It's All About the Players

Poker Stars Share Secrets Of Winning With Dan Rather

(CBS)  "If you are in a big game, and you're trying to decide whether to call or fold, do you ever find a little lump in your throat and say, 'I can't swallow, 'cause he might -- might tip him off to what I'm thinking,'" asks Rather.

"When I'm bluffing, I'll be thinking about who won the baseball game last night. I'll be thinking about what I'm gonna watch on TV tomorrow. I'm gonna think about the laundry I have to do," says Harman.

"I'm not gonna be thinking about the hand at all. So I don't really want to give off anything. So, yeah, sometimes, you feel like you have a lump in your throat. Sometimes you feel like your heart's in your stomach."

"When you look at Jennifer [Harman], and if you didn’t know her, you would see this petite, little blonde - like with this cutesy, little smile, and you wouldn’t think she’s even capable of understanding sophisticated bluffing strategies," says Negreanu. "She innately has an image that sort of precedes the idea that she even knows what she is doing. 'Oh who, little oh me. I won another one?' You know?"

"So this is the poker table version of the face of a choir girl, but the heart of an assassin," says Rather.

"There you go," says Negreanu, laughing. "Exactly."

And when the cards are dealt, all three keep their eyes not only on their opponents but also on themselves.

"I see some of the things I do, so I'm constantly changing up what I'm doing," says Negreanu. "So somebody might watch TV and see me do something, and they'll go, 'Oh, that must mean he's bluffing when he does it.' But I see it, too. I've got the tapes just like everybody else."

Negreanu says he studies the tapes "like an NFL coach would study the NFL."

"It's about exploiting weaknesses," says Negreanu. "If I find a guy at the table who's really weak, I'm going to do everything I can to exploit those weaknesses. It's just war. That's all it is."

At this war, Negreanu was again the victor, and won the spoils – all neatly stacked and delivered. This time, he won nearly $1.8 million.

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Those are the pros. But now hear the true story of how an amateur used some of the same tricks to win the biggest prize of them all -- the World Series of Poker. His name is Chris Moneymaker, and he was a 27-year-old accountant from Tennessee who earned $40,000 a year. He learned the game on the Internet, and he had never played in a live tournament before entering the World Series in 2003.

"When I first got out to Vegas, it was my first live tournament with the World Series," recalls Moneymaker. "And I went out there and I was completely nervous. So I wore shades and a hat to cover everything up."

But he had an uncanny ability to read his opponents -- so good that he made it all the way the finals. There, Moneymaker found himself playing head-to-head against veteran Sam Farha, and picked up a subtle signal.

"Whenever he riffled his chips or played with his chips with his right hand, he was gonna bet at you or he was gonna call your bet," says Moneymaker. "Whenever he started using his left hand, that was sort of his weaker hand. And he was gonna be folding or, you know, he was gonna probably fold the hand."

Moneymaker held his insight close to his vest while waiting to spring it at a crucial moment.

Finally, this was the moment. Moneymaker had a losing hand and he knew the only way to win was by bluffing, forcing Farha to fold. While Moneymaker revealed nothing, Farha was sending out mixed messages.

"You will actually see him go through the morphosis of playing strictly with his right hand and then moving over to his left hand," says Moneymaker, looking back at the game. "Now he's, I guess, starting to question what he's gonna do. This actually went on for about five minutes."

Moneymaker, however, says he would not have made it this far if it had not been for the kindness of a stranger: "A person told me the third day of the World Series that whenever I was bluffing, I would flair my nostrils," says Moneymaker. "I didn’t know I was doing it. I was doing that every time I was bluffing."

"So if I'd been playing you during that period and picked up on that, I might have been able to take you?" asks Rather.

"Yeah," says Moneymaker. "I would have probably been out of the tournament."

"This was a very long process where I really thought he was gonna call me for a while, because he kept using that right hand. That was my big thing," says Moneymaker, looking back at the tournament. "He calls, he wins."

This later became known as “the bluff of the century.” And on the very next hand, Moneymaker won it all -- $2.5 million.

Moneymaker's triumph helped popularize poker, making it seem like anyone could win.

Well, maybe not anyone. Galloway gave Rather what she called the poker player's essential kit.

"I felt a need for you to have these things if you're sitting down at the poker table," she says. "One, your baseball cap. You'll have to wear that. … It gives you a level of intimidation. If you're wearing your suit, looking all nice like you do, then no one's gonna feel threatened by you."

The second item? Cheap sunglasses. Rather tried them on.

"See, now you look like a poker player," says Galloway, laughing.