Where Are They Now: Eric Crain

Chad Holloway PR & Media Manager

Feb 15, 2012 6 min read

If you��re a poker buff, you may recall episodes of the Trump Taj Mahal��s U.S. Poker Championship. If so, you no doubt remember the boisterous Eric Crain, who was one of the primary players featured on the program two years in a row.

In both years, Crain amassed a big stack early and entertained viewers by playing lots of hands and interacting with other players. Unfortunately for Crain, he didn��t cash in either event.

The USPC may have been Crain��s first exposure to mainstream poker, but he didn��t stop there. For the past seven years, Crain has been traveling the circuit and playing low to mid buy-in events with quite a bit of success.

In September 2006, he scored his first major win by topping a field of 834 in the $300 no-limit hold'em event at the World Series of Poker Circuit at the Grand Casino in Tunica, Mississippi, good for $63,105.

Other highlights of Crain��s career include a win in the $200 NLHE Six-Max event at the 2007 Scotty Nguyen Poker Challenge IV for $11,032; sixth in the 2009 WSOP $2,500 Mixed Event for $38,074; first in the $300 H.O.R.S.E. event at the 2010 WSOP Circuit Harrah��s St. Louis for $7,129; and fourth in the 2012 WSOP Circuit Hammond Main Event for $139,815.

In addition, Crain just notched his first cash outside of the United States by finishing 32nd in the 2012 Aussie Millions Poker Championship AUD$1,500 NLHE �� Bounty.

If you still need to jog your memory a bit, have a look at the following clip, which features Crain squaring off against Michael DeMichele at the 2006 USPC:

PokerNews caught up with Crain at the World Series of Poker Harrah's Tunica to find out what he's been up to since 2006 and about his missed opportunity to buy a piece of a friend in this year's PokerStars Caribbean Adventure.

How did you become involved in poker?

I was like most everybody else, and saw it on TV. I was a Moneymaker baby boomer. I started playing a home game with people I worked with �� some college friends �� and we ended up playing once a week, which turned into twice a week, which turned into like 15 times a week.

I played a lot online. The online ride was crazy, let��s just say I won and lost tons and tons of money. It��s weird though, since Black Friday I don��t miss it that much, I really don��t.

Do you have any money tied up on Full Tilt?

I was lucky. I got off Full Tilt in February. I was running bad on there and Tilt closed my account. I bought a little bit after that, but nothing substantial. I have two friends who both live in St. Louis and are low-stakes pros. One of them backed the other in the $600 multi-entry FTOPS, and they ended up chopping it three ways, so they got $250,000 between them. I think they only got $30,000 off, so they have over $200,000 sitting on there. What can you do?

Tell me about the U.S. Poker Championship back in 2006?

That was my first exposure, my first Main Event that I started off well and didn��t cash in, which I��m really getting good at. [Laughs] I kind of went up there on a whim. I went up there with a few buddies to the first one and I did well enough to get some TV time, but didn��t cash. So I decided to do the exact same thing next year, but I haven��t been back since they stopped filming the USPC because Atlantic City is so far out of the way for me, I live in the Midwest still.

What was it like to get TV exposure during the peak of the poker boom?

It��s neat. I remember one time I was at a bar in Carbondale, Illinois, where I live. I��m going to the bathroom and a guy looks over and says, ��Hey, you��re Eric Crain.�� It doesn��t happen a lot outside of the poker room, but it happens enough to the point where it��s still kind of weird. I��ll be in a tournament and I��ll hear, ��Oh, you��re that guy from a few years ago that played that one hand.�� I had a guy do that in a cash game a few days ago. I always joke now that I��m 27 and already on ESPN Classic. I��m old news now.

What have you been up to since the 2006 USPC?

I do some traveling. I tried school about four different times. I finished one semester, so the over hit on the number of semesters I would finish. So I did some school, I travel around the Midwest a lot. I live in Vegas every summer. Right now I��m living in Carbondale. I moved back home and got a place there. I see a lot of my old friends from high school, we go out quite a bit. When I��m not traveling on the road, my life is pretty normal.

Speaking of traveling, we recently saw you down at the Aussie Millions. What inspired you to take that trip?

I��ll tell you what inspired me. I wasn��t going to go, I was going to go to the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, but at the last second I decided I didn��t want to go. I actually turned down buying a piece of Faraz Jaka in the PCA Main, so I tilted when he took third, and I decided to go to Australia and get it back, which of course I didn��t. I ended up rooming with Faraz down there. I was also there with Tom Koral and Matt Woodward.

It was so much fun because I had never taken a trip outside North America, that was my first time. So getting to Australia and seeing the sights, meeting people, and really just doing cool things. It was a lot of fun.

Jaka, Koral, and yourself are all Illinois boys, correct?

Right. I had never met Faraz before then, but we had enough mutual friends where we talked on Facebook and ended up rooming together. Tom I��ve known for six years or so. He won the $10,000 8-Game event down there. They��re all from Chicago and I��m from Southern Illinois. I��m about six hours south of there, but we��ve met at various tournaments and have a lot of mutual friends. I really do have a great poker crew out there.

How much of Jaka��s action could you have bought in the PCA Main?

I could have bought about 15 percent. He posted a thing on Facebook about selling it, and I had 15 to 20% of him in the Epic Poker League �� the one where Joe Tehan played like a champ and jammed 2x4x like an all star. So I was still a little sour from the four-deuce episode, and decided to take that one off. Of course he binks three-quarters of a million. That was fun.

What��s in store for your poker schedule in the coming months?

I��m going to Hammond in a week for the Chicago Poker Classic because the value there is just sick. They��re giving away something like $550,000. It��s just insane. They��re giving away $50,000 to the overall points leader. If you��re a pro who likes value, I can��t find a better place to go.

After that I��ll probably play the [WSOP] Circuit Main Event in St. Louis. You know, Harrah��s in St. Louis was the first casino I ever went to, so that��s been my home base for years. Aside from that, I think I��m going to take a few months off and just hang out with my buddies before the World Series this summer.

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Chad Holloway PR & Media Manager

PR & Media Manager for PokerNews, Podcast host & 2013 WSOP Bracelet Winner.

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