World Series of Poker Spotlight -- Sorel MizziMizzi Looks to Take Home His First WSOP Bracelet After Two Close Calls |
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Sorel Mizzi takes the chip lead into the final table of Event No. 21 ($1,500 seven-card stud) at the 2010 World Series of Poker this afternoon at 3 p.m. PDT. You can follow along with the action in Card Player’s live coverage of the final table. Today’s WSOP spotlight takes a look at the young star, who could win his first gold bracelet by the end of the night.
To win consistently in the new age of poker a player needs to possess the ability to win across continents and time zones. Few players have been better at that during the last two years than young poker professional Sorel Mizzi (pictured right). He has cashed in poker tournaments in five different countries during the first five months of 2010, and he has racked up 3,542 Card Player Player of the Year points thanks to a dozen cashes and four tournament victories. This puts him in second place in the current standings. His biggest victory came when he won the $7,500 East Coast Championship at the Borgata Spring Poker Open and took home $170,313, while he scored his largest cash in 2010 at the Aussie Millions main event where he cashed in third place for $638,004.
Mizzi has lived in various parts of the world recently, and thanks to his online poker background as “Imper1um,” he is used to playing poker for long sessions at all hours of the day and night. These factors have helped him develop a strong form of the new poker stamina that is required to compete well consistently on the global tournament trail. It is hard to find a player who has cashed in a dozen different countries during their career, while Mizzi has accomplished the feat during his first few years playing in live poker tournaments.
Despite his globe-trotting prowess, Mizzi still has yet to win a prize on poker’s biggest stage at the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas. His results haven’t been bad during three tours of duty at the Rio, but the fact that he still doesn’t own a gold bracelet might surprise you. In 2007 he scored three cashes, including a deep run in the main event, wherein he cashed in 208th place out of 6,358 runners. He cashed two more times in Las Vegas in 2008 and followed that with his first WSOP final table in Europe at the £5,000 pot-limit Omaha event, where he earned $237,976 for a second-place finish.
He booked another runner-up finish at the 2009 WSOP in a $5,000 pot-limit Omaha event that netted him $253,048. Last year was his best showing to date, with five cashes overall, including another deep run in the main event, where he finished in 366th place out of 6,494 players. Despite the consistent results he has posted, Mizzi says he is just now becoming really comfortable with live play, and that could make him quite dangerous in 2010.
“I’m really starting to get the hang of live poker. I have become more confident in my game, and I tackle situations a lot differently than I used to,” said Mizzi.
He recently appeared on The Poker Edge radio show on ESPN.com after he had won four tournaments in the span of six weeks. On the show he made an interesting comparison between his recent success in poker and a prior pursuit in his life. Mizzi used to play volleyball in high school and he said that one day everything just clicked for him on the court and he took his game to the next level. He couldn’t define any one change he made that affected his improvement after years of playing volleyball, but he attributed it to the sum total of time he had committed to practice and games. He admits that his recent improvement in live poker is also thanks to a commitment of time and overall efforts. He is now much more comfortable with his game and the rhythms of live play.
Mizzi is now very confident and dangerous in every location he plays, whether the poker is online or live. The confidence and results he has achieved so far this year have also given him a goal.
“It has been my goal to win the player of the year awards. I really want to go for that, and I think that right after I came in third at the Aussie Millions I was in the top 10. That’s when I decided I was going to go for it this year,” said Mizzi. “It has helped my focus because once you have a clear-set goal, you care a lot more. I always care, but now I have a goal and this is what I want to do. When I set my mind to something, I feel like I’m really good at following through and achieving it.”
Another strong run at the 2010 WSOP should help Mizzi achieve that goal, especially if he wins his first gold bracelet this summer in Las Vegas.
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