tilted behaviour

Recently ESPN.com released a top ten list on poker players.

It’s extremely difficult to rank the top ten players right now given that there is no one specific tour in combination with the fact that any player can play online at any given. They didn’t take into account the all-time rankings when composing the list as they are their rankings are all about what is going on here and now.

The panel of poker insiders who created the top ten list were asked to take into consideration online and live play as well as cash games and tournaments.

I don’t want to dive into a heated debate on ESPN’s top ten list, but instead comprise my own Australian version taking into account only online and live tournaments – as that’s where I’ve spent most of my time working during this year – and I must note that consistent performance in big events outweighs one big performance in my eyes.

So here it is . . .

1 – Jeff Lisandro: Although he is regarded as Italian, Lisandro will always be regarded as Australian in my eyes, and consequently his top ranking was a near certainty. Winning one WSOP bracelet is achievement, but knocking up three in one series is incredible – even if they were won in games that didn’t produce the mega fields like holdem does. Throw in a WSOP final table bubble, two further WSOP cashes, a few deep runs in other holdem events along with a cash at the EPT London, and Lisandro has definitely had an formidable year amassing over $830,000 in earnings to take his career earnings to over $4 million.

2 – Jarred ‘FlopNutsOnYou’ Graham: After kicking off the year with a win in the $1,100 Six-Handed event for $26,000 at the Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series in Melbourne, he went on to place in the Main Event before finishing runner-up in the $5,200 High Stakes Holdem at the Melbourne Poker Championships for $55,000. Taking some time to focus on cash games, Graham returned to be victorious in the inaugural Sydney Poker Championships for $121,500 before falling one place short of defending his Six-Handed title and the second running of the Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series. However Graham would defend his APPT Sydney High Rollers title when he collected $156,000 for his efforts before bubbling the APPT Sydney Main Event final table for just over $30,000. Graham is easily Australia’s best all-round young player – and being only 20 years of age – who knows who high this kid can climb

3 – Stewart Scott: A relative no name to the wider poker community, Scott kicked off the year in the best shape any Australian could by winning the Aussie Millions Main Event, before final tabling the High Stakes Holdem event at the Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series. Scott then ventured to Las Vegas where he picked up a handy US$120,000 for his third place finish in a WPT preliminary US$5,000 event. Returning to Australia Scott managed to cash in the ANZPT Queensland Main Event before winning his second title for the year when he won the No Limit Holdem / Pot Limit Omaha Rebuy event at the Victorian Poker Championships for over $15,000 before finishing his poker year with an APT Macau Main Event cash to take his career earnings to a near $2.2 million.

4 – Daniel Neilson: 2009 has been a breakout year for the 22-year old from Sydney starting with a runner-up finish in an Aussie Millions event before winning the ANZPT Sydney High Rollers event for $103,000 along with three further cashes including one final table. Heading to the WSOP, Neilson managed to min-cash Event 32 before running deep in the Main Event; eventually falling in 73rd place for just under US$70,000. Neilson then followed that up two cashes the Victorian Poker Championships, including a 4th placing in the High Stakes Holdem event before heading to Macau to finish 2nd and 3rd in two preliminary events. Finishing the year with a PokerNews Cup Main Event cash, another High Stakes final table in Auckland, New Zealand and a 4th in the Macau Poker Cup Main Event saw Neilson pocket over $250,000 for the year and move into the top 50 of Australia’s All Time Money List.

5 – David Steicke: If I’m going to count Jeff Lisandro as an Australian, then I believe this guy fits the quota too. After collecting $1.2 million for winning the Aussie Millions $100,000 Challenge, Steicke went on to place 8th in the EPT Monte Carlo High Rollers event before winning the APT High Rollers event and then finishing 4th in the Main Event just a few days later. Three further cashes in Europe including a runner-up place in a High Rollers event before heading to Cebu where he picked up a win in one of the APPT preliminary’s to see his 2009 reap more than $1.6 million in tournament earnings. Although seemed as a bit of an ‘odd ball’ or ‘mad genius’ when it comes to how he plays poker, Steicke still manages to exceed everyone’s expectations and continue to notch up result after result and win after win.

