Mike McDermott [speaking for Johnny Chan]
Did you have it?
Played by Matt Damon 
Rounders (1998) · 41 quotes
Rounders (1998) · 41 quotes
Most-quoted character in Rounders (1998): in 26 of its 41 quotes
Most scenes with: Lester "Worm" Murphy (11), Teddy KGB (3)
Listen, here's the thing. If you can't spot the sucker in your first half-hour at the table, then YOU are the sucker.
More lines from Mike McDermott
7 quotes Mike McDermott Mike McDermott I'm sorry, John. I don't remember.
Mike McDermott Johnny ****in' Chan.
Mike McDermott You were lookin' for that third three, but you forgot that Professor Green folded it on Fourth Street and now you're representing that you have it. The DA made his two pair, but he knows they're no good. Judge Kaplan was trying to squeeze out a diamond flush but he came up short, and Mr. Eisen is futilely hoping that his queens are going to stand up. So like I said, the Dean's bet is $20.
Mike McDermott We're not playing together. But then again, we're not playing against each other either. It's like the Nature Channel. You don't see piranhas eating each other, do you?
Mike McDermott I've often seen these people, these squares at the table, short stack and long odds against them. All their outs gone. One last card in the deck that can help them. I used to wonder how they could let themselves get into such bad shape, and how the hell they thought they could turn it around.
Mike McDermott It's immoral to let a sucker keep his money.
Scenes with Mike McDermott
18 scenes Mike It was a real blood game over at KGB's place.
You sat down with the mad Russian and he emptied your pockets??
Just like the saying says, you know? In the poker game of life, women are the rake. They are the **** rake.
Mike What the **** are you talking about? What saying?
I don't know. There oughta be one.
Joey What do you need? 500? 1000?
Mike I need 15,000.
Joey 15?
Mike Yeah.
Joey I need a blow job from Christy Turlington..get the **** outta here! Fifteen thousand dollars?!
Mike [before inviting Worm up to his place]
All right, listen. Things haven't been so smooth on the homefront, so tone it down a litte, alright?
Tone down what, mother****er?
Mike Great, nevermind..
Mike Alright, I'll call the two grand. I'll gamble. Don't splash the pot.
You're on a draw, Mike? Go away, this one not good for you. And in my club, I will splash the pot WHENEVER THE **** I PLEASE.
Mike So, uh, Nick the Greek, what's with kiting my checks?
I'm on empty.
Mike How much was the hooker?
Mike, please! "Relaxation therapist!"
Hey, you know what cheers me up when I'm feeling shitty?
Mike What?
Rolled-up aces over kings.
Mike Is that right?
Check-raising stupid tourists and taking huge pots off of them.
Mike Yeah?
Stacks and towers of checks I can't even see over. Playing all-night, high-limit Hold'em at the Taj, "where the sand turns to gold."
Mike **** it, let's go.
Don't tease me.
Mike Let's play some **** cards!
C'mon. I'll play you "Horse". Fifty bucks a letter.
Mike [tosses basketball to Mike]
Yeah? When I win are you going to pay me back with my own **** money?
[throws basketball back to Worm quite hard]
Woah, woah. Easy. Relax. Don't wing it, you know? Just step and throw.
[tosses ball back to Mike, Mike purposefuly tosses it away from Worm]
You need to work on your accuracy, you know that?
Remember when we found this place, man?
Mike Yeah, I remeber when we found this place. When you were hiding out from Tommy Manzy 'cuz you were afraid he was going to pound you into oblivion.
Yeah. Now see, what did I ever do to that guy?
Mike You **** his mother..
Heh..huh huh huh..yeah but she was a good lookin' older woman. You gotta give me that.
Mike Fifteen grand in five days, I can do that. I've gone on rushes like that before.
Ah, under optimum conditions with a bank roll. Maybe, maybe. But..what do you got on you?
Mike I got like 350.
Nah, that's only 1200 between us. We mind as well play the **** lotto.
Busboy
Call.
Mike [turns hand over]
Triple aces.
Busboy
I..I only got a pair. Jacks?
Manager/Tacky
What did you think he had? Does he look like a man beaten by jacks?
Customer
Jacks are a monster compared to the crap you play, Tacky.
Manager/Tacky
Eh, **** you. **** you!
Customer
**** me? **** you!
Taxi Driver
[last lines of the movie]
Vegas, huh?
Mike Yep.
Taxi Driver
Good luck, man.
