RIP Noel Furlong

Tikay10

Noel Furlong, the Irishman who won the WSOP in 1999, passed away on Sunday.

The WSOP was much smaller then - 393 runners in 1999, compared to around 8,000 in recent years - but it still took some winning, & it was a tough thing to win, with the likes of Erik Seidel, Huck Seed, Padraig Parkinson & Alan Goehring all in the final 6.

Just as impressive (to my mind) he won the Irish Open twice.

I met him a few times, but never really knew him as such, but @NChanning - who won an Irish Open himself - might come along later & tell us a little more about Noel.

Here's Noel's Wiki;


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noel_Furlong

Tikay10

Here's a Twitter story about Noel by Jesse May.

https://twitter.com/ScurrilousMay/status/1410014308235370501

kapowblamz

No way! I had never heard of him until 2 days ago when I was looking at the Hellmuth WSOP ME win final table. And yep it turns out he went on to win it himself a few years later.

A legit legend this guy.

Rest In Peace Sir.

Tikay10

tl;dr?

In short, In the WSOP Final, Noel called for all his chips with A-3.

In this day & age I suppose that's not unusual, but back in the day calling with A-3 - calling, not jamming - was not a thing at all. Especially with a million bucks on the line.

I have no idea if he was a truly great poker player, but from what I have heard, he was quite the character.

Tikay10

Here's a Tweet about Noel by his good friend Padraig Parkinson;

https://twitter.com/padraigpoker/status/1410150983796203522

Tikay10

I've not watched all of this yet, but here's a promising looking documentary on the 1999 WSOP;



http://www.pokercast.eu/poker-video-streaming/video/1162-inside-the-world-series-of-poker

NChanning

That A3 hand was incredible. He and Huck had a very large proportion of the chips and ICM says they should avoid each other and knock out the others before a big confrontation. Huck limps Jd8d and Noel raises and for Huck to now shove he has to be certain that Noel has a good understanding of ICM and thus will need to be at the absolute top of his range to call. Given that Noel is loose aggressive he feels he is very unlikely to call. Noel snap calls and tables A3 proudly like he knew that was definitely winning.

People talked about what a bad call it was and how he obviously didn't really understand the ICM implications. In retrospect not enough consideration was given to what Noel knew about the way Huck was thinking and it can be seen as a brilliant call.

MISTY4ME

Tikay10 said:

Here's a Twitter story about Noel by Jesse May.

https://twitter.com/ScurrilousMay/status/1410014308235370501

This photo looks a lot like our SPT friend EBBERS ...... @EBBERDON



RIP Noel

I'm sure I've seen his name in the Horse Racing World too @Tikay10

I'll watch the documentaries

Tikay10

@MISTY4ME


Yes, he was very much into horse racing, got his own stables I gather, though again, @NChanning will know better than I.

Pretty sure you'll enjoy this story of how Noel relieved the bookies of £1.5 milly at Cheltenham;

https://www.racingpost.com/news/the-day-owner-noel-furlong-won-a-pile-at-cheltenham-with-certainty-destriero/247872

TheEdge949

In this day of here today gone tomorrow online superstars its really saddening to see the original characters and faces slipping away.

RIP Noel

MISTY4ME

Tikay10 said:

@MISTY4ME


Yes, he was very much into horse racing, got his own stables I gather, though again, @NChanning will know better than I.

Pretty sure you'll enjoy this story of how Noel relieved the bookies of £1.5 milly at Cheltenham;

https://www.racingpost.com/news/the-day-owner-noel-furlong-won-a-pile-at-cheltenham-with-certainty-destriero/247872

Cheers @Tikay10 .......Great stories.

I knew I'd heard of him, I remember DESTRIERO well