An Online Pro's Success Story

by Matt Lessinger

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Normally, I use my newsletter articles to dispense strategic advice about online games. But this month I'll divert from the norm and tell you about Dave Huff. He is a close friend and a professional poker player. He is also one of the best no-limit hold'em tournament specialists I've ever seen.

You are probably asking yourself, "If that's the case, then why haven't I heard of him?" That's because, up to this point, he has played almost exclusively online. And last week he had his best tournament success to date, winning the PokerStars Sunday tournament for an $84,000+ payday. He defeated a field of over 3,400 opponents, and I had the pleasure of watching him from my own computer for the final four hours or so. He essentially put on a clinic, and it was magnificent to watch.

Obviously, his tournament win was something special. He defeated a field bigger than either Chris Moneymaker or Greg Raymer had to face. Most pros could play their whole life and never have a win like his. So I thought you might enjoy hearing the tale of his big day. And rather than try to do it myself, I will let Dave tell you about his Sunday victory.


Dave Huff

And now, Dave Huff:

Thanks, Matt. My bread-and-butter is to play a lot of sit-and-go (SNG) tournaments, with some multi-tables mixed in for variety. But I've always enjoyed playing the Sunday tournaments with a shot at a big payday, and last Sunday it paid off big time.

After warming up with a few SNGs, I'd won enough to pay for my buy-in into both the PartyPoker $215 buy-in $350,000 guarantee and the PokerStars $215 buy-in $500,000 guarantee Sunday tournaments, as well as a smaller $109 multi-table, which all started within half an hour of each other. The 3,407 players in the PokerStars tournament was the largest field I'd ever faced, and as the first hand was dealt I was already salivating over the fat prize pool. We started with 2,500 chips and blinds of 10 and 15, so clearly there was no need to get out of line early.

The first big hand came up during the second hour of play. I had around 3,000 chips and the average stack was up to around 5,500, with blinds of 100 and 200. In the big blind, I picked up JJ, and the under-the-gun (UTG) player made the minimum raise to 400. I started to think about how I was going to play the hand when to my surprise three players in the field and the small blind called the 400. I gave some thought to just calling the 200 to see the flop and avoid risking my tournament life on one hand, but I decided the chance to potentially pick up the 2,200 already in the pot without a confrontation was too much to pass up. I dropped the all-in bomb and was displeased when I got called in two places. I figured I was up against at least one overpair and figured to be a big dog in the hand. As the hands were being turned over, one of my other tournament windows popped up and covered the flop, but I could see that I was up against 99 and QQ. Yuck. I was disappointed, but my other tournaments were looking good, so I wasn't too upset. When I cleared the other window and saw the flop my heartbeat went way up. JJ7! Quad jacks, baby! Suddenly I was up to over 10,000 chips and looking good.

I continued running good and playing well and built my stack up to around 30,000. We were approaching the money when another interesting hand came up. I picked up A-K suited in the cutoff and was hoping to get a little action when the UTG player moved all-in for around 10,000, and the player to his left immediately moved in for 40,000. Everyone folded to me, and I took a moment to think it through. It's always hard to lay down A-K suited before the flop, but I thought this might be one of those times. The average chip stack was around 20,000, and we had about 425 players left with 324 places paying. I was in good shape to make the money, and I figured there was an excellent chance that the reraiser was trying to isolate the smaller all-in with a pair. I decided not to risk all of my chips on one hand when I was in good chip position, so I made the big laydown. I was shocked when bothof my opponents showed A-Q! I was lamenting the fact that I was playing too good for my own good when a queen showed up on the river! After mockingly patting myself on the back, I got back down to business.

Around this time Matt called, and we talked through all of the interesting hands that had come up in my various tournaments. I squeaked into the money in the larger PartyPoker tournament and finished tenth out of 510 in the other. With those out of the way, I put all of my focus into the PokerStars tourney. After snapping off a bluff or two and getting action on a few big hands, I found myself in the overall chip lead with 60 players left. At this point, my wife and two of our roommates came home. We set up my computer so that the image of my table was on our large-screen TV in the living room, and everyone could comfortably watch the action. It was televised poker, the home version.

After giving back a few chips with the blinds at 10,000/20,000, I had around 300,000 when I picked up A-J. The UTG player moved in for a little over 100,000 and I decided to take a stand. I moved all-in over the top to isolate him, and he turned over A-8. After an 8 showed up on the flop I was down to 200,000. On the very next hand I picked up A-K. I made a standard raise to 60,000, and another player moved in for 160,000. I made the obvious call; he showed me jacks and took the pot after an ace or king failed to show up. After dreaming about a final table finish, I realized I was in 44th chip position out of 46 remaining players. Suddenly my goal had gone from winning to waiting out one more player in order to pick up another $300 for 45th place. I was disappointed, but I was still going to win over $2,000 for the day, so I couldn't be too upset.

