NEWEST POKER PRO READY FOR ACTION
(Distributed April 4, 2006)
When JDtrojan3 — aka Jim Davenport — slips into his seat at the World Poker Tour Championship this month at the Bellagio in Las Vegas, the new pro might take a moment to remember family stories about his grandfather back in Kentucky.
Grandpa, the story goes, loved to play poker. “He would come home in the middle of the morning after playing all night in a home game and pull his pockets inside-out so all of the change he won would spill onto the table,” Davenport said. “Then my grandmother would come in and organize all the money!”
“I’ve always remembered that, so now every time I play I think that’s where I got some of my skill or that somebody’s just kind of watching over my shoulder,” he said.
Well, if granddad was watching the other day, he saw his 25-year-old grandson, an investment banking analyst from Newport Beach, Calif., capture what’s billed as the greatest freeroll prize in the history of online poker — an endorsement package valued at $250,000 including a $60,000 cash prize through PokerRoom.com.
The WPT Championship will begin a year’s worth of travel and tournaments in the United States and in Europe. He’ll be ready.
“It will be pretty exciting to see how I do around the big-name players,” Davenport said. “I can’t wait until the first time I sit down with players like Phil Hellmuth and Mike Matusow and hear all that banter. I’ve got enough brothers and friends that I’ve heard it all before. It won’t affect me.”
Indeed, the competitive requirements of poker should come easy to Davenport. The 2003 University of Southern California grad logs plenty of 13-hour days at his high-intensity job. He also played basketball in high school and USC inter-fraternity league, and coached the local YMCA team for three years. He now plays Monday nights in a city league representing his firm.
His team’s going to need a sub. Davenport estimates he’ll be on the road two weeks each month, “but the owner of my company and my boss are both very happy for me. I probably won’t be able to do the same things I’m doing at work now, but it sounds like there will be something waiting for me when I get back.'’
If he gets back. A big win during the year could change his plans.
“I don’t want to take this lightly because this is a real opportunity to set myself up for the future,” Davenport said. “I truly believe I can place in some of these tournaments and hopefully shock everybody and win one of these things.”
A victory wouldn’t shock the nine other online poker experts he defeated March 5 at a live final table on a cruise ship in the Caribbean. His live-play experience in the card rooms in Los Angeles and San Diego paid off for Davenport, who has competed online for just two years using a table name honoring his beloved USC Trojans.
As runner-up, BillyBluff13 received entry into this summer’s main event at the World Series of Poker. After losing the final hand, the Boston-area electrician acknowledged that Davenport “wanted it more than me.”
“I’m more competitive than I’ve ever been greedy,” Davenport said. “Just winning against those players was satisfying enough. You can see in my face (on the Web site video) how shocked but yet excited I was that I had just beaten some of the best online poker players in the world!”
Yes, we could see it. So could grandpa.
THE WINNING STRATEGY
Davenport started the final table in fourth chip position, but had decided to lay low at first.
“I was sitting back, trying to get reads on all the guys, especially monster chip leader BillyBluff13. I stayed out of pots with him, folding hands like A-J suited and pocket sixes when he raised. I had a feeling he was the one I’d have to beat to win the tournament, so I spent a lot of time watching him,” Davenport said.
The key hand came with five players left. Davenport raised with pocket nines only to see mdJohnny push all-in with A-Q. Davenport called, but a queen on the flop put him behind. A miracle nine came next, however, setting up the stretch drive to victory 19 hands later.
After that hand, “I was playing with confidence and dominating about 75 percent of the pots. I knocked out my friend Rufebert in third place, and I won all six hands heads-up against Billy,” Davenport said.
On the final hand Davenport slow-played A-Q (didn’t raise) against BillyBluff13, who held Q-7 of diamonds. That enticed Billy to move all-in when the flop came A-J-7, giving him bottom pair of sevens. Davenport easily called with top pair of aces, then caught a third ace on the next card, coasting to the title.
E-mail your poker questions and comments to russ@luckydogpoker.com for use in future columns. To find out more about Russ Scott and read previous LuckyDog Poker columns, visit www.creators.com.
COPYRIGHT 2006 RUSS SCOTT
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