A Poker Life: Justin Liberto

Justin Liberto was brought up playing cards, so it shouldn’t come as a shock that he’s now regarded as one of the top up-and-coming poker players on the circuit today. The 27-year-old poker pro burst onto the scene in 2013 with a final-table finish in the WSOP Millionaire Maker event, and has since made a World Poker Tour final table and won his first WSOP bracelet.

With $1.68 million in career tournament earnings, Liberto has been one of the more consistent players in a world where consistency is hard to come by. His 2015 campaign has been his best yet, with six final table appearances and two wins for nearly $900,000 total.

Poker Beginnings

Liberto is from Harford County, about 20 minutes north of Baltimore, Maryland. Although his family placed a priority on getting an education, Liberto was raised on card games.

“We played a lot of cards as a family,” Liberto said. “As early as six or seven years old, I was playing games like pitch and pinochle. My parents and grandparents were really into card games. There was a stretch where they were playing like three nights a week. It definitely came naturally to me. My grandfather would always comment on how absurd it was that I was playing with them at such a young age. The last thing he actually said to me was, ‘don’t stop playing cards,’ and obviously that advice turned out pretty well.”

Because of his fast start, Liberto had no problem jumping into hold’em when the poker boom happened, even as a high schooler.

“I started playing hold’em in the ninth grade after Moneymaker,” he recalled. “We would play $0.10-$0.25 or maybe $0.25-$0.50, but it wasn’t very stimulating to me at the time. It wasn’t until college that I began to take it more seriously.”

Liberto attended Virginia Tech University with the plan to get a degree in communications.

“I wanted to do something in sports marketing, but after graduation, I got a job in sales right away. I did that for about 18 months before I left to try and make it in poker. I didn’t hate the job or anything like that, it was just an issue with my hours. I was getting off work at 3 p.m., driving to the casino at Delaware Park and playing until 10 p.m. Finally, after doing that for a while and building up my bankroll, I decided to give poker a shot.”

The Big Score

Poker wasn’t an option in Maryland at the time, and the commute was killing him, so Liberto packed up and moved closer to a casino.

“I ended up moving to Philadelphia with my now wife and lived about 20 minutes outside of Parx. I grinded $2-$5 and $10-$10 for about a year and half. I was probably making $20-$25 per hour, but I still had a lot of leaks to plug.”

Liberto was a cash game pro, and rarely ventured into tournaments. But a trip to the World Series of Poker in 2013 changed his focus entirely.

“The Millionaire Maker was one of the first tournaments I really played after deciding to focus on that. I wasn’t really playing tournaments before that. Once I went out for WSOP, it’s been tournaments ever since.”

The $1,500 buy-in Millionaire Maker event drew a huge field of 6,343 entrants and Liberto navigated his way to a fourth-place finish. The $400,408 prize was a huge boost to his bankroll, and his confidence.

“My life changed drastically,” Liberto admitted. “Before that score, I was paying the bills, but everyone around me was still wondering whether or not poker was going to work out. It was a ‘shit or get off the pot’ situation. Then I had that cash, which was a huge relief not only financially, but now my parents could be proud to tell their friends what their son did for a living. Now, when people Google my name, there are big results attached to it.”

Avoiding The Variance

After that fourth-place finish, Liberto became a model of consistency on the tournament circuit. In 2014, he finished second in a WSOP Circuit event in Philadelphia for $71,664 and then followed that up with another second place score of $61,974 at the Parx Big Stax VI. Two weeks later, he got yet another second place finish at Parx, this time for $70,845.

“The general rule is that tournaments are a tough way to make a living and that if you can beat cash games, that’s the way to go. But fortunately for me, I was blessed with that first big score, so I never had to endure a long downswing or streak of mincashes. It’s just worked out.”

Liberto earned his first WSOP Circuit ring in December of 2014 and his second in March of 2015 in small tournaments, but for the most part had fallen short of a major victory. The trend continued when he took sixth place in the WPT Borgata Winter Poker Open for $140,878, followed by a runner-up showing at the Mid-States Poker Tour stop in Maryland for $42,966.

“I was feeling frustrated, but at the time I was making it more into a joke,” he admitted. “After the Millionaire Maker, I got interviewed and they asked me if I was disappointed because I didn’t win. Well, I would look like a huge asshole if I said I was disappointed after winning all of that money. But after getting all of those close calls, the need to win was there. I liked the money that came with all of those second-place finishes, but it was frustrating until I won this year.”

Scoring A Bracelet

The win Liberto references came this summer in the $3,000 buy-in WSOP six-max no-limit hold’em event. Finally, he was able to be the last man standing in a major event. For his efforts, he won the gold bracelet and the $640,711 first-place prize.

“Everything went right for me, all of the better players kept busting and I was able to avoid the good players that were still in until we were on the final table bubble. After that, I felt like it was my tournament to win.”

Although he was one of the better names at the final table, Liberto still found himself down more than 2-1 heads-up against Seamus Cahill for the title.

“We ended up having to stop play for the night and come back on day 4, but he wanted to know if we could work out a deal. I was open to the idea, but he wanted a little more than I was willing to give up. My friend Asher Conniff, who won the WPT Championship this year, looked at me and said, “It doesn’t feel like you want to do this.” And the truth was that I didn’t want to do it. So I went back to the table and told him, “I’m sorry, let’s just dance.” And after I said that line, I saw him sink back with a defeated look. Sure enough, in 30 minutes I had come back and won.”

If his previous fourth-place finish gave his parents something to be proud of, then his bracelet win gave them serious bragging rights.

“It was so gratifying. I was euphoric,” he said. “The outpouring of support that I got from friends, family, and even the poker community was overwhelming. I know I had won some small tournaments before, but this win was a relief for me as the guy who had come close before but didn’t get it done.”

Moving Forward

With nearly $1.7 million in tournament earnings in less than three years, Liberto find himself in a great position, especially with a new wife to support.

“Right now, I’m in a good spot where I don’t have to worry about the money as much, which is a great feeling. If I lost money for the next three years or something like that, then maybe I’d start to worry, but I’ve been blessed with having the atypical poker career that has gone smoothly for the most part.”

But perhaps the best part of being financially independent is that he doesn’t have to be chained to the poker table anymore.

“What’s great about it is that it gives me the opportunity to be picky,” he explained. “Now if I show up to the casino and sit down in a bad game, or even a good game with miserable people, I can simply get up and go home. I can afford to enjoy my time at the table more and not be so concerned with the grind.” ♠