Photo by Andrew Leo
A man of many talents, Andy Bloch has a law degree from Harvard, two engineering degrees from M.I.T., and a short but successful career as a stock trader.
But there is no doubt Andy is a born gambler. Andy was a member of the infamous M.I.T. blackjack team, and he actually cut classes during law school to play in the World Series of Poker (WSOP).
While Andy has passed the bar and can probably have any legal job he wants, he refuses to commit to a career in law.
"I tell my parents I'm still looking," Andy mused.
Onlinepokercenter.com (OPC) sat down with Andy at the 2005 WSOP, and we talked to Andy about religion and poker, how to make money in tournaments, and Andy's WSOP performance.
OPC: Andy, the number of players at the World Series of Poker (WSOP) is larger than ever. Would you say you need a bit of luck to win it all?
Andy Bloch: Luck is a huge factor. You cannot beat 5,800 people without getting lucky at some point. At least, you must avoid getting unlucky.
You have to avoid bad luck so many times that luck becomes a huge factor. There are several times when you can get [your chips] in as a 3 to 1 favorite and win. But it is hard to win five or six of those hands in a row, which is what you need to do to beat that many players.
OPC: As a poker player, do you feel that you are more superstitious or religious than the average person?
Andy: (Laughs) I think it is unlucky to be superstitious.
This might get misinterpreted, but poker is a godless game full of random pain. What I mean is that praying to God is not going to help you become a better player; unless, of course, praying relaxes you and makes you play better.
But praying is not going to get you the cards you need. It is not going to help you survive. It's up to you. It is not up to luck. It is not up to God.
OPC: You call poker a game of random pain, but you obviously love it. Which part of poker appeals to you?
Bloch: For me, I like looking at how I'm playing and analyzing whether I'm playing well or not. I can be much more objective than most people. I'm continually looking at my game. So I'm not worried if I lose one day, one week, or one month. As long as I can look back and see that I've played well.
OPC: What are some of your proudest accomplishments in poker?
Bloch: I've won a few major poker tournaments. No World Series events, although I did win a World Series Circuit event. I have a couple of World Poker Tour final tables. I have more cashes in the WPT than anyone but Daniel Negreanu and a few other players.
OPC: Do you play a lot of tournaments during the year?
Bloch: Yeah, I play mostly tournaments during the year. I play one to two hundred of them during the year.
OPC: Do you prefer them over cash games?
Bloch: Now I do. If you are trying to make a living playing poker, tournaments are they way to go.
When you play tournaments, you have ways to make money off poker without actually playing poker. If you do well in tournaments, you get recognized. There are starting to be some sponsorship deals and opportunities to make money. Selling books, DVDs, that kind of thing. You didn't have too much of that before. Now you have so much of it. So now it is worth it to play poker tournaments.
However, I would not recommend it to people unless they have another source of income. That other source of income may come from playing cash games. If you're playing cash games, and you're up for the month, and you want to play poker tournaments, go ahead. But do it as a hobby or as something fun on the side. In these huge fields, it is not a easy way to make a steady income.
It is so volatile, so volatile. You can play in the World Series, enter every event--some of them are multiple rebuy events--and you can lose over $100,000. And that's just over five to six weeks.
And a lot of the people who play in every event don't cash and earn money. Daniel [Negreanu] got two cashes, but he probably lost more than me because I didn't play every event. There are many top players who go through the entire World Series without cashing.
It fluctuates a lot. You have to maintain a lot of focus. It could be very difficult. You must be prepared everyday to play your best poker.
Photo by OPC Staff
OPC: What do you do when you're not playing in tournaments?
Bloch: I play on Full Tilt poker a lot. A lot of top pros are involved with that site. We helped design the site, we play on the site, and we give lessons on the site.
I'm on there ten hours a week. I play mostly No Limit Hold'em, and some Pot Limit Omaha. I usually play two to three tables at once. I play real money, play money, everything basically.
