CONVersation: Team PokerStars Pro George Danzer is Poker's Newest Ambassador
The GPI European Poker Awards were a roaring success last night, and one of the standout winners was Team PokerStars Pro Gorge Danzer.
The very popular German has been a positive force on the European Poker Tour for a number of years now, and despite being nominated for Breakout Player of the Year, it was actually the Best Poker Ambassador award that he walked away with – an award without any nominees- decided wholly by fan votes.
Danzer is currently playing in theEPT Malta High Roller event (down to 35K from a 50K starting stack) and was kind enough to spare PokerNews some time for a chat during a break.
PokerNews: You were nominated for the Breakout Player of the Year Award but have been around a long time. Did you find that strange, or do you feel 2014 was your breakout year, especially in tournaments?
Danzer: For me it really felt like a breakout year. I don’t know exactly how they come up with the nominees – what the rules were; if you weren’t allowed to be nominated if you’ve won a tournament before; if you’ve been around for a couple of years you couldn’t be included, but after they nominated me, I thought, yeah, maybe they just take it as it is. I was doing okay and then had an exceptional, breakout, year. After I was nominated I thought I had a good chance of winning it.
Amazingly you won the Best Poker Ambassador award. Were you shocked?
I didn’t expect that at all because there are a lot of poker players who have a huge following on Twitter, Facebook and are big stars around the scene. I was sure they were going to get a lot of votes because of the fans that they have. I have a smaller fan base in Germany but then I was really surprised when that was enough to win that category. It was great!
As an ambassador, how do you feel you’ve helped progress the game in Germany?
I think we, Jan Heitmann and myself, since 2005 were the first ones to bring it to the mainstream. We started a poker blog called “Poker Amigos” where we talked about what we were doing around the world; playing tournaments and making a lot of appearances on German TV shows.
Since 2007 I’ve been part of Team Pro, or Shooting Stars as it was back then. I’ve also been around the media for a long time and I think that it’s not just the way I explain the game to other people, it’s how I play the game – to always be at the table in a way I wish everyone would be at the table. It’s really hard as we get a lot of bad beats in poker but it’s just the way I approach it, and I wish most people would do it like that.
The German Team Pro Team has been massively shrunk in the past few years. How do you keep earning your contract?
Now a lot has shifted to social media, which I’m not an expert in, so I’m just trying to do what I can there. There are new channels now, for example, Twitch that I have created a channel on where I stream a couple of times a week. I explain some strategy and how I play the game, all for free. Giving out content too and not just keeping all the secrets for you and trying to beat players but trying to give something back to the community. I like talking to people and most of them know I’m going to answer them.
During the WSOP last summer, were you keeping in touch with your fans?
Yes, I was mostly doing German video blogs. They are on the PokerStars Blog and the usual outlets. I also did a Google Hangout and the Remko Report which we’re going to do again this year from Las Vegas. We’re going to make a live chat and stuff like that.
Take us back to when you first played poker, fell in love with game and realized you were good at it?
I first discovered poker at chess tournaments. We used to play other cards games like Magic and a German game called Schafkopf and Skat, when one day some guy said we should try this Texas hold'em they play in the US. We played no-limit Texas hold'em in the evening and I lost a little but I bought a couple of books, like The Theory of Poker by David Sklansky, and I tried to get better so the next time I beat them.
Then one day I started playing a little bit online and I liked it. It grew very slowly and then just when the poker boom came it was exactly at the point that I had learned a little strategy. Then I thought, let's try some live tournaments so came on to the live circuit and since then, I’m here!
You’ve achieved so much in the past year to 18 months. How so you keep yourself motivated and what goals, if any, do you have for the next year or so?
I’ve always wanted to win a SCOOP or WCOOP leaderboard and I was so close but didn’t win it. Each year I play a complete SCOOP and a complete WCOOP in an attempt to win the leaderboard. Now that I’m the WSOP Player of the Year of course I’m going to try and defend it as no one has ever done that before. I’ve always wanted to win an EPT too, so there’s enough stuff left after winning the bracelets to keep me motivated for the next couple of years, at least.