Poker Player Biography: Phil Ivey

 

Poker Player Biography: Phil Ivey

When we think of all the professional poker players there is one name that always comes quickly into our minds – Phil Ivey. He is one of the most popular professional poker players and with his winning streak this doesn’t surprise us one bit.

Phil Ivey was born in the New Jersey in 1976. He grew up in the suburbs in your typical, average American family. One of his first jobs was a telemarketing salesman – which he was good at. He learned from that experience and decided to apply it to the world of poker to see how it would work. He started off playing in small groups and became so popular among them all and won so many times against them that he earned the nickname “No Home Jerome” – which he will sometimes use in online poker rooms.

If you have seen Ivey play than you will notice the aggressive style in which he handles himself and the game. Trying to read his face is almost impossible. At times you would think he is sad until you realize that he is holding a winning hand. Along with being aggressive Phil Ivey is also smart and knows exactly what he is doing. In fact he can practically do two things at once. It is rare to find him at a poker table without his iPod and his Los Angeles NBA team jersey. You’ll find that you may have to shout at him if you want to be heard while he is listening to his music. That is until the final round comes.

One of the more common things that Ivey is known for is re-raising in some of the worst situations. Or at least what we would think would be the worst and tensest situations. He explains it well when he said, “If you play a lot of poker, you realize that the better players play a lot of hands and they take chances. The players that don't do as well are just sitting there folding every hand and not taking chances. I'm playing against the best players in the world day in and day out, so you can't just sit there and play only good hands all the time. You've got to take some chances and know when you're beat and know how to get certain advantages.”

We don’t know exactly how much Ivey makes per game or every year – but we do know that since 2005 he has had very memorable winnings that have exceeded the $10 million amount. He has won 5 World Series of Poker bracelets. Is we look back beyond the years we will remember that in late 2005 he won $635,603 – which has been one of the most remembered of his career. He has also had some very big winnings at the World Poker Tour. Though he has never made it to first place in this competition he has made it to the final tiable on many occasions and played against some of the heaviest competition.

We all know that Phil Ivey is one of the best professional poker players – but sometimes he prefers to practice and blow off some steam at the real life tables and can sometimes be found at Full Tilt Poker. He plays at medium and high stakes tables under his many nicknames. He does try to stay away from the tournaments play – excluding the larger competitions. He is one player that we look forward to seeing and we are looking for more great things from.