Mike [narrating]
People insist on calling it luck. [to taxi driver] Thanks. [narrating] First prize at the World Series of Poker is a million dollars. Does it have my name on it? I don't know. But I'm going to find out.
O yea one more thing, I got a feelin'....
Mike yea, what feeling is that?
i know you know this feeling..you know this feeling very well..i mean you got you table all set up, your fork, your knife, your A1 sauce..
[together]
all you need is the steak.
[mike reaches for money]
Mike You comin' up?
No, I've been standin' out here all this time just to say hi.
Mike All right, listen. Things haven't been so smooth on the home front, so tone it down a little, all right?
Tone down what, mother****er?
Mike Great. Never mind.
Mike [after getting thrown out of a game for cheating]
What the **** were you thinking?
I was trying to give us an edge.
Mike I had them.
Look, I'm sorry we got banged up, I took a shot and missed. It happens.
Mike Happens all the time around you.
And it doesn't happen to you? You're the one that flushed his whole bank roll on one hand.
Mike Oh, **** you, man, that was different.
How is that different? What makes you so **** special? Why are all your moves so smart and noble and I'm always the idiot piece of shit? You act like you're only one with any ambition.
Mike Then what's your ambition? I don't know, you tell me.
I don't know, I don't think like that.
Mike No, you don't think.
No, I don't think like you, you always think you can beat the game straight up. That's not me, and I'm always going to look for that edge, always.
Mike Alright, what's the edge now? We owe fifteen grand in a day and we're broke, what the **** do we do?
That's easy, we get the **** outta Dodge. We go on the road, we stay out of the city for a bit, this will all blow over.
Mike Not a chance am I gonna live that way. You call Grama, you get him to stake me.
...we're not just dealing with Grama.
Mike You said Grama was on his own. You said Grama was on his own!
KGB bankrolled him.
Mike [scoffs]
So you just **** us right in the ass.
Yeah. So no fooling around, it's highway time.
Petrovsky For generations, men of my family have been rabbis. In Israel; before that, in Europe. It was to be my calling. I was quite a prodigy, the pride of my yeshiva. The elders said I had a forty-year-old's understanding of the Midrash by the time I was twelve. But by the time I was thirteen, I knew I could never be a rabbi.
Mike Why not?
Petrovsky Because for all I understood of the Talmud, I never saw God there.
Mike You couldn't lie to yourself.
Petrovsky I tried. I tried like crazy. I mean, people were counting on me.
Mike But yours is a respectable profession.
Petrovsky Not to my family. My parents were destroyed, devastated by my decision. My father sent me away to New York, to live with distant cousins. Eventually, I found my place, my life's work.
Mike What then?
Petrovsky Well, I immersed myself fully. I studied the minutiae. I learned everything I could about the law. I mean, I felt deeply inside that it was what I was born to do.
Mike And did your parents get over it?
Petrovsky No. I always hoped that I would find some way to change their minds, but they were inconsolable. My father never spoke to me again.
Mike If you had to do it all over again, would you make the same choices?
Petrovsky What choice? The last thing I took away from the yeshiva is this: We can't run from who we are. Our destiny chooses us.
Mike Uh, you know what? I got my five grand here. That's just fine by me. I'm going home.
Fine. It's a **** joke anyway. After all, I am paying you with your money.
Mike What did you say?
Your money... I am still up twenty grand... from this last time I stick it in you.
Mike [Narrating]
They're trying to goad me, trying to own me. But this isn't a gunfight. It's not about pride or ego. It's only about money. I can leave now, even with Grama and KGB... and halfway to paying Petrovsky back. That's the safe play. I told Worm you can't lose what you don't put in the middle. But you can't win much either.
[Teddy KGB reveals the river card: an ace.]
It hurts, doesn't it? You can't believe what fell. All your dreams... dashed. Hopes down the **** drain. [motioning to Grama] Your fate is sitting right beside you. That ace could not have helped you. [splashing the pot repeatedly, with a flourish] I bet it all.
Mike You're right that the ace didn't help me. [revealing his hand] I flopped the nut straight.
Grama That's it? What the **** you talkin' about, "that's it"? Take him out, Teddy!
Nyet! Nyet! No more! No, not tonight! This son of bitch, all night he check, check, check! He trapped me!
Mike Well, you feelin' satisfied now, Teddy? 'Cause I can go on bustin' you up all night.
[Teddy's henchmen begin to move in on Mike.]
Nyet, nyet. He beat me. Straight up. Pay him. Pay that man his money.
