How Thor Hansen Became More Important Than Poker

Topics: Epic Poker League

According to the American Cancer Society’s Cancer Facts & Figures 2012, Thor Hansen’s discovery that he had cancer, for which he is recovering from the effects of surgery earlier this week, made him one of 1,638,910 people living in the United States diagnosed with the disease this year. That’s a terrifying large number of people, and the terror is multiplied when it becomes personal. Thor is one of our own, and poker, though a ruthless, Darwinian profession, cares about its own.

When I first heard that Hansen had been diagnosed with cancer – never mind even the word “terminal,” which is so hard to wrap our minds around that we want to skip over it, much as prior generations were frightened of uttering the word “cancer” itself – I hoped, like Doyle Brunson expressed immediately over Twitter, that it was a phony rumor, like “those RIP Doyle idiots.”

I didn’t know Thor particularly well. We had said hello a few times. We had drawn the same table at some World Series events. I knew his role as a pioneer of tournament poker. My friend Anthony Holden’s classic 1990 book Big Deal described his dual role precisely: “By taking the $158,000 first prize in the seven-card stud championship [in 1988], a Norwegian, Thor Hansen, had become the first non-American to win a World Series title. Maybe there was hope for me, after all.”

A. “The first non-American to win a World Series title.” Wow. The WSOP started in 1970 and it wasn’t until 1988 that a non-American won a bracelet.

B. “Maybe there was hope for me, after all.” That sentiment started a wave of non-U.S. players on the tournament circuit, leading to the expansion of that circuit to the point where European poker may arguably (after the World Series, of course) be the hub of professional tournament poker.

It increasingly became clear that the stories about Hansen’s condition weren’t a sick joke. They were a sick reality. I finally received confirmation from our mutual good friend, Eric Drache. Eric, who was responsible for Hansen coming to the U.S. back in 1986 and served as best man at Thor’s 1999 wedding to Marcella, left me a message that he had just spoken with Thor. “He went to the hospital emergency room 4-5 days ago … He went there with what he thought were kidney pains. He had major surgery yesterday, for a tumor in his colon. They told him it spread to his lungs, lymph nodes, and liver. Even with chemotherapy, they’ve given him two years to live.”

It sounded so stark, so hopeless. Drache also told me that Thor didn’t have insurance and was considering traveling to Norway. As a citizen of Norway he might be eligible for health coverage and treatment he couldn’t get in the United States.

I wanted to hear something hopeful. Is it me or is it common to the human condition that we seek out some way to leaven even the worst news with a ray of hope – a long shot, a silver lining – or at least some meaning in an irredeemable situation?

Thanks to Eric Drache, I spoke to Thor Hansen last night, and he was kind enough to give me both.

First, Thor handled the dim prognosis with the dignity and gravity we would idealize in a poker player in this situation. “It is what it is,” he told me. “I’ll fight it.” He didn’t doubt the accuracy of the diagnosis, but described what a negative place a hospital can be. Out of the hospital, he had just completed a meeting with another doctor. “She’s a good doctor. She plays poker, her husband plays poker. She had a good tone.”

I asked if, after recovering from the surgery, he might get back to tournament poker. (I probably sounded like I was begging for good news.) “I would love to but I can’t answer right now. I have to see how things go.”

Second, there is some meaning to be derived from Thor Hansen’s fight with cancer, however it turns out. He confirmed that he didn’t have health insurance. “I’m a poker player, and poker players are always thinking of other things. I’ve always been healthy. I never thought I’d get sick.” That didn’t help his already dire situation. “If you don’t have insurance or a few million dollars, it takes a long time to get help for something like this.”

I don’t want to use this as an introduction to a political argument about health care. Rather than argue about something divisive, let us as poker players take from this something we can agree on: (a) poker players, as independent operators, may not tend to think of health insurance when they’re healthy; (b) society at large may be the same way, except when you grow up in a family that has health insurance or you work in a job that provides it; (c) if the hundreds or thousands of professional poker players were all workers in the same office, an element of their pay would likely be health insurance, at a better rate than they could get it individually (if they even thought of it at all); and (d) if it was as easy as the Bellagio or the Commerce raking another buck out of every pot, all poker players would probably have insurance.

My conclusion from this is that players should recognize the need for health insurance. And someone honest, with a profit motive, connected with poker, should initiate a discussion about how a large number of professional players contributing individually might get group coverage on a better basis than they could get on their own.

I mentioned all this to Thor, who agreed such a discussion “would be a good thing to come from this.”

Finally, I read Thor (who is not on Twitter and doesn’t check his email often) just a few of the multitude of good wishes coming his way from poker players around the world. He admitted that, having just gotten out of the hospital, “I haven’t read much but that’s nice. It really lifts my spirits.”

I didn’t ask him about sharing his email address so players could contact him personally, but I want him to get the message that he is beloved in poker. If you could take the trouble to comment to this article below, or tweet about Thor Hansen @EpicPoker, I’ll make sure he gets the messages.

We’re not ready to say good-bye, and I can tell Thor isn’t either, but we should definitely let him know we’re saying hello.