6 – Jonathan ‘xMONSTERxDONGx’ Karamalikis: There has been no-one over my short poker reporting career that I have sweated more than this young boy out of Adelaide. Karamalikis kicked off 2009 with an unlucky runner-up finish in an Aussie Millions event for over $120,000 before winning the $1,650 Shorthanded Shootout event during the Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series. A cash in the Melbourne Poker Championships Main Event before bubbling the APPT Macau High Rollers Event saw Karamalikis slightly depleted in his form for the year. However, this extremely skilful young gun continued to strive online before capping off his year with two final tables at the ANZPT Sydney Grand Final. Karamalikis’ standards are set expectantly high, and although he may have had a disappointing 2009 in his eyes, his skills on the poker table will see him reap more than a small fortune in the years to come.

7 – Sam Khouiss: Although he may spit profanities at dealers and rant on about how bad he runs, Khouiss has stood the test of time on the tournament circuit since his first recorded cash back in 1997. Beginning his year with an Aussie Millions final table and a $36,000 score, Khouiss went on to cash in the Main Event before hitting up the next major championship with another final table in the ANZPT Melbourne Main Event when his 5th placing earned him just under $40,000. A regular visitor to the WSOP, Khouiss found two cashes, including one in the $10,000 World Championship Omaha Hi/Lo where he fell just shy of the final table. Returning to Melbourne for the Victorian Poker Championships, the loud Sydney-sider finished runner-up the High Stakes Holdem event before final tabling yet another Main Event; this time a 4th at the PokerNews Cup to take his year’s earnings to just on $250,000. His ability may be undermined by his character, but Khouiss proves to all his doubters that he has the skill, talent, capability or whatever it may be to go the distance in Main Event’s and big tournaments time after time.

8 – Steve Topakas: One of a handful of players to play the tournament circuit on a regular basis, Topakas has been one of the most consistent players this year registering cashes at nearly every major championship. Beginning the year with a runner-up finish in the Aussie Millions opening event for over $110,000, Topakas would collect another Aussie Millions cash before winning the Pot Limit Holdem / Omaha event at the Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series. Two cashes during the Melbourne Poker Championships were highlighted with his runner-up finish in the $1,100 Main Event for over $100,000 would prove that Topakas had what it took to surge through large fields. Three more cashes to round out the year would see Topakas sit just outside the top 40 of Australia’s All Time Money List. In some people’s eyes, Topakas may not be the best player to grace the felt, but his results do speak enough to see him slip just into the top eight list.

Now of course what I just spent 1,100 words describing will probably upset many people out there and I can understand why!

Why a top eight list? How about this person and that person? Does he really deserve to be there?

Firstly I do a lot of things in eights – my tournament reviews, the little stars a few eye levels up and the fact that I’m a halfy – or maybe I just couldn’t decide on a nine and ten!

Of course there are the honourable mentions such as Lee Nelson, Van Marcus, Joe Cabret, Con ‘tsapy’ Tsapkounis, Grant ‘grunter’ Levy, Joel ‘StrongPlay’ Dodds and a few young guns that have been impressive such as Andrew Hinrichsen and Julian Cohen – and without doubt many others – but this is what I believe to be the top eight tournament players of 2009 – with a major emphasis on results, and most importantly consistency.

Please, with a cherry on top, give me some feedback on my list in the comments section, and please feel free to post your own list.

It was an unfortunate day on the cricket pitch today.

Well personally anyway as we locked up first innings points by bowling out last year’s premiers for 100 and making the score and a further 40 by the end of play. There is no need to talk about my dismal performance at the batting crease . . . let’s just say I should be back in the seconds soon enough if I continue to play this bad . . . 0*, 80*, 32*, 31, 0 (* = not out).

Afterwards I met up with my cousins for a family get together as my cousin Scottie and his girlfriend were in town visiting everyone.

Now this might not sound like a big deal, but back when we grew up our cousins were always closer than any of our friends, and as we were all close in age we spent holidays and weekends together. However with most of us growing up and going our separate ways in terms of living and working, it’s always hard to just randomly meet up for a catch up even though there are fourteen of us just on Mum’s side of the family!

Dinner was at an Indian restaurant in town, and after a quick stop off at Cold Rock for some much needed dessert, we headed back to Adam’s house to continue a recently started tradition of playing video games all night!

Last time it was Buzz, but this time Adam had a new toy with DJ Hero and we all took shots at becoming DJ Jazzy Jeff all night long!

