PocketFives had the opportunity to sit with Jason JLaw Lawhun (pictured, ranked 17th in New Jersey), who relocated from Ohio to New Jersey for work purposes two years ago.

It turned out to be perfect timing, as online poker became legal in New Jersey, allowing him to fire up cash games and tournaments from the comfort of his own home.

Lawhun discovered his knack for poker in his college years at Ohio State when he would play weekly sit and gos with his friends. From there, he played as much as he could so that he could improve his game and bring in some extra cash. With over $81,000 in tracked online cashes, some of his notable accomplishments include making the PartyPoker/Borgata $50,000 Guarantee final table six times and also finishing third in the 888/WSOP $30,000 Guarantee for a total of $28,211.

Visit PocketFives’ New Jersey poker community for the latest news and discussion from New Jersey players.

PocketFives: Give us your thoughts and experiences of regulated online poker in New Jersey.

Jason Lawhun: Overall, I’m thrilled there is finally completely legalized online poker somewhere in the United States. It blows my mind that in this great country of ours, due to seemingly arbitrary laws, people had to move out to pursue their personal dreams of playing poker for a living.

Along those lines, I have a hard time understanding what differentiates the stock market or daily fantasy sports from poker. There are elements of luck involved in all of them, but winning is a matter of having more/better information than your opponent and being able to implement that information.

That being said, having legalized poker in New Jersey is definitely a step in the right direction. It’s really nice not to get any more questionable checks from the Bank of Singapore with instructions to tell my bank I received the money for participation in an “online contest” and not to mention poker. I feel more confident in the fairness of the games now with the backing of American companies that can have legal ramifications if fraud is discovered.

Once on the old Full Tilt site, I got an email stating that something like $22.31 was returned to my account because cheating was discovered in one of the games I was playing in, with no more details. It made me wonder how much I had been cheated out of in all of the time I played and who knows how they came up with their random number. I still worry about collusion in the games.

The biggest problem with the New Jersey online poker scene is, of course, the small player pool and limited selection of games. All of the games for any decent sized stake are dominated by tough regs. Most of the cash games I play in will have four to five regs and one guy I’ve never seen before who has a pretty slim chance of leaving the table with any money.

The tournaments with a buy-in of greater $50 seem to be the same 100 to 150 people every time, most of whom are pretty decent players. The player pool in New Jersey is certainly more difficult on average than the player pool in the days of the country-wide poker boom.

PocketFives: How did you get started in poker originally? Why was it appealing?

Jason Lawhun: The first time I played poker was in college at The Ohio State University (Go Buckeyes!). A friend of mine started a Thursday night poker game that usually played like a sit and go with first and second making money. We would play for $10 or $20 dollars a person, but I enjoyed it a lot and realized pretty quickly that I had a knack for the game.

I decided to deposit $50 on PartyPoker to see how I faired. After initially running it up, I lost the $50, but was hooked on the game. It seemed that poker, particularly Limit, was a mathematical-based game that could be “solved.” I figured if I could learn the theory behind the game I could make a lot of money and I enjoyed the mental challenge the game provided. I bought a bunch of poker books by David Sklanksy and tore through them (if you haven’t read any of his stuff, the guy is a poker genius).

I was soon beating the low-stakes limit poker tables to the point I could pay my living expenses while going to school. If I went on a down swing, I’d get a random job like delivering pizzas to build my bankroll back up. As time went on, I started getting bored with limit and started playing more no limit.

PocketFives: What are your favorite New Jersey online poker sites to play on and why?

Jason Lawhun: I’d have to go with PartyPoker as my favorite site in New Jersey. The main reason would be the slower structure of the tournaments compared to WSOP. I think there are a few more tournaments on WSOP, but once you get close to the money, it’s a short-stack shove-fest. Sometimes the big stack at the table will have 25 big blinds.

I have had more geo- location issues with PartyPoker (always infuriating, especially at final tables or after you raise in a cash game), but the slower tournament structure and better cash game selection narrowly wins over WSOP’s better software and tournament selection. If either site (or Poker Stars) can add some sit and go traffic, I’d go there.

PocketFives: What has been your most memorable cash or win on the New Jersey sites?

Jason Lawhun: I’d have to say that would be in August of this year. I final tabled both the Sunday $50,000 Guarantee on PartyPoker (took third) and the Sunday $30,000 Guarantee on WSOP (took fifth) on the same day. In the end, I took a few beats and couldn’t take down either one, but I felt like I played my A-game against some really tough competition. I consider this my top poker accomplishment, as they were the two biggest online tournaments offered in the state that week.

PocketFives: How many hours do you dedicate to poker a week?

Jason Lawhun: Prior to July of this year, pretty much the only tournament I played in was the Sunday $50,000 Guarantee on PartyPoker and the occasional cash game on the weekend. Then, I read Jared Tendler’s “The Mental Game of Poker” and got inspired to focus on tournaments and increase my volume to see how I’d do. I realized from the book I enjoy tournaments more than cash games even though it’s harder to consistently make money. Since then, I’ve probably been putting in 20 to 30 hours a week.

PocketFives: Do you feel online poker has helped improve your live game?

Jason Lawhun: Since I lived in Ohio until moving to New Jersey two years ago for work, I never got the chance to play in many live games. I actually just entered my first two live tournaments at the Borgata Poker Open in September. I went deep in both tournaments, cashing in one of them. I think years of playing online definitely prepared me well technically for the live tournaments, but I did realize that there are new aspects to the live game I’ll need to improve dramatically on.

PocketFives: What do you do away from poker? What else interests you?

Jason Lawhun: I’m a scientist in the Global Microbiology department of an industry-leading consumer products company, so that takes up the majority of my time. Other than that, I spend my time with my girlfriend and her two kids (who are great and supportive of my poker interests) and my best friend (who happens to be an English Pointer).

I enjoy exercising, reading, writing, inventions, the stock market, DFS, pretty much anything science related, and a lot of other random activities which I tend to take up in spurts. I’m also a huge Buckeyes, Browns, and Cavs fan (in that order).

Recently, I’ve been thinking about really analyzing my game and trying to take it to the next level. I’ve started looking at poker training sites and have been thinking about hiring a poker coach.