Hoodie Allen In Da House - Busting 100 Poker Players!

What does an award-winning, chart-topping rapper and songwriter do when he needs to chill out from the rigours of recording a new album? Binks a nice little $10k Hustler poker tournament of course! – and that’s exactly what ‘Hoodie Allen’, aka Steven Adam Markowitz to his nearest and dearest, did this week.

Hoodie’s ‘mental health day off’ saw him pop into a $150 buy-in tournament at the Hustler Casino in Los Angeles, event number 10 in Liz Flynt’s (husband of the famous and infamous Larry Flynt) Spring Classic 2018.

Several hours later and ‘The Hype Life’ star was walking off with $2405 having seen off exactly 100 other players, and although not the biggest score he’s ever had on the felt – Hoodie started the year with an excellent 2nd spot in the CardPlayer Main Event in Baltimore and over $46k in his pocket -  it was certainly a pleasant way to recharge the batteries for Allen.

For those who haven’t followed his rise from Long Island-born Steven Adam Markowitz the Google AdWords associate, to ‘Hoodie Allen’ the chart-topping rapper, it’s an amazing tale – a gifted student and sprint football defensive back at University of Pennsylvania whose dream life really lay in music, and who grabbed the chance to indulge his passion as soon as it appeared…

Hoodie’s love for poker came about in a fairly standard way, the rapper telling me:

“My friends all played in high school. I honestly didn’t get interested until a few years ago when I played at a friend’s home game and got my butt kicked. After that it really got me interested in getting better!”

This led to “reading books, listening to podcasts, crush poker etc etc” and the man with seemingly boundless energy soon found he had a gift for the game, with “the tournament style most to my liking so I’ve stuck with that”, he explains.

Two summers ago he made his WSOP debut and “cashed like 30th in one of the $1500 buy-ins and free-rolled to the Main where I did not do well, haha”, his sense of humour a good thing to have in the twin tough worlds of music and poker.

In his musical existence, 8 years on from his decision to give up the day-job in search of his dream equates to an astonishing 18 singles, 3 EP’s and 3 full albums, Hoodie Allen’s pursuit of what some might call a perfect existence showing no signs of changing or slowing down, a debut Grammy Awards night out showing how well he ‘scrubs up’…

…and a wrap up of the European Tour he’d not long finished, featuring interaction with a few of his million+ fans and followers…

Poker, however, is one of the things which keeps the young man grounded, Hoodie explaining:

“I play on tour when I’m bored and still have some friends who will accompany me to play,” and he says, “I’ll probably be back at the Main Event this summer in Vegas”.

And who knows, if you don’t catch ‘Hoodie Allen’ in concert, maybe you’ll get a chance to see him playing poker on TV instead, Hoodie admitting:

“I’d definitely play Poker Night in America if invited.” 

Over to you PNiA, but make sure you get the inflatable dinghy ready for his entrance!