November Nine: Phil Ivey

<img src="http://www.liquidpoker.net/staff/Pindarots/09/philivey.jpg" align="right" style="margin:5px; border:1px solid black;">Whenever you ask a random pokerplayer about who is the best pokerplayer in the world, the odds of them coming up with Phil Ivey are huge. The 33-year old American from Riverside, California has earned his respect in the pokerworld during the last decade, with good table demeanior and excellent pokerskills that brought him success in both tournaments and (online) cash games.

The Phil Ivey we know is quite different from the guy playing poker in his early years. His grandfather introduced him to poker when he explained the 8-year old Phil Ivey the game of Five-Card Stud. The old man must not have known what he started, yet little Phil was well aware of his future, as he already told his family and teachers that he wanted to be a professional gambler when he grew up. At 16 Phil really saw his potential when he easily manages to beat all others in a home game. Having to wait until the age of 21 didn't seem like a good prospect for Ivey, and at 18 he got a fake ID to start playing poker in Atlantic City casinos. He spent lots and lots of time there under the name Jerome Graham, which earned him the name "No Home Jerome".

He learned a lot throughout these years and from 2000 onwards his name was set in the tournament-world as well. At the final table of the $1500 Pot-Limit Omaha table, he beats Amarillo Slim heads-up, after knocking out Phil Hellmuth in 4th place. During the 2002 WSOP he won another 3 bracelets, this time in 7 Card Stud, 7 Card Stud Hi/Lo and SHOE. 3 years later his fifth bracelet was won in the $5000 PLO-event, and in 2009 his 6th and 7th bracelets were won, this time in No-Limit 2-7 Draw Lowball and Omaha Hi/Lo / 7 Card Stud Hi/Lo. This means he's won 7 bracelets, but still not a single bracelet in Hold'em. In the meantime he has also had his success in other events. He made 7 WPT<A name="cutnews"></A><A name="cutnews"></A> final tables before winning one in February 2008. He only made one EPT final table yet, mainly because he doesn't play many of them, and he managed to finish 2nd in his first EPT event in 2006.

And there's more success worth mentioning. In 2006 he played the billionaire Andy Beal heads-up for "The Corporation", a group of pokerpro's who put together some money to play Beal. In this sick $25,000/$50,000 game, he won over $16,000,000 in 3 days! He also won the Monte Carlo Millions in 2005 for a cool million (partly thanks to thisawesome hand), and just one day after he won the Fulltiltpoker.Net Invitational Live From Monaco for $600,000! His current tournament winnings are over 12 million dollar (including 9th place prizemoney).

Outside poker, Phil likes to play golf, do propbets (he once put $5000 on which ice-cube would melt fastest) and video-games. He also loves watching NBA-games, and is a frequent visitor at the LA Lakers and Houston Rockets games with his wife, his former high-school sweetheart Luciaetta.

Some people call Phil "the Tiger Woods of Poker", as his carreer and looks show some similarities with that of the golf phenom. Phil however mentioned he doesn't like that nickname very much, for one he thinks Tiger's edge in golf is much bigger than his edge in poker, and he also mentioned he'd rather be called "the Phil Ivey of Poker".

He had a pretty rough last day before the final table of this World Series of Poker Main Event, as he lost a few million chips while the average went up a lot. Yet he still has plenty of chips to play with. With little over 40 big blinds and two seats left of chipleader Darvin Moon, his odds of winning are valued at 4:1, 3rd behind Moon and Buchman. It is rummored that he gets $10 million from Full Tilt Poker if he wins the event, and he has a 99:1 propbet against Andy Bloch (set with 2400 players still in) which can earn him 2 million dollar. He would also get $5 million from Howard Lederer, as he bet that Phil wouldn't win 2 bracelets within 3 World Series fo Poker-series (set after his first bracelet, he won one already so the next bracelet earns him $5 million). That means winning the Main Event could earn him over $25 million! Some people said that no big name was ever gonna win the Main Event again, can Phil prove them wrong?

