Eric Froehlich having major heart surgery

[Dan Druff]

Eric Froehlich set a record (which has since been broken), when he won a WSOP bracelet in 2005 at the age of 21 and a few months. The event was $1500 Limit Holdem, and the third place finisher was a somewhat older guy who was also playing his first WSOP event -- a gentleman named Todd Witteles. He was the youngest bracelet winner ever at the time, but that record was broken in a subsequent year, I think by Jeff Madsen, and then others.




Froelich was one of the Magic the Gathering players who converted to poker. The Magic community produced a number of successful poker pros, including David Williams, Justin Bonomo, Brock Parker, Ben Yu, Gabriel Nassif, Ali Eslami, and a number of others. He is still involved in Magic and is considered one of the legends of that game.

He generally has a good reputation, and has never been involved in any poker scandals.

Obese his entire life, he got over 400 pounds at one point, but has also dieted down to the upper 200s. Now married and 39, he got himself again down to the upper 200s, only to find himself with a heart condition (unrelated to the dieting), and needs to have major surgery.

Here is his statement:

I think anyone who knows me, has seen me, or has heard of me in any capacity probably is well aware that I’ve never exactly been the pinnacle of health. I’ve been overweight literally my entire life, starting as a toddler, if not before. I haven’t spent a single day of my life being a “normal” weight, or really close to it. I don’t know that I’ve ever believed it was possible.

This isn’t to say I’ve never tried. I’ve spent a large amount of time trying more diets than anyone can count. I’ve had personal trainers and gone to the gym consistently for large stretches of time throughout my life. I’ve counted calories, cut carbs, and most everything imaginable. It was successful in getting me from where I was for a portion of my life at over 400 pounds to below 300, but it’s been a total plateau for a decade or so since.

I wanted that to change this year.

I came into the year right around 300 lbs. I had been working hard to get a lot of my health numbers into a good space, even if my weight didn’t cooperate, and had done a pretty good job of that. My stress levels were lower, I was eating less and healthier, I was moving more, and I was actually seeing results. My general health numbers continued to improve to a good spot. My weight was going down. I decided to be proactive and make sure the other big piece of the puzzle was also looking good and scheduled to have just about every heart exam you could have done.

I went into my last exam at just under 270 pounds. To put things into perspective, I couldn’t remember ever seeing a number that low in my entire life. I think the last time that was even possible would have been before high school and the lowest I ever saw in my plateau was right around 280. It finally felt like this was possible and I was on the right path to health.

Unfortunately, the heart exam results weren’t what I hoped for. While initial reports all seemed to be pretty good, my cardiologist said he shared them with an expert colleague who saw something that looked concerning. A couple tests later and it was deemed that I was going to need to have surgery on my heart.

My surgery is scheduled for next week. It’s a very major surgery that involves stopping my heart. They tell me the odds of survival are 99%, but as a professional gambler for decades, every 1% bad beat of course has been running through my head these past several weeks.

That being said, I think I’m pretty optimistic. Assuming everything goes well, I’ll spend about a week in the hospital and about 2 months of recovery. I’m definitely sad and nervous, but my odds of living much longer vs having not found this early are exponentially higher. I also don’t know what it’s like to have a fully functioning heart and I’ve never known that. My quality of everyday life and just performing various exercises, which I always assumed were hard because I was out of shape my entire life, might be much improved.

I’ve been super excited and planning out my 2 month long Vegas WSOP trip since last July. I skipped the Main Event last year, despite feeling good, after recovering from COVID because I was still testing positive and didn’t want to put anyone at risk. It was hard, but I always knew there would be next year. I’ve canceled my trip, and it feels bad. There’s always a chance, if everything goes really well and I’m feeling great, that I make it out for the Main Event this year, but I'm going to have to just wait and see at this point.

So that’s what’s going on with my life and my health. I’ll be offline for a period of time while getting everything done, but hopefully I’ll be back soon and better than ever. I’m very grateful to have hopefully gotten in front of this and for the amazing family and best partner anyone could hope for to help get through this. I also truly appreciate having so many of you “in my life”, in some capacity or another, and wishing everyone the best. Please take care of yourselves. Much love.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...K27-gUMsE/edit


GL to him. I would also be very worried about a surgery with a 1% death rate at the age of 39.

[ReformDorm]

Yeah definitely wishing him good luck with the surgery. Obviously him being severely overweight for most of his life contributed to his heart condition.

[Dan Druff]

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[ftpjesus]

my guess is valve replacement. Its been seen in some Covid patients that they have suffered either aortic valve damage coming from the left ventricle or the bi cuspid between the atria and ventricle also left side ends up with leaks or worse what is referred to as vegatative growth which is as bad as it sounds essentially microscopic cellular matter grows and eventually causes the valve ot start leaking causing minor backflow. Cant imagine its much more if they are telling him its 99% non issue.. If it was a bypass type situation the odds wouldnt be essentially needing runner runner for a str/royal flush to not make it.

[tgull]

Yeah definitely wishing him good luck with the surgery. Obviously him being severely overweight for most of his life contributed to his heart condition.

Overweight and lifestyle contributes but a lot of it is unavoidable and hereditary. I stumbled into an ER last year ago having a hard time catching my breath, I was at a salad bar of all places 10 minutes earlier. I was literally in the best shape of my adult life after giving up carbs. 98% blockage and had an emergency stent put in. The cardiologist said there was no time to wait when he saw the image. I was so close to death they kept me for 3 days even though most people get out the next day with a stent. You never know. Not that anyone cares but my EKG in March was fine and Doc says I am in good shape. Still, it is always on your mind when your heart skips the occasional beat.