Poker Articles

Faraz "The-Toilet" Jaka has been a high-profile online tournament player for over a year.  Since joining PocketFives.com as an active forum member, his online accomplishments include wins in the UltimateBet $200k Guaranteed and PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up in back-to-back weeks.  He also won the Full Tilt Sunday Mulligan three months ago, but his largest tournament score had been winning the Full Tilt $1k Monday for nearly $85,000.  That is, until a few days ago, when he won the Los Angeles Poker Classic $1k preliminary event for $104,900.

With 4,146 Sliding PLB points, "The-Toilet" ranks among the Top 150 online tournament players in the world.  He respects the games of fellow Illinois players Andy "BKiCe" Seth and Ty "dabears87" Reiman, who are ahead of him in the Top 5 of online tournament players in the state of Illinois.  Ty was actually a student of Mr. Jaka 18 months ago.  He also credits "Chong94," "Kevlar," "The_Bao," "Psmoney," "Krispy23," and anyone in ThePokerhaus with helping him improve his game.  Before he reduced his online tournament volume to concentrate on his grades, he had moved up as high as #24 in the world at online tournament play, according to PocketFives.com.  He is currently a 4th year student at the University of Illinois at Urbana, where he will graduate this summer with a major in Economics and a minor in Business Administration.

In spite of his recent success at the poker tables, Faraz has his priorities straight.  In a February 26th interview with PocketFives.com, he had this to say when asked about his goals for the rest of the year.  "As far as 2008 goes, I am still in school finishing off my last semester, so I have to cut out on a lot of playing time to focus on grades.  I plan on playing in the 2008 WSOP, though.  In the long run, I consider myself an entrepreneur first and a poker player second.  I plan on traveling the EPT and WPT events all year long, but every now and then I will take a few months off to pursue some business ideas.  I plan on using the money I make from poker to finance investments in real estate, the stock market, and future entrepreneurial endeavors."

When asked about his tournament results, Faraz gave some insight into the way he sees himself as a poker player and of his tournament victories.  "The win in the $1k LAPC was very important to me because I claim to be a much stronger live player (than online), but I haven't had results to prove that because I am still in school and have played less than 20 live tournaments.  The win in the Full Tilt $1k was a bit different from the rest of the wins because I was up against such a strong field.  I attribute my success in that tournament to knowing the many strengths and weaknesses of all my opponents and finding ways to exploit them.  The UB $200k and PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up had huge fields with a lot of players.  I think people invest too much emotion into them and it hurts a lot when they go bust with 100 players left.  I try to detach myself emotionally and I think this helps me play the way I need to play and make moves when necessary."

"The-Toilet" plays a unique tournament style that many opponents find unpredictable.  "I've been known to play Loose Aggressive to the extreme at times, but also Tight Aggressive to the extreme.  I'm capable of playing all the gears out there, and it just depends on the table dynamics at the time.  Most live tournaments are a lot deeper stacked, so I do tend to get involved in more pots live."

It's unclear whether Faraz will pursue graduate school upon completing his undergrad studies this summer.  It's becoming clearer by the week that "The-Toilet" could be a force to reckon with, both online and live, for a long time to come.  Congratulations to Faraz for his victory in the LAPC $1k prelim event, and best of luck to him as he makes his case for a repeat appearance in the Top 100 of the PocketFives.com Rankings.