In less than a year, Joshua Beckley from Marlton, New Jersey started a promising tournament poker career that was honed on the virtual felts of New Jersey’s online poker and gaming industry. He is known as asdf26 on PocketFives.

—

Tournament Poker Edgeis the only poker training site dedicated exclusively to MTTs and features over 1,000 training videos, blogs, articles, podcasts and a dedicated strategy forum for members. Check Tournament Poker Edge out on Twitter.

—

When Day 7 of the 2015 World Series of Poker Main Event picked up for Day 7, Beckley was in the lower half of the 27 players remaining (22nd place), but will be armed with a substantial 3.745 million in chips.

Beckley’s first official US regulated online poker cash came at the now-defunct Ultimate Poker in New Jersey, when he finished in fourth place for $500 in a $5,000 Guaranteed $10 R&A tournament.

That finish only whetted his appetite for more New Jersey poker; between that and the 2015 Main Event, Beckley earned 56 cashes on the array of New Jersey online poker sites, topped by his best ever $2,405 win in a $3,000 Guaranteed Turbo on PartyPoker/Borgata in March 2015.

While Beckley has been able to do quite well for himself on the virtual baize of the Garden State’s online poker rooms, he has also acclimated himself adequately to the live version of the game. His first live cash came at the Parx Casino in Pennsylvania in August 2014 when he won a $1,500 No Limit Hold’em preliminary tournament on the Big Stax VII schedule for a $98,348 payday.

Not even a year since then, Beckley has been able to amass 18 cashes, including four at the 2015 WSOP, and earn $219,526 overall, a figure that has been eclipsed by Beckley’s finish in the top 27 of the Main Event.

Beckley hasn’t mixed it up frequently in the 2015 WSOP Main Event, but one particular hand put him, as one of the younger players in the field, against its oldest and potentially demonstrated the respect that Beckley has earned. After Beckley raised out of early position, 72-year-old European Poker Tour veteran Pierre Neuville protected his big blind and saw an 8-J-3 flop.

After both men checked, a deuce on the turn brought a check-raise from Neuville, which Beckley calmly called down. An ace on the river completed a potential flush draw and, after Beckley fired out for the first time in the hand, the wary Neuville pushed his hand to the muck.

Beckley entered the 2015 WSOP November Nine in seventh place.