Seat 1: Darvin Moon - 58,930,000
Seat 2: James Akenhead - 6,800,000
Seat 3: Phil Ivey - 9,765,000
Seat 4: Kevin Schaffel - 12,390,000
Seat 5: Steven Begleiter - 29,885,000
Seat 6: Eric Buchman - 34,800,000
Seat 7: Joe Cada - 13,215,000
Seat 8: Antoine Saout - 9,500,000
Seat 9: Jeff Shulman - 19,580,000

IVEYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

whatttt, do they have any of the hands/videos from him playing against Beal?

bank

http://www.pokerroad.com/video/the-li...hil-ivey-s-self-imposed-exile-in-cabo

Latest "life of Ivey"

pretty sick

Ivey is such a boss.

I wonder how much $ he's worth, cause he does some crazy gambling.

phil is such a fuckin badass, he doesnt even care if hes being filmed hes just like "i duno why i even do this shit... so fuckin stupid"

i think it would be hard being him tho becaue of being all the way at the top like he is with no where to go, but i guess he keeps trying harder and harder at golf which keeps his competitive side up.

it kinda like having cheat codes to a rpg game, it kinda loses the fun..

On October 24 2009 20:02 DarkDevildog wrote: whatttt, do they have any of the hands/videos from him playing against Beal?

i want that too! such sick high stakes and ive never seen anything about it at all

For you guys interested in the session agains Beal, theres a book about it I can recommend: The Professor, the Banker, and the Suicide King

wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo Ivey is the man

25,000 / 50,000 ...

what the fuck? LOL phil ivey's a BEAST!

On October 25 2009 01:57 milkman wrote: phil is such a fuckin badass, he doesnt even care if hes being filmed hes just like "i duno why i even do this shit... so fuckin stupid" i think it would be hard being him tho becaue of being all the way at the top like he is with no where to go, but i guess he keeps trying harder and harder at golf which keeps his competitive side up. it kinda like having cheat codes to a rpg game, it kinda loses the fun..

I dunno, winning multiple millions of dollars would take a prettttttty long time to get old to me

God Ivey winning the WSOP would be the sickest shit ever.

On October 25 2009 13:32 Sliggy wrote: 25,000 / 50,000 ... what the fuck? LOL phil ivey's a BEAST!

it was limit and many pros shared their action

On October 25 2009 19:30 Baal wrote: it was limit and many pros shared their action

Ahh, he's shit then nevermind. ;p

what legends are made of

phil is such a boss

On October 25 2009 00:52 ShaperofDreams wrote: Ivey is such a boss. I wonder how much $ he's worth, cause he does some crazy gambling.

have heard from a reliable source that the way phil ivey plays craps is actually +EV for him. here's how:

i don't know anything about how to play craps, but apparently you can place one bet that is slightly -EV and in addition to that, "play max odds" which essentially gives you a perfectly 0EV coinflip for substantially more money. most casinos won't give you comp ratings for the 0EV flip portion of your bet, but some do. so phil ivey does that, only at casinos that comp the odds, and grinds out comp value that is higher (converted to $) than the slight -EV he gives to the casino by playing. then, he plays for tons of money so he gets noticed and none of his bets miss their comp value

there are a number of long-term craps grinders in vegas who have made primary income in other ways but have lots of documentation showing that this has been +EV at casinos that comp the odds (which is why most don't). a notable exception is Venetian

http://www.pokerlistings.com/blog/wsop/2009/the-cristal-balla


if anyone hasnt read that story about ivey please do loooooooool

On October 26 2009 00:20 [vital]Myth wrote: Show nested quote + On October 25 2009 00:52 ShaperofDreams wrote: Ivey is such a boss. I wonder how much $ he's worth, cause he does some crazy gambling. have heard from a reliable source that the way phil ivey plays craps is actually +EV for him. here's how: hes black

fyp

that story is pretty retarded if its true ;o

i mean they should have stopped after he gave them each a bottle, instead of starting that idiocy