while. I have played at every level, but I never played big online before I played on Full Tilt. It is so safe and comfortable. I enjoy my poker and play maybe 50-60 hours a month. I think I play a lot more Omaha now, but I will keep moving until I find a game I can beat.”
    Ross, how big do you play?
    “I play from $1-$2 to $200-$400, but I find I have more success in the $1-$2,” he said, laughing.
    What bankroll do you need for the $200-$400?
    “I didn’t have enough, and I went broke quite quickly in it. How much should you have? I would say no less than a million for the pot-limit Omaha. But if you have a million, you don’t need to play in that game! I am very comfortable at the
$5-$10, $10-$20, I spend a lot of time there, it is much more relaxing, I like to play three or four small games to constantly be in action where I can’t do any serious damage. I have four screens at the office at home.”
    And for Barny:
    “Full Tilt brings the atmosphere of live play to online. You have people playing with their real names, great avatars, and it encourages chat. The Hendon Mob has taken that to another level with our Tuesday night league game. Anybody who signs onto the Hendon Mob Forum can play. We are giving free packages and lessons with the Mob. It encourages a community atmosphere and everyone knows each other.”

Competing Online
Has playing online changed the Boats?
    “Players play differently, it is a difficult game to master when you have been brought up in the backstreet games,” said Ross. “The game has evolved.”
    Barny, are there any edges for the old school?
    “We don’t have an edge over the young smart players. We recognise what we can learn from them, but they don’t think they can learn from us. The games are different, but it works both ways. Yes, you play 100 times the number of hands, but you can’t think that deeply in such a short time. The game has changed. To survive you need to adjust, and the smart ones do adjust.”
    When talk turns to the upcoming semi-final battle where the brothers are pitted against each other at the same table, there is some laughter, but a little seriousness, too.
    Barny, what tells will you use against Ross in the Ladbrokes Poker Million VII?
“As he walks away from the table, I can really tell how pissed off he is!”
    Ross, what have you got to say to Barny about the big battle ahead?
    “Unlucky Barny.”
    The Boatmans want this event more than anyone playing, not for the cash, but to seal the major title that has eluded them.
    How much do they deserve it? The answer is 100 percent, and their chances are good, but the field is tough.
    Will a million-dollar win change them? No way. The brothers are firmly on planet Earth, unlike some other ‘ambassadors of poker’. They are unpretentious, unassuming stars and major foundation builders of European poker.
    The Boatmans are simply diamond geezers.
    And they have already won something much more precious than rankings – respect.

Catman is Europe’s leading poker agent. Casino photo shoot location courtesy of www.paddingtoncasino.com .

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