Jake Balsiger May Leave Poker and Return to School
Jake Balsiger, who is currently taking part in the Aussie Millions 2014 Main Event, may not continue playing poker for long.
Balsiger had finished third in the World Series of Poker (WSOP) 2012 Main Event. He had played against Jesse Sylvia and Greg Merson for more than 11 hours before busting and taking home a third-place prize of $3.8 million, which definitely changed his life for the better. He was only 21 when this happened.
His spectacular WSOP success led to 888 Poker signing a sponsorship deal with him. This gave him the opportunity to travel all over the world and take part in live poker tournaments. He reached the final table thrice and became the runner-up of a side event in the Aussie Millions 2013.
Balsiger enjoys playing poker in Melbourne. Talking about playing poker at the Crown, he said: “It’s a really friendly environment. Aussies are very cool—I like talking at the table because a lot of them are recreational players and they have a lot of fun. Their life stories are awesome, and I like getting recommendations for things to do around here, different beaches and things like that.”
Balsiger likes Melbourne so much that he has decided to stay on for some time post Aussie Millions. In the middle of January, he tweeted: “Moving to Australia today for the next three months to play Aussie Millions and get my yearly kangaroo fix.”
He is currently playing the fourth day of the Aussie Millions 2014 Main Event. Earlier, he had a short stack, but soon overcame the situation. Sharing his experiences, Balsiger said: “It was just lucky on my part. I had 17 bigs, Eoghan O’Dea opened in the cutoff and I shoved with nines. He had ace-seven and called, there was an ace on the turn and I stood up. Then the nine came on the river, and it’s the second or third time it’s happened this tournament, which is pretty sweet.”
Even if he continues to play well, poker is not the only thing in Balsiger’s life at present. He says that he is mostly focusing on poker, but wants to become a history teacher as it is what he has always wanted to do.
He does not have any concrete plans though. But he has expressed a desire to go back to Arizona to graduate in history. When he took part in the WSOP 2012 Main Event, he was a senior student at the Arizona State University (ASU). However, he couldn’t focus on his studies as he was busy playing poker and was hardly on campus. When he was busy taking part in the Aussie Millions 2013, he had no time to study and had to drop out.
Balsiger may return to school sometime in the near future, but right now, he has just completed the third day of the Aussie Millions 2014 Main Event with chip stack of 588,000. If his good luck persists, he will win another large poker pot in one of the world’s biggest poker events.
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