Poker Quotes - Top Ten Funny Poker Quotations

TEN FUNNIEST POKER QUOTES OF ALL TIME?

as chosen by Colin M Jarman aka The Quotable Poker Player

What makes for a really funny poker quotation? Since this is my list, the answer is simple: any saying or thought about poker that makes me laugh.

Having spent the past two years compiling The Quotable Poker Player - a book of 1500 humorous poker quotations - I figure I have as much right as anybody to pick my Top Ten Funniest Poker Quotes of All Time.

So, apart from making me laugh in some way, how do I judge a funny or humorous or amusing poker quotation? My particular brand of poker humour is predicated on three main factors:

A. Hilarity ... it has to make me laugh out loud or smile deeply within.

B. Cleverness ... I'm a stone cold sucker for intelligent humour and if a non-poker pop culture reference is also thrown in, then that's the quotable equivalent of the nuts.

C. Originality ... just as there are only three basic jokes, there are only three basic poker quotations (those about playing poker, those about poker & sex, and those by Victoria Coren). So, the more original the quote the more I love it.

Having published the first-ever book of 1500 funny poker quotations and having rejected a whole lot more that failed to make the final cut of 1500, these ten are the funniest poker quotes that I keep coming back to time after time. Every time I read them I still laugh, smile or genuflect in their general direction.

As with all my Top Ten quotations list they are not ranked 1 to 10 or in any cogent order ... as with a deck of cards I like my poker quotations well shuffled.

“When the next hand starts, stop talking about the last hand, whether you won or lost. Living in the past is a Jethro Tull album, not a smart poker strategy."

Richard Roeper in The Chicago Sun-Times (2005)

"No-Limit Texas Hold ‘em may be the Cadillac of poker games, but there are plenty of other fine cars out there in the showroom."

Conrad Brunner on CardPlayer.com (2006)

"The Americans tip the odds in their own favour, with World Series tournaments like Limit Razz and Ace To Five Draw; such un-British games that they might as well be competitions to see who can name the most Texan garden centres."

Victoria Coren in The Guardian (2001)

Phil Gordon: "Even Jesus wouldn’t bet all of his chips on a J-3."
Dave Foley: "Well, if he did, by the time the cards hit the table they’d be different."
on Celebrity Poker Showdown

"I played Texas Hold ’em that night, but the only thing I was holding when I went home was my MetroCard. I had been cleaned out by men who knew how to fold early, bet strong and run the table like Rudy Giuliani runs the city."

Brian Koppelman in The New York Observer (2001)

Campaigning for poker to be included in the Olympic Games - "After all, the ribbon-waving rhythmic gymnasts are in. The shuttlecock-chasing badminton players are in. Even the ice-sweeping curlers are in. And poker’s out? That’s like throwing a party for mankind’s greatest inventions and forgetting to invite indoor plumbing."
Poker in Athens (2004)

“Bridge has an image problem. While Hold 'em conjures up hard-bitten men, scantily clad women, and long nights in Las Vegas, bridge evokes cucumber sandwiches, dank afternoons in village halls, and sharp words between bitter octogenarians. In Hold 'em, you need balls. In bridge, you are more likely to have a dicky prostate.”

Ed Caesar in The Independent (2006)

"Everybody just sits. These people spend more time on their butts than FDR did. And now you, too, can get the entire 2003 World Series of Poker on DVD, featuring all that sitting! (Comes with an ice pick to insert into your brain.) The dullness is built into the game. The way to win at Texas Hold ‘em is to be as expressionless as drywall and fold a lot. Whoo-ee! You talk about exciting! What’s ESPN going to put on next, the World Hairline-Receding Championships?"

