best parts of the SCTrojans(1 of the best online poker MTT player) Well on Pocket fives.com

1. poker story:

For those of you who don't know me my name is Scott and I'm 22 years old and have lived in the Los Angeles area my entire life. I grew up playing competitive sports and had a stint playing competitive magic the gathering between the ages of 10-15 or so.

I've been playing poker since I was 16 just before the Moneymaker boom. I was extremely fortunate that one of my better friends in high school and his dad had been competitive poker players for years and they shared with myself and my friends (including #1PEN). With an entire room dedicated to poker with multiple casino quality poker tables and chips and 10+ willing poker players almost nightly I was very lucky to get through some of the early poker stages before the boom hit.

I entered USC in 2004 as a freshman and continued to play poker for fun primarily onpokerstars grinding lower stakes sngs and mtts. At the time I had very little desire expectation to be a professional but enjoyed the game, the challenge, and the small amount of money it provided me. It wasn't until I witnessed #1PEN's success in late 2006 that I realized I could be really successful.

After I completed my 3rd year at USC late April of 2007, partially due to some success in early 2007 and partially due to me turning 21 and the WSOP coming up, I decided to play poker full time during the summer of 2007. This is when I was fortunate enough to run fairly well in May online winning 3 triple crowns and my deep finish in the WSOP main event leaving me with a bankroll of just about 400k.

I was faced with one of the more difficult decisions in my life with whether to go back to school in August and finish my final year, or really go all out and see what I could do with poker. With a ridiculous amount of support from my parents and confidence in my ability to go back to school when the time came I continued to play poker full time traveling the WPT circuit and had a lot more success online throughout 2007.

Unfortunately after PCA in 2008 I realized that I no longer had the drive to play poker that I used to. I felt like I had achieved an understanding of the game where improvement and success was extremely slow. The inability to control the game began to take its toll on me and I became very frustrated. I just needed to take some time off and played less than 10 days of poker from January 2008 to the 2008 WSOP.

For whatever reason I decided to come to Vegas in 2008 to play the WSOP, partially because I wanted to see and spend time with the many friends I met in 2007 and partially because it has always been a goal of mine to win a bracelet. I played 11 tournaments and was fortunate enough to make two final tables including a 4th place finish in the second 1k rebuy for 223k.

I have played limited poker since the World Series both online and live instead focusing on other aspects of life most importantly my friends, family, and my health. I spend too many hours railing online tournaments and browsing the forums and not enough playing :)

Please feel free to ask anything about myself, poker, my thoughts of you, and please be as brutally honest with your opinions of me. I know many things I say aren't healthy and good for the community. I've publicly admitted my inability to filter what I say is my biggest character flaw. Those of you who know me know I'm a good person at heart and those that don't I hope to get to know you so you understand

2.   

Originally Posted by jesterwords 

What life lesson has most stuck with you from your experience grinding on-line poker for days upon days?

Input = output (if that even makes sense).

I worked so hard and put in so many hours thinking about and playing during the year of 2007 that I really feel that barring genetics you can do anything you try hard enough to do. I credit the majority of my success with my work ethic in poker.

3. 

Originally Posted by fly44 

What are your future poker plans and life plans?

If you had to give one piece of poker advice to P5 members what would it be?

Oh and I thought I would add, I think the flaming is useful as it limits stupid posts by making people responsible for when they ask for advice.

Poker plans hmm. PCA, I'll probably play some events at LAPC because its in my backyard, and the occasional day online just like I do now. I will probably stay in Vegas for the month of the WSOP again but I don't have any real set plans.

As far as life I would love to take some action me going back to school in the fall of 09 :) That would have me graduating in spring of 2010 and then I'd hopefully work on my career in business. I'd love to stay within the poker community.

The one piece of poker advice I would give hmm... It would probably honestly be and as stupid as this sounds just work hard and be patient. I believe that you need to truly want to be good at poker to become good at poker. If you really want it, and you put the time in, the results will come. Obviously training sites are the best way to learn if thats what you are asking. I tell all my friends to get a PXF or Cardrunners membership.