At Full Tilt, You have a chance to play against the great players in the poker world for play money, low limits, small buy-in tournaments, you name it. Regular players can interact with the pros. It's a great opportunity.
OPC: Is there a rivalry between the Full Tilt team and other online poker teams?
Bloch: There is a little bit of a rivalry. We had a Transatlantic Cup tournament in Monte Carlo against the Hendon Mob. There were four Hendon Mob players and four Full Tilt players there. (Smiles) We beat them, three to one.
OPC: You're also known as a great blackjack player, can you tell us a little bit about that?
Bloch: I use to play a lot of blackjack. That's actually how I got started in poker.
I joined the MIT blackjack team early on. Playing on the MIT blackjack team gave me a steady income. I felt very comfortable quitting my job and becoming a professional gambler. When I started, I actually learned more from blackjack. Since I've been kicked out of so many casinos for my blackjack play, I started playing poker
OPC: The casinos that banned you from the blackjack tables still let you play poker?
Bloch: (Smiles) Sometimes they don't, sometimes they do.
OPC: The book "Bringing Down the House," tells the story of the MIT blackjack team winning millions of dollars from casinos with legal card counting techniques. Were you part of that whole scene?
Bloch: The book talks about two blackjack teams, the amphibians and the reptiles. The book is about the reptiles, I was one of the amphibians. I've played with most of the characters in that book. When I joined, it was one team. Later on the team split apart, about the same time the main character in the book joined.
At one time, we were four to five different groups, each calling ourselves the MIT blackjack team. We had a good time, but now it is mostly poker for me.
OPC: How many days a year are you playing poker?
Bloch: About half of the days. During the World Series, it is every day for six weeks.
OPC: What is the poker lifestyle like?
Bloch: Poker players never wake up any earlier than noon. The big games hardly start before the afternoons or evenings. But now the new tournaments start at noon, so you have to wake up earlier.
At this year's World Series, the first three days start at 11:00 a.m. That sounds great for some people, but poker players aren't used to that early start time. We're used to staying up really late, long hours.
The lifestyle is not as glamorous as it seems all the time. It can be but you have to withstand the swings. A lot of people would not enjoy that.
Photo by OPC Staff
OPC: What is your favorite movie?
Bloch: Gandhi.
OPC Can you tell us a little bit about how you busted out of the 2005 World Series of Poker's main event?
Bloch: Most of my chips were lost when I had about $12,000. I had 99. I called a raise and the flop came 6-7-8. The other guy bets $500, I raised and made it $2,000. He called pretty quickly, so I know I'm behind and need to catch up.
I caught a 10 on the turn, which gives me a straight (6-7-8-9-10). Unless he had a J9, which I highly doubted, I was way ahead. The pot is over $5,000 now, so I put him all in. He called, and showed me pocket 10s. So he had a set, and I was a four to one favorite on that hand. Unfortunately, a 7 came on the river and he made a full house (10-10-10-7-7).
That got me short stacked to about $3,000 or $3,800. A little while later, I limped in with JT, the flop was K-J-10. Same player has AQ. He flopped a straight and I flopped bottom two pair.
It was one of those situations where, you flopped bottom two pair, and you don't want to give KQ or AK to get a free shot at you. Someone could easily have thirteen outs on you. So you want to make sure you're getting them out, or that you're making them pay for it.
So I bet the turn. I guessed I could've checked the turn. If I had just checked the turn I probably would've still been in the tournament, because on the river came a king. So the king would've counterfeited my two pair. Anyone with a king would've had me beat. Plus there was another player in the pot. So that hand could've turned out differently, I suppose.
OPC: Are you happy with the way you played the rest of the tournament?
Bloch: I'm happy with the way I played. There were a couple of things I could've done a little bit differently. A couple of moves I could've made.
But you never know, those could've backfired. I might have someone read wrong, you never know. (Shakes head and smiles.) Sometimes you just don't know.