Full Tilt's Kelly Kim -- WSOP Main Event InterviewKelly Kim Talks About His Opponents and His Main Event Journey |
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From David toppling Goliath to Rocky Balboa battering Apollo Creed, everybody loves an underdog. As the final table of the WSOP Main Event approaches, there's no bigger long shot bet than Californian Kelly Kim. Kim survived by the skin of his teeth to get this far and will take just 2.6 million in chips with him to the table, the shortest stack by a considerable margin.
Yet, as everybody knows, No-Limit Hold'em is a fickle game and just one double-up would see Kelly Kim back in the thick of things. Before this summer Kim had been a member of the quiet crowd of thousands that make a decent living from poker without ever threatening to set the world on fire. Some great play throughout the week of the Main Event put a change to all that though and he now has the opportunity to make a real name for himself at this final table.
Surely winning the thing from his position was unthinkable though? When CardPlayer caught up with the man himself, he didn't seem to think so and if he gets a good start, it could turn out to be one of the most memorable comebacks in poker since Jack Strauss was left with just a chip and a chair.
CP: Even though you weren't a known name before the Main Event, you had had a fair degree of success in tournaments before this.
KK: Success is maybe an overstatement. I'd had some deep runs but it would always go wrong at the end. I got really frustrated with tournaments. I would play so hard, so good and so well but after all poker is a lot of luck, especially at the end of tournaments. By the end, I couldn't handle it anymore. But the Main Event is the Main Event so I had to play in this one.
CP: How did you get into poker in the first place?
KK: At high school we would play games and I really enjoyed playing cards in general. Then I went to college in San Diego where there were lots of Indian reservation casino that I was old enough to get into. I discovered Texas hold'em there. I stared playing limit hold'em and by my third year in college I was using that as my income.
After college I got a job but found that I was still playing poker twenty hours a week and making more money from that. Eventually I gave up my job to play poker. I see playing poker as running a business. You have to be smart about it in terms of the risks you take and I wouldn't change anything. I'm glad I finally made the plunge to play full-time. You can't put a price on your freedom and honestly, working a nine-to-five just wasn't for me.
CP: How did the Main Event play out for you?
KK: The Main Event was a rollercoaster. Day One I had above average and then on Day Two I did really well before I lost a sick pot at the end of the day that nearly crippled me. I ended the day with exactly 100,000 so I started Day Three a little below average. That day was a struggle. Only forty spots away from the money bubble and I only had about fifteen big blinds, and then I won a key double-up just before the bubble. I cruised through Day Four but Day Five was a huge struggle and I could never get above 800,000 all day until right at the end when I got a huge double-up. I had A-J on a jack-high flop with three hearts against some other guy's A-10, with the ten of hearts. I had to call off my whole stack and that got me up to 1.7m.
CP: Making big calls like that must have filled you with confidence?
KK: I'm not sure if confidence is the right word. I'd never been in that situation before. There was only 100 or so players the money payouts were really flat until you got to the top 50. In that hand, I had to make the right read but also my hand to hold too. I went with my read and made it but at the same time I have never had that sort of intensity in live poker before. I had to let out a big scream when my hand held out!
Day Six put me in a position to get to the final table. I started the day with 2.5m and halfway through the day I was already up to 9m. Everything was going right, people were making mistakes against me and I made my way into the top three or our in chips. At that point I adjusted my strategy to try and maintain my stack. With just 27 left I finished the day with 9m chips, which was sick. But then Day Seven was absolutely the opposite. Nothing worked, I struggled a lot and I was so short with 14 players left, but just managed to squeeze in.
CP: Just getting to the final table with your short stack must have been like winning the tournament in itself. But how were those closing stages knowing how much is riding on you making it to the final nine?
KK: I think I had the most pressure on me. Playing the short stack is one of my biggest strengths in tournament poker but at that moment with that intensity level at that time in the Main Event I can't really express the amount of pressure I felt properly. It was just so overwhelming. I just had to settle down and survive. Surviving is the key in this tournament. You have to survive every day. Early in that day when I started off so deep I wanted to put myself in a position to win the tournament but things just didn't go my way. I bled off lots of chips, I never had Aces or Kings and never got in situations where I flopped anything big. I was just haemorrhaging chips.
Many people don't understand that this tournament is about pot control and preservation though. Too many want to play power poker and ship it in, make big bluffs and all that. But you don't need to, it's about surviving. The game of poker has changed tremendously in the last five or six years and at this point I feel it's better to play tight and just pick situations out with this structure. I'm really proud of myself that I didn't just go with a hand and try and force it. I'm realistic to know that in my lifetime I'll probably never be in this situation again. I thought to myself that every decision I make could determine whether or not I would have the chance to become the world champion. That affected all of my decisions.
CP: Do you feel as though you've done the hard work now and everything from here on in is just a bonus?
KK: Well, I hope I can win it. I dream about winning it. But realistically, everything from here on is just a bonus. When you look at the whole scheme of things and the amount of money on the table – humans are greedy by nature – so I can't stop but think of what that would be like. To just get here is so huge. I played for that and I could have gambled earlier to get a bigger stack but that wasn't my approach.
CP: Is it almost easier to deal with the pressure because you are such a big underdog?
KK: It's easier in the sense that if I finish 9th nobody is going to be disappointed. You would think the pressure is not on me but there definitely is because I'm never going to be in a similar position where I'm playing for the same amounts of money. I have a lot to play for and not much to lose on the surface but I still want to make the most of it.
CP: Which of you opponents at the final table do you respect the most?
KK: I haven't played with all of the players that much. Of the ones I've played with though, I really respect Peter Eastgate's play. He's a young kid but he's well seasoned in tournament poker as far as knowing when to play big pots and when to slow down. Chino impresses me. The guy plays for the moment and is willing to make the moves that I'm not willing to risk. There's a lot to be said for that, even if you do bust out sometimes at the expense of going for the win at all times.
Ivan Demidov is pretty scary. He has such controlled aggression. He will generally play pretty tight but then out of nowhere he will make a huge move and you have no idea if he really has it or not. There are no big name pros here but I think everybody in the group plays pretty well.
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