Two locals finish in top five at pro poker tourney at Ameristar

Two locals who learned their craft in the back rooms of bars and on riverboats finished in the top five at the Heartland Poker Tour stop at Ameristar Casino.

Elbert Campbell of Utica, who takes his poker advice straight from The Gambler himself, finished second behind Rankin County Supervisor Jay Bishop of Pearl in the Heartland Poker Tour.

“Most of all you’ve got to know when to hold ’em and know when to fold ’em,” Campbell said, quoting the famous Kenny Rogers song.

He took home a $24,456 cash prize for the finish in the No-Limit Texas Hold ’Em Tournament. Bishop took the top prize of $39,129.

“It’s spring out there with the trees budding and the flowers blooming. That’s how I feel,” Campbell said of his tournament performance. “I’m budding.”

Campbell said he began playing poker in the back room of a bar after he became locally famous in another game.

“I was a dice shooter — the baddest dice shooter in town. The guys wouldn’t face me any more,” Campbell said.

Doug Segers, a retired riverboat pilot, who lives in Vicksburg finished fifth, taking a $8,560 purse.

“I never expected to be here at the final table,” Segers said. “Anything is possible when you’re playing poker. If luck wasn’t a factor there wouldn’t be a poker game.”

Segers began playing poker while working on a riverboat and in bars where other patrons would ignore the illegal games.

“When the casinos came, it was a good, safe place to play,” Segers said, later adding, “I’ve seen the image of poker do a 180.”

The public perception of poker began shifting in 2003 when Chris Moneymaker, an accountant from Tennessee, qualified for the World Series of Poker through an online poker site, said Fred Bevill, executive producer of the Heartland Poker Tour.

“When he won and poker was as easy as logging onto a website … the game just exploded,” Bevill said.

Heartland Poker wasn’t far behind. It began in 2005 as a way to make high-stakes poker tournaments affordable to average Americans. The buy-in for a Heartland tournament is about $1,500. Previous tournaments had buy-ins as high as $20,000, he said.

“That was the founding principle of the tour,” he said.

Heartland has awarded more than $55 million in prizes since 2005. The televised show is in its 10^th season, and the episode featuring the Vicksburg tournament is expected to air in syndication in the fall.