Paul Wasicka

Part II

By Justin West

Justin: Did the insane amount of media attention affect your play at the WSOP?

Paul: No. I had a little experience with that at the WPT. I didn't have the hole card cams, but I had all the cameras around and stuff so I was a little more used to all that stuff going on, and it was a little less of a distraction. As far as the whole card cams go, the WSOP was the first time using those. I was actually really excited. I thought: "These people get to watch what I do. This is kind of cool! I get to show them some moves."

Justin: Since it was your first time playing with the hole card cameras, did you do anything different than you normally would have given that the audience would see your play?

Wasicka: No. I just set out to do what I normally do, so I don't think I was trying to pull any crazy stuff to just show off. But there were points in the tournament that I was playing really fast, other points where I was really tightening it up and playing just one hand an hour. So, it just all depended on the dynamic of the table at the time - didn't have to do with if my cards were shown on TV or not.

Justin: Were you surprised at being approached for endorsements following the events last year?

Paul: Well, it's unfortunate because I was in negotiations with a couple of the sites right as the first bill was passed, so that just cut off all communication with everybody. They didn't know what was going to happen. A lot of people thought they were going to lose their jobs. That just kind of ruined any endorsement opportunities that I had at the time.

Then when things kind of settled down and a lot of the private companies said they would remain in the US, things started grilling a little bit and I took on Poker Royalty with Chris Porter. Then this whole Neteller thing happened, which obviously doesn't help whatsoever. Especially when a lot of the stuff I was supposed to be in was postponed. For example, Poker After Dark was postponed. The PPT was postponed, and I was really looking forward to some of these free rolls. There are rumors of the Tournament of Champions being postponed. It just really sucks - the timing of this.

Justin: Tell me about your involvement with High Stakes Poker.

Paul: Well, the producers invited me to play. I got to play the 3rd season, the 3rd session. You know, I'd been wanting to play on that show for such a long time, so it was a real honor to be invited there and play with those phenomenal players.

I brought 200k there and was just going to treat it like an online cash game - play some deep stack poker, try not to get involved in too many pots, try to play a little bit tighter than I do online. I knew I was going to be pulling a squeeze play or two, and I was pretty confident going in there because I'd watched it before - and a lot of these tournament guys they're making some mistakes in my opinion in the cash games. So I was really looking forward to it. I ended up walking out with about with 80k.

Justin: Jamie Gold appeared on the show, as well. And from what I've heard, the two of you have become good friends. At the same time, people have been saying some pretty negative things about Jamie's character, lately...

Paul: People are quick to judge, even when they don't know someone. I mean, who really knows him, that's saying that? Just a bunch of online forum people that see him play on TV and make these comments. I've hung out with him on many occasions. In fact, he's the one that invited me to Sundance, which I just got back from.

He's one of the nicest people you'll ever meet. He's a very generous person, just always very friendly, will always be signing autographs, or taking photographs. He's very accommodating to people. He's a really, really nice guy.

He got a pretty bad image from ESPN. I watched the whole WSOP, and I do understand why people don't like him. Every person that I talk to says, "Man, he just looks like a complete asshole!" Yeah, well, ESPN made him out to be the villain. That was a little bit of his persona at the table, but off the table he's a completely different person - just the nicest guy

Justin: What did you do at Sundance?

Paul: ESPN had a booth there, and they had me and Jamie stop by there and teach a bunch of the VIPs how to play. People wanted to take pictures and get stuff signed, and there was a charity event that we went to. We were there for about four days... yeah, we had a great time.

Justin: Finally, Paul - You're living the dream. A lot of people want to make the leap to becoming a pro. How did you happen into it, and what advice can you offer?

Paul: I actually turned pro before any of my tournament success. I was having a lot of cash game success and I turned pro about a year ago. The success from my cash game play allowed me to buy into some of the tournaments.

Like I said, I don't like to satellite into a lot of the tournaments. My first major tournament was back in late march of last year - that was the Reno Hilton WPT event. And I bought into that with winnings from cash games, satellited into the WPT in which I was fortunate enough to get 15th in which really helped the bankroll.

I do get a lot of emails asking: "How do you do it?" I tried to turn pro about two and a half years ago. That didn't go so well, so then I took a 6 month hiatus from poker without pulling a single hand, and then I got back into it once I felt I was in the right frame of mind.

The one thing I would advise people is that they have an extremely solid foundation in poker before turning pro. They need a pretty solid roll that can allow for some pretty big variance. Once you start running into a few losing sessions you start getting nervous if you don't have that roll.

I typically advise 20-25 buy-ins at whatever stakes you're playing before you turn pro. Until then you should be paying your expenses through your job - if you're turning pro before then you're going to give yourself a lot of stress.

For all things Wasicka, visit his website at http://www.kwickfish.com

Part I | Part II

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Justin West played poker since the age of 17, he spent more than a year earning a living on the green felt; a modest living, to be sure, but a living nonetheless. His aim was at one point to win the WSOP main event, thus causing Hell to freeze over. However, given his penchant for sin and his extreme dislike of cold weather, Justin has put that dream to rest.

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