DJ Hero follows the same concept of Guitar Hero and has a controller based on a turntable. There are three buttons to activate accented beats while you scratch away and adjust their crossfade between songs. There are over 80 remixes of two different songs from a selection of over 100 songs across numerous genres; for example Daft Punk megamixes, Vanilla Ice mixed with MC Hammer and even Jackson 5 mixed with Third Eye Blind!

This is simply one of the greatest games I’ve played in ages, and being able to mix some old school classics with new pop songs, some corny but cool graphics and great songs and music quality nearly – actually – does beat a night out at the club . . . once you minus the drunk randoms, overload of guys and cramped space.

Just check out this sample from the game with Kid Cudi’s Day N Nite mixed with the Black Eyed Peas Boom Boom Pow.

Today I made another decision that will change my life forever.

Today I decided that I am going to get a new dog!

Just a few of the puppies I’m looking at

The three and a half people that read this website on a regular basis would most likely know that my family dog Goldie passed away a few months ago.

I do still think about Goldie on regular basis, and not having him round while I’m home is a really big downer. I’m really surprised that I miss him sleeping next to the couch snoring his head off or moping round the house slowly . . . but I do! Therefore deciding to get a new dog was an idea that has continued to grow and evolve until now when it seems so logical.

I would never want to get another Beagle – and after dog-sledding in Alaska with my Dad back in 2002 – I’ve always had a love for a Siberian Husky / Alaskan Malamute.

Now they are both slightly different, and I’m yet to decide on which one to get, but my only solid decision so far is that I want to get a female – but even that idea could change.

So I’m putting the call out there to anyone that frequents Tilted Behaviour . . . if you know of anyone or you yourself have some knowledge on these dogs, please drop a comment on this post or send me an email.

Today I made a decision that will most likely change my life forever.

Correction.

It will change my life forever!

Today I decided that I will be purchasing a . . . wait for it . . . a Nintendo Wii Console!

Yes the picture is large . . . but that is to reinforce the dramatic nature of such a huge decision!

Now you all might be thinking how the hell is buying a Wii such a big life-changing decision? So let me break it down for you.

Beginning my gaming days with a Super Nintendo before moving on to a PlayStation and then a PlayStation 2 – combined with a GameBoy here and a few PC games there – my inner Asian nerd wouldn’t be satisfied until I took the next step and evolved my current gaming situation.

With currently three superior gaming platforms on the market –XBox 360, PlayStation and the Wii – it was always going to be a tough decision about what platform would be next in line to drain my brain cells of precious life and continue my evolution to an albino due to lack of sun.

The XBox 360 is the older of the above mentioned platforms, but that doesn’t mean it lacks an edge in the gaming market. I believe that the XBox 360 is the leader in online gaming, and since I don’t have any real need for that, it was ruled out early on.

For the past few months I have had my eyes locked firmly on purchasing a PlayStation 3 after testing it out at a few different friend’s houses. The graphics were phenomenal and the game play was unbelievable – and in reality there was no doubt about it – the PlayStation 3 was what I wanted! The only problem . . . the cost . . . but that has now been solved with prices plummeting downward so that the plebs of society (myself) can now afford one.

So you must now be thinking how does the Nintendo Wii even get a mention? Technically the PlayStation 3 may be far superior, but I believe that the Wii offers more than it’s Sony counterpart. Games that interest me; such as FIFA 09 and FIFA 10 and the soon to be released FIFA 11, are all available on Wii with the same capabilities as on the PlayStation 3 and XBox 360 versions. Combined with the ability to alter controllers into guns, steering wheels and tennis racquets to play the vast range of non-FIFA games is a massive plus. Throw in Wii Sports, Sports Resort and Wii Fit and my inner Asian nerd may actually get off his fat ass and bowl some strikes or hit a home run.

Considering that I’m starting to get old, the need for a gaming console that could entertain a more mature group of friends that don’t spend their time cracking level 17 on Super Mario Kart or playing ten tables a day for fifteen hours was also a positive. This is where the Wii Sports and other such interactive games push the Wii into the number one spot in my search for a new gaming platform!

I hope now you can understand that choosing a gaming platform is truly a life-changing decision that shouldn’t be rushed, but heavily thought about, so that the inner Asian nerd in everyone can be completely satisfied when his or her eyes turn square!