A Poker Life - Jared Jaffee

Jared Jaffee was among the leaders in the Card Player 2010 Player of the Year (POY) race for much of the year. It was quite an impressive performance when you consider that 2010 was Jaffee’s first year of playing full time on the tournament trail.

He made half a dozen final tables during the year, and the bulk of his POY points were won at World Poker Tour (WPT) main-event final tables. He won more than half a million dollars in POY events in 2010, and was in the top 10 in final-table appearances, as well.

Previous years of Jaffee’s life were dedicated to his education in law, but he quickly discovered that the life of a practicing attorney was not for him once he began working, and he quickly turned to poker.

Passing the Bar and Quickly Moving On

Jaffee passed the bar exam in New York after completing law school, and then promptly went to work in the legal industry. “It was definitely one of the bigger accomplishments in my life [passing the bar], and I was really happy to do it,” he stated.

He quickly left that job to pursue a career in poker. “I got swarmed the morning of my third day at work, and when I came back from lunch that afternoon, that was it. It was when the economy was bad, and it definitely wasn’t the job I was looking for at the time. I could tell right away that it wasn’t a place I wanted to be long term,” said Jaffee.

He went with his gut instinct, and the decision has proven to be a good one for the 29-year-old poker player from Brooklyn Heights, New York. “I’m having a great time. It’s a fickle industry and things can swing on you quickly, but for now, I have no complaints,” said Jaffee.

His law degree has been a big help to him in his poker career thus far. “The analytical thinking helps; it enables you to look at situations in a different way. You see a lot more angles when you’re playing hands. Listen, any education that you have is going to make you sharper; it fine-tunes your skills in ways that you don’t even notice that there’s a direct correlation,” said Jaffee. “Those long sessions of studying for the bar also prepared me for long poker sessions.

“The way that they teach you things in law school is much different than in college and high school. They really teach you to think in a different way. It’s kind of hard to describe it exactly, but they teach your brain to work in a different way,” continued Jaffee. “When you’re playing a hand, you see a lot more of the angles more quickly than you may have otherwise. I was never one to study a lot, but for the bar, I had to study 14 hours a day for months. That helped me to be more patient. Those long sessions in which you play poker for 15 hours go down a lot easier.”

Jaffee admitted that while he was studying for the bar, he played sit-and-gos. “I would have the book in front of my computer and look up when it was my turn. If I had to play a hand, I would play it; otherwise, I would fold it,” said Jaffee.

Learning Poker Through Playing Stud and Being Backed

Jaffee has played poker for a number of years, learning the game first through playing seven-card stud, which is a rarity these days. “I played cards when I was very young, and when I graduated from college, I played in some stud tournaments in Atlantic City and had a lot of fun with that,” he said.

After graduating from college, he started playing online a lot, and began to mix in live play and games other than stud, as well. “I played straight through law school, and played in cash games in New York. I won a few trips while in law school, to the PCA [PokerStars Caribbean Adventure] and the EPT Deauville, for example. I won satellites into big tournaments, so I have experience playing in live tournaments. Last summer was the first time that I went to the World Series, and I stayed there for the whole summer. It was kind of a lost summer, as I didn’t do too well,” said Jaffee.

After that summer, Jaffee entered into a backing partnership with Ben Zamani. “I have to give a lot of credit to Ben. He told me that I could play whenever I wanted, wherever I wanted, and he would back me. Then, I started winning, and he has been real good to me. We have a partnership with my action. He has helped me with my game as much as anyone I’ve spoken to. If it wasn’t for him, I don’t think I would be in this position right now. He helped me a lot with my understanding of the game,” said Jaffee.

Finding His Stride

Jaffee played in a few live tournaments in 2009, but he truly found his stride on the tournament trail in 2010. He cashed a total of 10 times during the year, and now has $1,035,461 in career tournament earnings. According to Jaffee, everything clicked once he found a backer and could commit to playing full time.

All of the time that he spent at final tables in 2010 proved to be an invaluable learning tool and confidence booster. “It’s super valuable every time that you make a final table. You’re getting experience playing shorthanded when the stakes are higher and everything is being televised. I made a final table at the World Series this year, and one at the Wynn. I believe that the WPT has the toughest final tables to make, and they are the most intense, because everybody wants to make the final six, and once you do, the cameras are rolling. I feel that every time you play, it gives you an edge when going into the next one. You’re a lot more comfortable,” said Jaffee.
Jaffee also stands by the strength of his short-stack game as the reason that he did so well in 2010. “I think the most important thing in these tournaments is being able to manage a short stack. You have to be patient with a short stack. That’s the biggest weakness in a lot of successful players’ games that I have seen at this point. When they get short, they just get it in and hope to get lucky and win a race. They get down to 15 big blinds and it’s time to shove. I might take a flop more often than somebody else with fewer blinds, or there is even a possibility that I might put in a small raise and toss my cards away if I get three-bet. Once they’re down to a certain level, most people will shove all in and hope to get lucky or go home. I don’t really subscribe to that. You’re never really more than a few hands away from getting yourself back into it,” said Jaffee.

“I was definitely very aware of the Player of the Year standings,” said Jaffee. “When I started the year, I had a couple of good finishes. I set a personal goal to get into the top 10 by the end of the year. Since it was my first year of playing live consistently, I thought that was a good goal for me.”

Jaffee acknowledged that he changed his schedule around to stay competitive in the POY race during the homestretch of the year. “I definitely played in more tournaments than I normally would have. I didn’t play quite as many as some of the other players at the top, but I played a lot. It also solidified the fact that I’m doing something right. Poker is a game in which you can feel like you’re the smartest and the best one day, and then feel like you have no idea what you’re doing the next. I feel good, with all of the great players out there, that I had a year that was comparable to most of them. It reinforces that this was the correct career path for me, especially since a lot of people gave me a hard time about doing this when I gave up practicing law; a lot of people shrugged it off as something that was silly, or they thought I was being lazy. They thought that I didn’t want to work, but at this point, all of those same people are excited about what I’m doing. It has been a nice reinforcement, and makes me feel a little bit better about my decision.”

Setting Up a Future Endeavor?

For now, Jaffee is happy to see where poker will take him, and he says that he will continue playing as long as it remains fun and profitable. And if it doesn’t work out, he always has a law degree to fall back on. “I have no idea where I will be 20 years from now. If I make a lot of money in the next couple of years, it would put me in a good position to set up my own practice. Instead of starting at the bottom, I can skip the first couple of levels. It’s not traditionally the way that it happens, but it’s certainly not impossible. Hopefully, I can put away some money and potentially have that opportunity down the road,” said Jaffee.

In the immediate future, he is focusing on broadening his poker repertoire in order to play in as many tournaments as possible. “I’ve been trying to play a lot of eight-game lately. My first live eight-game mixed tournament was at the World Series this year, and I got seventh, but I definitely have a lot to learn. There is a lot of value in those games, so I want to play in as many live eight-game tournaments as possible,” he said.

“The more you play all of the games, the better the game selection you will have when you want to play online. When it comes to tournaments and cash games, people are better at some games than they are at others, so if you’re at a high skill level in all of the games, it will definitely give you a serious edge when you’re playing on a consistent basis. I don’t think I’m at that level. I have to improve in all of the games, but I feel like I’m getting close enough now that I should be putting myself in a position real soon to win consistently in all of the mixed games,” said Jaffee. ♠