Lol flaming on forums is something I'm used to. Having played World of Warcraft its something I'm not sure I'll be able to shed as easily as I'd like

4.

Originally Posted by Iplaythabored 

how much was your roll when you decided to play full time in 2007? what tournies did u start playing?

My BR when in late april when school finished was ~25k maybe 30k. I was playing everything 50 freezeout+ 10r+ up to the occasional 100r when i was feeling good. The last Sunday of April I actually played the 200r for the first time which I admitted was a poor decision on my part but luckboxed and chopped it for 35k or something.

5.

Originally Posted by warrior913 

what got you back after losing the drive to play?

Boredom, friends playing, after taking 2 weeks off and having a Sunday Monday or Tuesday with nothing to do I kinda get an itch to play. I'm playing an average of probably 1 day a week now so I'm not really "back". Also I like the things I can do with the money I've earned so thats always a motivator.

6.

Originally Posted by norcaljeff 

1. is it possible to become a very good poker player while playing low volume?

2. is taking shots worth it or is strict bankroll management the way to go? especially if one plays low volume?

3. USC won me 25 big ones today (dollars obv. woot!). that is all.

4. I started the wow online trial, is it worth it to pay teh monies if I can't play that often? in other words, is it possible to <strike>be a very good</strike> have a lot of fun as a wow player while playing low volume?

5. can I brag about getting a pm from you even tho you thought I was someone else?

ty for doing this. these "wells" are teh awesome immfo

1. Of course it is it will just take longer. I believe that poker learning is correlated with volume / time put in or whatever.

2. I'm a big fan of shot taking in the right situation. For example I think that those with the BR to play $50 freezeouts and $10 rebuys should be playing the sunday warmup and million every single week because they are certainly +ev and with 2 tourneys/week its not going to strain the br. I don't however think you should be playing the 100r 2x/day with a 10k br, for obvious reasons.

7.

Originally Posted by POKER_PANDA 

are u/were u a member of any of the training sites? If so, what are ur favorite videos, or who are ur favorite pros from the sites?

since u say u rail too much, who are ur favorite players to rail? who is the best to watch and learn?

thanks alot man

I've never been a member of any training sites. I've been asked to make videos by most (sick brag) but I haven't for whatever reason. I was very close to doing one with PXF and Cardrunners but I'm an idiot and it fellt hrough.

I rail my closest friends. My personal favorite players to rail are moorman and stevie444 and andy mcleod and djk (in majors). If I was better friends with them I'd love to watch eisenhower and breeth.

The best players to watch and learn are honestly the biggest nits. I truly believe that you will find more success playing like tmay420 or allin@420 or thay3r than you would trying to learn from the players I listed above until you develop an understanding for the game to do some of the things they do (which will come in time

8.

Originally Posted by norcaljeff 

sct: #2. I'm a big fan of shot taking in the right situation. For example I think that those with the BR to play $50 freezeouts and $10 rebuys should be playing the sunday warmup and million every single week because they are certainly +ev and with 2 tourneys/week its not going to strain the br. I don't however think you should be playing the 100r 2x/day with a 10k br, for obvious reasons.

- can you translate that for low stakes? like if I play $8 (top 5 get $26 tokens) sngs or $10 mtts is a shot at a $30/50/75 (50 to 180 person)mtt a bad idea? for a hobby player who plays for fun but with the idea of making monies also.

#5. no im embarrassed :(

- f it I'm still braggin...lol. ty for teh advice fwimfwiamfgf

I wouldn't recommend taking random shots in tournaments that are more difficult fields than your regular tournaments. I would however recommend playing that new $22 200k or whatever on sundays they put in on FTP, which almost certainly is a weaker field than your normal tournaments. I don't know if they have any lower stakes majors but Sundays are generally much softer fields across the board. Basically just be aware of the fields you are entering imo