Capture The Flag: Poker Pro Brian Tate

Bobby’s Room regular Brian Tate has quickly ascended to the top of the cash game world. In just a few short years, he has gone from playing mix games at stakes of $75-$150 all the way up to $1,000-$2,000.

The 26-year-old Michigan native arguably could be considered “one of the best players few have ever heard of,” but that could obviously change quickly. Tate, who said he will likely play no more than 10 tournaments this summer thanks to the cash game action, will surely be a force to be reckoned with in some events at the 2014 World Series of Poker.

Card Player had the chance to speak with Tate about his poker beginnings, as well as what the big cash games are like during the summer poker festival.

Brian Pempus: So, how did you get started in poker?

Brian Tate: At a very young age I played Magic: The Gathering with friends. We started out playing casually and worked our way up to playing more competitive events like the pro tour. As most players know, these skills transfer over quite well and gave me a competitive start in the poker world. My best friend Brandon Demes started playing on PartyPoker and quickly realized there was more money in the poker world than Magic. So at 17 I used my parents’ credit card and made my first $50 deposit. I had made roughly $1,000 from Magic, and lost it at small games before I started to eventually win.

BP: Was that first deposit nerve racking? Did you have to keep poker a secret?

BT: It was a secret for the first month or so. They didn’t find out until I cashed in a tournament for $1,700 and needed to tell them to expect a check in my dad’s name. At first they were excited; this was a ton of money to us. Their excitement quickly went away when they realized I was playing online poker for real money. They thought it was still gambling and likely still do. The only thing that may have changed is their trust in me over the years as my success grew.

BP: Did you know right away that you wanted to play for living?

BT: Definitely not. I was doing well in school and had plans to go to college and eventually medical school. Poker was a completely separate path and seemed to fit at the time, giving me a little bit of financial freedom I wasn’t used to. This was actually a key point in my life, when I decided to play full time. I was living in Michigan with Brandon and our girlfriends who happened to be sisters. I was going to college at Grand Valley State University, and we were playing online at the time, and we went to Los Angeles for a weekend vacation. On our return trip we had a layover in Arizona, a state that I had never been to before. Brandon’s dad lived there for a while, and we always wanted to move out west. He jokingly said that we should just stay there and not go back to Michigan. The four of us must have been pretty crazy, because that joke quickly turned into serious planning.

After some phone calls to family we decided to skip our flight and go apartment shopping. They wouldn’t let us take our bags off so we went back to Michigan, packed up, and drove all of our stuff out a week later. This was the biggest moment in my poker career. I decided to not continue college and instead play poker full time in Arizona.

BP: Was your bankroll big enough at the time to make this all affordable?

BT: Not really. Looking back it was a very irresponsible move. I had recently taken a $10,000 student loan out and most of the money was deposited onto Full Tilt Poker. This was also before I had ever played live poker, other than $10-$20 limit hold’em at Soaring Eagle Casino. I was 20 at the time, so not quite able to play in most casinos yet. After the move I found Casino Arizona was only 10 minutes away, which had maybe the best limit hold’em games in the country at the stakes I wanted to play ($40-$80 to $75-$150). It was a total coincidence.

BP: Has it sunk in how big of a gamble it was? Especially taking out a student loan to play online? How did you go about building your roll big enough to play 75-150?

BT: Yeah, now that I’m much more responsible and understand variance much more, I realize how crazy that was to take that risk. I played a lot of $20-$40 first and just worked my way up from there, adjusting to live play was difficult for me at first. I guess I kind of played super fast and like a robot. I eventually realized there is a ton of different information you get at a live poker table. There are many exploitative plays you can make to get a bigger edge than you ever could online.

BP: But online definitely prepared you for it?

BT: Yes, coming from online I had a very large edge over most of the players with no online experience. I thought about the game differently. I had played millions of hands online and my fundamentals were definitely solid. I definitely lacked the live aspect of the game, though. Some players weren’t all there fundamentally but would make great exploitative plays that I didn’t understand at the time. I eventually learned to respect both sides of the coin, a tough game theory oriented style and the ability to adjust it to maximize your edge.

BP: Can you give some specific examples of fundamental skills online gave you that others in those live games didn’t have? Like certain strategic concepts about limit hold’em.

BT: Well, the biggest one with limit hold’em is balance. Basically you want it to be hard for your opponent to put you on a hand. So you want to play your big hands the same way you play your draws or bluffs. A lot of live players at the time didn’t grasp this. They might take a line with a draw that they would never ever take with a big hand, or vise versa. This would allow someone to make an exploitative fold or call that they may not normally be able to make.

BP: Can you detail how you moved up from those stakes to where you are at now?

BT: I played at Casino Arizona for roughly four years. During this time most of the action there changed from limit hold’em to mix games. Right before Black Friday I started playing deuce-to-seven triple draw online. Once online poker went down I was sort of thrown into the $75-$150 mix at Casino Arizona, forced to learn on the spot. They played a crazy mix consisting of baducey, badacey and even some made up games like any-high, any-low triple draw. Once I was comfortable there I started making trips to Commerce Casino in Los Angeles. Moving to $200-$400 was another big step. After getting more comfortable with that limit I decided I should play there full time. This is when I moved to Santa Monica. Two years later I began playing more often in the bigger games in Las Vegas.

BP: Is hold’em your strongest game in the mix?

BT: Not anymore. I have put a lot of work into some of the other games. I would say my strongest games are badugi and deuce-to-seven triple draw. I just started playing them. The biggest thing is thinking about spots away from the table. Discussing hands with other players is crucial.

BP: How are the mixed games in Las Vegas during the WSOP compared to the rest of the year?

BT: Year round there is a pretty consistent game, $800-$1,600 to $1,000-$2,000, mostly consisting of Vegas regulars and whoever happens to be in town at the time. During WSOP everyone is here, so there are many games around that limit with different types of mixes.

BP: Is the WSOP the time of year where you expect to make the majority of your money for the year?

BT: Not for cash games. It’s a very intense two-month period, and I will put in a crazy amount of hours over that time, but the games are somewhat similar in size to the games that run year round. They are much better, because a lot of new players who aren’t as familiar with the games are in town. So my win rate will be higher, but it’s not like tournaments where there will be a single year-defining score.

BP: How do you go about finding some sort of schedule in the summer? Or do you throw it out the window and just play until you are basically falling asleep if the you think the game is great?

BT: One of my biggest flaws as a poker player is scheduling. I try to eat healthy and keep a regular gym routine, but I have a very hard time leaving a good poker game. This likely hurts me in the long run. My schedule will usually just adapt to whatever schedule the game is on. I start a lot of games and play till most games break. If I notice that I’m not focused because I’m falling asleep at the table, and it’s negatively affecting my play, I’ll consider quitting, or ordering an espresso. I might choose the espresso option more than I should. This all depends on the quality of the game of course. There are occasionally games that are extremely special, where quitting before the game breaks really isn’t an option.

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