Chris Ferguson
Chris "Jesus" Ferguson ( born April 11, 1963 in Los Angeles ) is an American professional poker player.
Ferguson attended the University of California, Los Angeles ( UCLA), where he received his doctorate in 1999 in the field of computer science (focus on Artificial Intelligence ). He studied for five years before his first degree and 13 years as a university graduate. His doctoral advisor was Leonard Kleinrock. Both parents Fergusons have a PhD in mathematics. His father, Thomas Ferguson, teaches game theory at UCLA.
Ferguson played with nine years of poker. In college, he whetted his skills through IRC Poker, where he played in chat rooms about money. In 1994 he began tournaments in California to visit and 1995 he participated for the first time at the World Series of Poker. Ferguson defeated TJ Cloutier in the main event at the World Series of Poker 2000 and so won the prize money of U.S. $ 1,500,000.
He is the only player who has won three titles at the World Series of Poker Circuit tournaments. He won in Las Vegas and San Diego and won more than 1.2 million U.S. $.
In 2005, Ferguson finished the National Heads-Up Poker Championship second behind Phil Hellmuth. He made it to the finals again in 2006, but came back only to the second place, this time behind Ted Forrest. In 2008 he finally succeeded to prevail in the final against Andy Bloch and thus won $ 500,000.
Ferguson received the nickname "Jesus" by his trademark long, brown hair and beard. In April 2006, Chris Ferguson took on the challenge, from $ 0 to win an amount of $ 10,000. He started with freerolls and needed seven months to get to $ 6.5. After another nine months he reached the $ 10,000 mark. He donated the money won Save the Children.
In February 2007, Ferguson won a copy of Poker After Dark and cashed $ 120,000. He defeated heads-up Tony G.
His playing style is regarded among the established poker players to be extremely tight. In the early years of his career, his decisions were based solely on the mathematics of poker, and therefore he is next to Andy Bloch as " mathematician of Poker" (English: "math guy" ) (citing Chris Ferguson: " If you think the math isn ' t important, you do not know the right math " - in German: If you think that the mathematics [ poker ] is not important, you do not know the right math ). In tournaments him these abilities are of great advantage, but make it in the big cash games to a more dangerous player. He earned his livelihood accordingly - unlike most of his colleagues - almost exclusively with tournaments. In recent years, Ferguson has his style of play by his own admission somewhat changed, as he became more and more predictable by its increasing awareness of other players, who knew him from television. Although he has maintained the extremely tight player's image, but is now also able to play unconventional.
Previously, he won more than $ 8.2 million in poker tournaments. His most last tournament he played in December 2010.
Full Tilt Poker
Ferguson was a member of the design team of Full Tilt Poker, an online poker site, which opened in July 2004.
On 20 September 2011 the U.S. Department of Justice file a civil complaint against Full Tilt Poker. Chris Ferguson, Howard Lederer and Rafe Furst were accused of having embezzled as managing client funds. Ferguson's lawyer denied the accusations and resulted in the collapse of Full tilt poker on management failures back .. On February 20, 2013, included a comparison. Without his guilt, he paid a fine of an unspecified amount.