My name is Dutch Boyd. I am a professional poker player and World Series of Poker bracelet winner. I am what I call a third-generation poker player, meaning I got into poker after Rounders but before the Moneymaker World Series in 2003. I can honestly an confidently call myself an expert in the poker industry. Here are some reflections I’d like to share.

Back in 1999, at 18 years old and fresh out of law school, I was one of the co-founders of an online cardroom, PokerSpot, which went under and left over 1200 players holding the bag for their cashier balance. It was a big disaster for everyone involved and should serve as a cautionary tale to anybody putting too much trust in an online gambling site or buying into the “first-mover advantage” myth. But we did invent real money multi-table tournaments, and after almost a year of trying to peddle the software to someone, we finally abandoned the project and open-sourced the poker software. I like to think this has helped the continued development of online poker.

After Pokerspot failed, I started focusing on making a career as a professional poker player. I propped the 20-40 games in 2002 at Garden City Casino in San Jose, CA… I then saw a huge opportunity in poker tournaments, so I quit the prop ob and started following the professional tournament circuit. I hit my first major break in 2003. I won the very last mega-satellite to the main event, and finished 12th. It was the first year ESPN was really doing it justice, and they had all new production people who didn’t really know much about who was who…. so they focused on results. I was the chipleader for a good chunk of time in that tourney, and in the top ten for three straight days… so I got a lot more camera time than I otherwise would have. Poker was changing and poker stars were going to be made. A few friends were with me, Joey Bartholdi and Brett “Gank” Jungblut, and “The Crew” was born, bankrolled with that initial 2003 score.

We recruited a couple of other guys. Joey left The Crew and then we picked up Scott. We went pretty much broke, but found some backers for the WSOP 2004 and kicked some ass. Gank won a bracelet. Scotty won two. Joey and I both got as close as you can get (3rd and 2nd, respectively). ESPN blew us up, Rolling Stone ran a feature. We’d continue to dominate the poker scene. But by this point we were no longer really that tight of a group. There were some internal feuds. Friends became rivals. But we all knew that we’d always be The Crew… it was more of an experience than anything else. A handful of 7 guys trying to reach a poker dream.

Joey would finally get his legendary win by snapping off the WPT Championship event in 2006 for almost $4 million dollars. At the time, it was the third largest poker tournament in the history of the game. I’d get mine a month later, snapping off the first $2,500 Six-handed event at the WSOP. It was a televised event and had me going up headsup against Joe Hachem, the previous year’s world champion. Up until that event, I was admittedly the (male) poker player with the highest fame-to-earnings ratio. After that win, though, that could no longer be said.