http://www.pokertableratings.com/ful...olandthetrault

This 2200 at the age of 18 player has mostly given up chess and has good results, to put it mildy, in HU and SH cash. He also doesn't like MTT's because of the luck factor, so your theory may have some merit.

Pretty sure he never had a FIDE, he left at a very very early age, but was defintiely around 2200 or so as a 10-12 year old.

Taken from wikipedia:

After he disappeared at a very young age, many people thought Jeff wouldn't be seen playing chess again. In September 2007 Jeff resurfaced to the chess scene apparently without training and entered a 30 minute semi-rapid tournament at Malbork castle in Poland. He finished in third place with a score of 7/9 in a group of 86 players including four Grandmasters. Since he had no active chess rating, he was given a provisional Elo rating of 2300 FIDE but seemed to perform above that level.

Jeff seems like a huge badass. That being said I can't imagine him being the thrid best player in an EPT.

Does EPT keep track of player data, like the WSOP does? My guess is Elky would have the best EPT record, in terms of # of cashes and final table appearances.

slurpedy slurp

He seems quite eccentric and a good guy. I wish him all the best. The BEST.

Why does he live in Danzig? (cooler than Gdansk)

There's only room for one true badass jeff in poker imo:

Are assburgers like dingleberries, or clegnuts?




















Piles to anyone who doesnt recognise the medical terms above

who knows

In addition to a person's mental capacity to excel, he/she still needs to put in tons of what's called "deliberate practice" to actually improve any skill. Deliberate practice has three components- 1) Setting specific goals 2) Receiving feedback during practice 3) Concentrating on technique rather than results
This is kind of what was talked about in the book Outliers to explain how people reach expert levels in their field. If Sarwer neglects to put in a significant amount of time, he'll never be anywhere close to world class in poker. You guys think Fischer became the best from talent? He was not looked at as a prodigy when he first entered Chess; he only became good after being OBSESSED with the game and putting in literally every waking hour to studying it.

Apparently ( and from the video on his website ) Sarwer played a lot by feel as a chess player. One Chess professor was actually making your exact point, he wouldn't reach the top of his capabilities as a chess player if he didnt put the time and effort to study the game, and become more "technical" .

He does seem to have put a lot of study in his new poker career, saying he read plenty of poker books .

Btw, he just made the Final Table at EPT Vilamoura , and is still 2nd in chips.

FTP and PS, put your eyes on this guy.

that guy comes across as really cool and positive minded in the interview and not the least bit socially awkward... much more so than about 99% of online poker player interviews that I've seen

that's enough to make me root for him I guess

fatalerror, obviously crossbooking is kinda ******ed but ill make some performance based results bets if you like


deeb quitting because someone is better than you in tournies is stupid, most likely you won't be top 10 in the world in any form of poker, but the difference between you and the superheroes is gonna be least significant in the mtt world

He has played more EPTs than that. From wikipedia:

"Since December 2008 Jeff has been playing on the European Poker Tour and has 5 cashes including a 10th place finish at EPT Warsaw."

I'm not sure about his EPT cashes but he at least finished 3rd at the EMOP Tallinn last season. It had like 400 players with a 1100€ buy-in.

We were at a dinner here in Vilamoura just today with Jeff and some grinders, and Jeff gave a long speech about how high-level chess is like poker, talked about bluffing in chess etc. I was at the other end of the table that sat like 30 people so I didn't catch all of that but it sounded very interesting.

Having spent some time with Jeff at the tournament circuit this year, I have to agree with the praising in this thread: he has a mind as beautiful as it gets, and as a side note he's also a really great guy (or then he's just pulling a bluff on all of us, pretending to be supernice so we wouldn't 3bet him so much in tourneys).

I would also predict that his FT at EPT Vilamoura tomorrow won't be his last in a major tournament.


And no, I'm not Jeff.

A friend of mine rides motorcycles.
Apparently, amongst a number of riders in the greater Chicagoland area, the term "road rash" has been replaced with "ass-burger syndrome".

If this dude is actually a genius, I feel really, really sorry for him.

Dumb and happy is the right way to go through life.

just watched his video on his website and read his wiki

his dad seems really weird though. why did he pull his kids out of school !?

Done. If you think he is better NLH player than anyone in the world but Ivey or Elky (NLH tourney wise) than lets make a substantial bet 1:1.

I get anyone else but Ivey you take Sarwer.

Amen

Im sure he would destroy tournament poker if he dedicated himself to playing!

andy mcleod was a former youth chess champion and he was winning ridiculous sums of money at 15 playing mtts online...

2300, but that's his 'provisional rating'. Apparently he performs above that level.

I used to play chess as a kid. I never played seriously, but had pretty good results taking on kids quite a bit older than me at some crappy inter school tournaments.

The things I remember about chess is firstly, you have to have a sick amount of concentration. My games had 90 minute clocks on either side and I was literally tired after the long games.

You also learn to think many moves ahead. I was thinking say 5-7 moves ahead (with accuracy of predictions sliding down the further I looked ahead) and the number of possibilities inceases exponentially with every extra move into the future. In this way, you can put your opponent on a range on possible moves. There may be a play that will work the best against the whole range, but the trick is to get inside your opponents head. Think like them, or better yet, make them think how you want them to think, then you can narrow down their "range" a lot more. Doing this allows you to make some more exploitable plays that work superbly against their narrow range.

Big cross over IMHO.

P.S. Just speaking from how I always thought about the game. I could be way off.

seeing people are taking part of this out of context i want to clarify, he has the best mind, not the most developed one, he is still at least a month or 2 of full time play to absorb enough general knowledge to actually have all the tools that the top 10-20 tournament players have.

i admit i'd be taking the worst of it as near term as the PCA but would still be happy to crossbook vs almost anyone for a fun sweat, but the PCA is definately the toughest EPT by far and will present jeff with more challenging opponents of different styles to break down and adjust to.

sorry to everyone who thought they'd get 6 figure crossbooks down, i'm wayyyyyy too busto for that

Because it's just a short drive to Germany I guess

EPT FT is underway, 8 left, he's third, but has twice as much chips as the fourth.

Played with Jeff quite a bit and also got a chance to get to know him a little bit these last 2 ept's. He's a super friendly/cool guy (he actually busted me out of EPT warsaw after pretty much owning me) I would definitely say that his potential in poker exceeds most good players. The way he thinks about the game and how he get's his opponents talking are his top two attributes as a player. Fundamentally, he's a little bit unsound but if he worked on his game hardcore for a few months I could definitely see him being a top player. Happy to crossbook vs him for now in a few months to a year, i might change my mind