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Sandstrom explains the origins of Tuff_Fish’s infamous videos: “I was a member of CardRunners and they had a feature where users can make their own videos and submit them. So I made quite a number of them, but they were never intended for widespread circulation. I didn’t think too much of it and sometimes would get really exasperated, if you will. I did this a number of times and I had reason to get upset. Somebody leaked these things and finally someone gave me a heads up that they were all over the place. It wasn’t my idea for them to become widespread.” Tuff_Fish was an appropriate name for Sandstrom, the stubborn player who continuously and relentlessly returned to the online poker tables no matter what bad beat took place: “The name Tuff_Fish was made up when I started playing online poker. I was thinking to myself fitting names and I said I’m going to be one tough fish. That’s where the name came from.”

The videos, which leaked all over the internet and also appeared on various online poker forums such as PocketFives.com, quickly became Tuff_Fish’s staple. He claims to have made 50-60 videos in total. Sandstrom comments, “Obviously the videos showed me at my very worst game. I was cold-decked for a while, which makes you play badly. Then I tilted and played even worse. The games everyone is familiar with are some of my worst. When I’m not recording, I tend to play a much better game. When I’m recording, it’s a distraction.”

PocketFives.com Podcast Co-Host Adam Small comments on Sandstrom’s legacy in the online poker world: “Tuff_fish got the online community talking when he released some of the most entertaining poker videos any of us have seen. After talking to him, it's become clear to me that it'd be hard to reenact the spontaneity that made those videos so special. We were all just lucky that it was recorded the first time around.” The spontaneity of the original videos has been difficult to recreate for Sandstrom, who has since not only played under other names than Tuff_Fish, but also attracted a wide variety of mimickers who have recreated their own Tuff_Fish magic with limited success. Sandstrom notes, “I’ve never seen any of the mimickers, so I don’t know how they’re doing. My opinion is that if you’re trying to be like I was, you’re not going to be very successful. All that stuff, especially the famous rants and raves, were totally spontaneous and it’s very difficult to come up with that when you’re trying to be that way. I found that myself. Is it flattery? I don’t know.”

Besides online poker, which he plays every so often, Sandstrom is passionate about politics: “I follow politics a lot and rant and rave while reading the editorial pages and tell my wife how much of a better job I could do in office.” He works for a company that handles satellites and rocket motors and, instead of playing recently, has taken his concerns about the future of the industry straight to the online poker community: “Lately, I haven’t been able to spend a whole lot of time playing poker. I’ve spent a lot of time messing around on the forums arguing with people about the state of online poker. My contention is that online poker is in a lot of trouble right now and a lot of people don’t want to believe that.”

In the meantime, the memories of Tuff_Fish are preserved on sites like YouTube. If you want to pick up your own piece of Tuff_Fish history, check out his website at www.fstln.com.

A special thanks goes out to CardRunners.com for making the interview with Tony “Tuff_Fish” Sandstrom possible. Check out the PocketFives.com Podcast featuring Tuff_Fish on Thursday the 15th by clicking here!