Online Pro Wins 1K Event
Giving up a job he 'hated,' as a computer consultant in New Hampshire, Jim Buckley moved west, began playing full time online, studied hard and tonight won his first major land tournament, $1,000 limit hold'em.
It took about two hours to lose the last two players before the final table started at 3 a.m. With limits of $1,000-$2,000, 260,570 chips in play, hour rounds, and the smallest stack being $16,000, it looked like a long day ahead. At least we had David Levi to entertain us with his singing and dialect wisecracks.
It then took only eight deals to lose our first player, poker player Ali Eslami, who was lowest chipped. He was all in with A-8, in bad shape against Tom Kang's A-9, and in much worse shape when an ace and 9 flopped.
Blinds went to $1,000-$1,500 with $1,500-$3,000 limits. The two biggest gainers in the round had been Robert 'Chip Burner' Turner, firing away, picking up pots, and doubling his starting chips to about $40,000, and Levi, who had moved up sharply, from $27,500 to roughly $50,000.
On hand 19, Jason Steinhorn, an engineering manager with a second in a limit hold'em event at the World Series this year, started with 9c-2h in the big blind and flopped a nine. When four hearts came, he had a baby flush and bet his last chips. Antoine Hasrouni, who had called all the way with 5h-5s, had a bigger flush and two were gone. Meanwhile, Levi had kept moving up, and by the time he won a pot with a flopped set of 10s was close to $70,000.
On hand 68, at 4:30 a.m., X.B. Reed III, a CEO, raised with As-4s. Turner re-raised and Reed three-bet and went all in. Turner's jacks held up, and we were down to seven.
Limits became $3,000-$6,000. Nick Henna went all in and survived for the fourth time when he paired an ace to outrun Hasrouni's pocket 10s, and eventually moved into the lead with about $50,000…then $65,000. 'Free-fall then parachute,' observed Kang, making an up-and-down motion with his hand. As play continued, Buckley took a big pot from Kang and began to move into contention.
Turner went all in from the small blind on hand 76 with Ah-6h. Edward Yoo had A-K in the big blind and it was over when a king flopped as Turner finished seventh. Yoo, a financial analyst, had started as second chip-leader, but had been hanging on for a long time. Finally, at 5 a.m., he re-raised all in with A-Q and got knocked out when Henna's pocket 8s held up.
Then, just a few hands later, Hasrouni, an engineer, went broke. He was all in with A-10 and lost to Kang's J-J on a board of 5-3-3-Q-5. Four were left, none of them short-chipped. As play went on, Buckley beat Henna, a food broker salesman, in a couple of pots and moved into the lead. Kang, meanwhile, had gotten short-chipped and went out in a capped pot. He had A-4 and lost when Henna, with K-6, flopped a king.
At the next break, Buckley had 120k; Henna, 107k; and Levi was down to 33k. Returning, the limits were now $5,000-$10,000. In the next few hands, Buckley beat Henna twice and lost to Levi once, and then a chip-count deal was proposed as the time neared 6 a.m. Buckley had 150,000 chips and of the remaining 140,000, Henna had slightly more than Levi. The deal was made and Buckley's credentials as a pro were established.
-Max Shapiro
BIOGRAPHY
After struggling for a year playing at Foxwoods, Jim Buckley began playing online last summer, and then seriously and full time after he quit his computer job in November. He paid for the move here from his winnings in a Vegas trip. Until now, he had been playing almost exclusively online. It was slow going for a while, but recently things fell into place. 'I feel I've got a really good system now,' Buckley said. While he's won some smallish tournaments online, this is his first big win 'against pros.' From here he plans to go to Foxwoods for the World Poker Tour.
Tonight in early going he was all in but fought his way back. 'I played really well, but also had good cards,' he said. He had trouble handling Henna when it was five or six-handed, because Henna, playing aggressively, had position. 'But later, when I had position on him, that took his aggressiveness away. I had him after that.'
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