Nolan Dalla – On The Conference Call That Started It All

Ten years later, Dalla recounts the dawn of the EPT.

Nolan Dalla - On The Conference Call That Started It All
Neil Stoddart - PokerStars, All Rights Reserved

Here’s yet another interesting read from poker historian and industry insider, Nolan Dalla.

Dalla, back in the day, served as the Director of Communications for PokerStars at the birth of the European Poker Tour. In his latest blog post, Dalla tries to take you inside his brain as he was put on the conference call with PokerStars mastermind Isai Scheinberg and EPT creator John Duthie just as the deal for the EPT was going down.

In his own words, despite being brought in for his perceived knowledge of these kind of deals – Dalla didn’t “know jack shit” about how to help out but he had to anyway.

But I didn’t know that back then. In fact, I didn’t really know much of anything. I’d been marginally involved in the initial ESPN negotiations with Binion’s Horseshoe back before the 2003 WSOP. However, I don’t know jack shit about business or negotiating finances. I certainly didn’t know anything about the European gaming and television landscape. However, I was asked to be on this call for the simple fact that I was now within the inner-circle at PokerStars, and it was presumed I was one of the pillars of the ESPN-WSOP alliance (I wasn’t).

What if you work your whole life for a seat at the table, but once you get that seat you don’t know how to hold a knife and fork?

While the post doesn’t exactly provide specifics about how the deal went down or who contributed what – it is an interesting read based on Dalla’s own observations and opinions of both Scheinberg, Duthie and his former self.

So, even though you don’t actually hear a lot about the creation of the tour, it’s worth your time to check out.

Read: *A PokerStars Conference Call: The Creation of the European Poker Tour * [Nolan Dalla]

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published 8 years, 7 months ago • by • permalink

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