After we were down to 45 players, I picked up A-6 UTG and sent in my remaining 38,000 chips. Unhappily, I got called by both blinds, but flopped an ace and tripled up. Shortly afterwards I picked up Q-Q and doubled up through a big stack who'd put on the heat with 99. I was back in it with a slightly above-average stack of around 260,000. Before I knew it, I had navigated my way through the remaining players, and suddenly found myself at the final table with around 2,000,000 and the chip lead.

Ninth place was just over $7,000, with each place being about $5,000 or $6,000 more than the preceding one. Suddenly I got nervous that I was going to do something stupid or make the wrong move in a close decision situation. Despite my five years of experience as a serious player and two years as a pro, I was worried that I would do something that I would regret for a long time and miss out on tens of thousands of dollars. As each player got eliminated, my friends and I exchanged a flurry of high fives, and each time someone survived an all-in, we groaned in unison. Although I was willing to make a deal, Matt reminded me that, if I suggested the deal, my bargaining power would be hurt.

When we got down to seven players, "riverloser" suggested a deal and "biotop" immediately said it was too early. Again with five players "riverloser" suggested a deal, and everyone except "biotop" (the chip leader) was on board. Happily, "biotop" took a pair of jacks against a pair of kings and suddenly found himself with only 350,000 in chips. He was then eliminated on the next hand, and cardroom manager Lee Jones stopped the action so that the remaining four of us could make a deal.

We agreed to do the split based on chip count. Since we were all fairly close in chips (2.3 million for the chip leader, 2.2 in second, I was in third with 2.1 and fourth had 1.6), the payouts were pretty similar. PokerStars has a policy that any deal must leave at least $10,000 on the table for the outright winner. With $74,000 already locked up I set out to win the remaining cash. With the blinds frozen at 40,000/80,000, we had a lot of play. With so much money already in the bank I was able to relax and play my best game. Also, as a result of playing so many SNGs, I have a lot of short-handed experience, which worked to my advantage.

After about an hour of short-handed play I found myself heads up against "riverloser." In addition to being a good sport and all-around nice guy, he is #1 on the PokerStars tournament leaderboard for the year so far. Not exactly weak competition. After about 15 minutes of back-and-forth I reraised him all in with Q♣ 9♣, and he quickly called with A-6. After flopping a 9, I was the champ.

My wife, my friends, and I immediately went out, bought a bunch of champagne and spent the rest of the night and the next day celebrating. My friend E.B. gave a toast that pretty much summed up my feelings: "Hopefully, this will be just the beginning." I plan on traveling and playing more live tournaments in the next year or two, and I'm looking forward to continuing my current success.


After the tournament: Dave and Jen Huff (on couch), and roommates Chrissy and Jake

A Good Story, but Not the Whole Story

I definitely enjoyed reading Dave's account of the tournament. However, I'm a little disappointed that he didn't recount some of the hands that demonstrated his considerable skill. Instead, perhaps out of modesty, he focused mostly on situations in which he got lucky. Of course, he got some luck along the way - you can't win a 3,400-player tournament without some luck - but he unquestionably made the most of it.

For instance, he barely mentioned how he worked his way from 10,000 to 30,000 chips during the third and fourth hours of the tournament, or how he managed to garner the chip lead with 60 players left. Both were difficult tasks. But perhaps his most impressive stage of the tournament was when he built his stack from 260,000 to the chip lead of 2,000,000 by the time he had reached the final table. It was a beautiful combination of well- timed bluffs, well-analyzed calls, and all-around rock-solid play, and I felt privileged to be able to watch him at work.

If Dave has made up his mind to play more live tournaments, then you can expect to see his face at a final table in the very near future. He made his first trip to the World Series of Poker this year, and in his very first WSOP event he made the money from a field of 1,100 players. There is no question that he will build on his current successes, and I'm looking forward to being there when he does. And, hopefully, you will remember that you heard his name here first.

Next month I'll be back to talking online poker strategy with a discussion of rebuy tournaments, which I just can't seem to get enough of. See you then.

Matt Lessinger's "Bet With Less" column appears in Card Player magazine. He can be reached at mlessinger@hotmail.com.

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