Poker Player - David Williams
David Williams is one of the fastest rising stars of the new generation of professional poker players, already ranked at number 7 in the World Series of Poker All Time Money list. Born in Texas, David grew up in a single parent household, and learned independence early. He has achieved academic success, attending the Academy of Math and Science in Texas during his teenage years before being accepted by both Havard and Princeton. Shortly after attending however, he became homesick and he is currently studying at the Southern Methodist University in Texas.
David Williams is a young star, only in his mid twenties, who has only been playing poker since 1997. Before taking up poker, he was highly ranked as a player of a card game called Magic: The Gathering. He describes the game thus: “Magic is a strategy card game that is played one on one in tournaments. It is sort of like Pokemon for adults, although most of the tournament players are from 17-25. I began playing as a hobby in 8th grade and found out about the pro tour, which is a circuit of invite only tournaments held around the globe for prize money (nothing like poker money, but pretty good for a HS student.) You have a deck of cards which all have a specific function which is explained on the cards, and you use them in combination to defeat your opponent. Like poker, there is luck in the game which keeps it appealing for all.”
From this background, David also took up playing poker online, and like his contemporaries Greg Raymer and Chris Moneymaker, he won his way to the 2004 World Series of Poker through PokerStars.com. In 2004, he came second to Greg Raymer, winning an incredible $3.5million at the World Series of Poker Main Event. In the same year, he also took prize money of $573,000 for his runner up World Poker Tour finish. He has expressed a preference for live tournament play, in spite of his online poker prowess.
In everyday life, David Williams has been described as polite and reliable, smart and mature for his years. He is responsible in his attitude and obviously academically capable as well as having street smarts. At the poker table however, David is fiercely competitive, striving to always be at the top of his game, and never being satisfied with second place. At the 2004 World Series of Poker main event, his second place finish won him $3.5million, but the final hand still haunts him. He says “I think about the final hand every day. I think about it all the time – the way it went down, getting so close to being the champion. I mean, it wasn’t about the money – OK, sure it was about the money, the money was nice. It is nice. But it wasn’t entirely about that. Winning was so much more important to me. If the first place has paid $3.5million and the second place had paid $5 million I still would have liked to win. I wanted to win. I think about it all the time. All the time. The way it went down. I don’t know if I’ll ever get it out of my head.”
David William is clued up about his future, continuing to study as well as play professional poker, and he is also happy about being one of the few black poker players on the circuit. Although his father was Iranian, David never knew him, but is aware that a part of his appeal is his racial mix, which opens up poker to a wider audience. With his drive and charm and obvious ambition for his life as well as on the poker circuit, it is guaranteed that David Williams will be not only making more final tables at world class poker tournaments, but taking the titles too.
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