Rick Reilly in Sports Illustrated magazine (2004)

Brant: "What’s going on?"
Charlene: "We’re telling stories. You just missed a really good one about a man who won November 1937 in a poker game."
Neil Gaiman, Sandman: A Tale of Two Cities (1994)

"If you think what we have going on today is online Poker Mania you’re in for a gaming earthquake of mega-magnitude. To use a Beatles’ metaphor, today we’re somewhere around Love Me Do and Please, Please Me. We have the massive climb towards Rubber Soul and Sergeant Pepper to come!"
‘All The Aces’ in The Daily Star (2005)



The Top Ten Funniest Poker Quotes - a personal selection - was compiled by
Colin M Jarman aka The Quotable Poker Player

Poker Quotes - Lou Krieger's Top Ten

TOP TEN POKER QUOTES by Lou Krieger

Some time last year, while researching a book of humorous poker quotations, I came across this interesting article in Card Player magazine …

“This column marks a milestone for me: my 200th article for Card Player. My personal celebration involved perusing each of my 200 columns and pulling my favorite poker quotes to share with you. I don't know if any of these will make it to Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, but if someone ever complies a book of quotable poker quotes, I hope to see a few of mine there.”
Lou Krieger, On Poker: You Can Quote Me on That  in Card Player magazine (2000)

With such a heartfelt plea it is only fitting to add Lou Krieger to my ongoing list of ‘Top Ten Poker Quoters.’

In some small way this Top Ten tribute may make his dream come true as some of Lou’s quotations do indeed appear in my book The Quotable Poker Player. Although TQPP is not going to match Bartlett's Familiar Quotations in terms of size or age, TQPP is certainly much funnier and is 100% poker-based.

“In poker - as in so many other disciplines - there are great ‘players’ and then there are great ‘teachers.’ Lou Krieger is both. Trust me. His appreciation for the intricacies of poker are obvious. He's one of the few writers who incorporates both good card sense and comprehensive situational analysis in his writing. Reading Lou’s advice is like getting painting lessons from Rembrandt or being taught the violin by Stradivarius.”
Nolan Dalla

With a glowing introduction like that from the World Series of Poker Media Director and renowned poker writer / historian, who is this Lou Krieger and what has he got to say about poker?

Lou is currently the editor of Poker Player Newspaper and has written 11 books and more than 400 columns about poker strategy for a variety of magazines. His first book, Hold ’em Excellence: From Beginner to Winner, was published in 1995. Since then Lou has also published other poker books such as: MORE Hold ’em Excellence: A Winner For Life, Poker For Dummies, Gambling For Dummies, Internet Poker: How to Play and Beat Online Poker Games, Winning Omaha/8 Poker, The Poker Player’s Bible, Secrets the Pros Won’t Tell You About Winning Hold ’em Poker, The Portable Poker Pro: Winning Tips for Texas Hold ’em and 52 Great Poker Tips.

With a resume like that there is no doubt that Lou deserves to have his own list of poker quotables - and this is my personal choice of  the Top Ten Quotes by Lou Krieger (with sources where known) …

“Hold ‘em - like life itself - has its defining moment. It’s the flop. When you see the flop, you’re looking at 71 percent of your hand, and the cost is only a single round of betting.” 

“Learn their secrets and determine how they keep from going on tilt. If the shoe fits, steal it!”

“As batting practice is not baseball, reading about poker, or playing against computerized opponents - while undeniably helpful - is not the same as playing for real money, against live opponents, in public games.”
from Hold ‘em Excellence (2000)

“Only losers and amateurs blame the cards. After all, cards don’t care; they don’t take sides, and they have no memory. They are blind justice holding her scales, and in the long run they’ll tip evenly for the novice and the skilled alike.”
from More Hold ‘em Excellence (1999)

On the pre-poker boom TV shows - “Before that, even for poker fans like myself, poker was boring. It was just a bunch of guys grimacing at one another. Boring television.”

“Most of the money you’ll win at poker comes not from the brilliance of your own play, but from the ineptitude of your opponents.” 

“Figure out what your opponent wants you to do and try to do the opposite.”

“You have it in your power to turn a bad beat around simply by realizing this simple truth: The more bad beats you encounter, the luckier you are. It’s a sign that you are playing against opponents who continually take the worst of it, and if you can’t beat someone who always takes the worst of it, you can’t beat anyone.”

“Not only is poker good for you, it’s the American way, where winners play fair, have the right stuff, and nothing else matters, except, perhaps, a bit of luck every now and then.”

“There are two kinds of poker face. Everyone thinks of Mount Rushmore, immobile, but the other is to broadcast so much information that no one can tell what you’re thinking.”


Compiled by
Colin M Jarman
The Quotable Poker Player


For more great poker quotations by Lou, go to his excellent blog Keep Flopping Aces and his excellent quotes page  - Quotable Krieger. Also check out Poker Player Newspaper edited by Lou.

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