Michael Phelps has spent the better part of his retirement swinging golf clubs and deflecting rumors of a return to the pool, but on Wednesday the swimming legend tried his hand at cards, entering the $5000 no-limit hold ‘em event at the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas.
Phelps, who entered the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure last year and has been known to play in high stakes cash games, said pros Jeff Gross and Antonio Esfandiari convinced him to enter the famous poker tournament on a whim Wednesday.
“It’s kind of weird,” Phelps told NESN Wednesday. “I wasn’t even going to play today. I just wanted to come over and see everything, and somehow these guys talked me into playing.”
Phelps added that plans to play a few more of the WSOP events this summer, though no telling how many, and hopes to add some more hardware to his already impressive Olympic haul of 18 golds.
“I’ve never been out here, and all these guys always seem like they’re having so much fun when they play,” Phelps added. “If I ever win a bracelet before [they] do, they’re going to be really pissed. So we’ll see what happens.”
