“I can tell you right now that I’ve never met anybody who cares less about money than Daniel Negreanu. He cares about the title, the bracelet and his legacy,” said Balsbaugh. “In 2004, the cover of toto bet hk magazine had ‘Will he win the big one?’ and Daniel on the cover for the first week of the WSOP. And he’s wanted this for a very long time and it’s every poker player’s dream to win the Main Event of the World Series of Poker.”
We’ve been here before though. In 2009 Phil Ivey made the November Nine and fans, other players and media were excited to see the world’s best poker player on its biggest stage. In the four months between reaching the November Nine and the resumption of play live on ESPN Ivey, largely under the guidance of the disaster of a PR team that Full Tilt Poker had at the time, was almost invisible. He granted ESPN the Magazine andE:60 some access to follow him as he gambled his way around the world.
Outside of that though, he was basically a ghost and existed only in press releases that Full Tilt Poker was crafting for him. Things were no different when he busted out of the tournament in 7th place. Ivey disappeared down one of the back hallways of the Rio, granting a short interview to a select few who chased him down while the media who had gathered – some specifically to follow Ivey – were left wanting.
“He made a comment to me that, in the early stages of this tournament, you can play every hand. At some point though, when the talent gets higher and the competition gets tougher, you have to shift gears. At that point he hadn’t shifted gears. He has now and he has a great 30,000 foot view of where he is in the tournament and the overall game plan of how to end up with all of the chips.”
All of the chips.
“The (November) Nine has no relevance to me. The One does. So I’m focusing on the One. Maybe some people are focusing on the Nine, but I’m focusing on doing everything I need to do to get to the one spot,” said Negreanu. “And it’s obviously what I play for. The Main Event is the coolest event in the world, so it’s the one I want to win.” Many of the player still left in the field are eyeing that $7.6 million first place prize and dreaming of the life that comes with that much money. Negreanu, through his poker success and business ventures that have done well, has that life already. What he doesn’t have is a Main Event championship and Balsbaugh knows that’s what’s motivating his client at this point.
