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Poker Profile – Ben Ponzio

Poker Profile – Ben Ponzio

About Ben Ponzio

Current ResidenceElmwood Park, Illinois
Born1975
Birth PlaceOak Park, Illinois
Total Winnings$753,434

Ben Ponzio Trivia

Many people dream of that one big win to change their life.  For poker players, that dream is winning a WSOP bracelet and a radio salesperson in Chicago, Illinois realized that dream back in 2007 when Ben Ponzio went to Las Vegas, played in the WSOP, and captured the $2000 No Limit event, winning $599k.

PLAYER SCORE8/10
Aggressiveness8
Looseness7
Limit9
No-limit9
Side Games8
Steam Control7
Against Strong Players9
Against Weak Players8
Tournaments8
Short-Handed7

Not Quitting Your Day Job

Ben Ponzio has been an Illinois guy all his life.  Growing up on the south side of Chicago, Ben went to high school at Fenwick High School, a private Catholic college prep school in Oak Park, Illinois.  After graduating, he went to complete his BA in Speech Communication at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, graduating in 1997.  After graduation, Ben got a job working as a senior account executive at Emmis Chicago, and volunteered at the Sheridan Carroll Charitable Works Foundation which works to alleviate poverty in eastern Illinois

In the early 2000’s, like many other people, Ben had caught the poker bug after the Moneymaker boom.  He started flying to Las Vegas to get his fix in and began playing the WSOP.  Playing $2k-$3k events, Ben cashed his first WSOP event in 2005, finishing 122nd in the $2k No Limit Hold’em for $2300. Two years later his biggest cash to date happened when he finished 3rd in a WSOP Circuit event in Southern Indiana for $6200.  He left for Las Vegas with a new baby at home and entered that same $2k NLH event.  And on his first Father’s Day, Ben struck gold, winning the event for $599k and his first bracelet.  When asked if he was going to quit his job, he said no because $600k is not enough to live on for the rest of my life.

Déjà vu??

With a name for himself, Ben returned to Las Vegas the next year to go for more gold and almost found it.  He entered the $2500 Deuce to Seven Triple Draw and ended up 5th, cashing for over $28k and still his second-best cash of his career. 

Since, Ben has not been able to catch lightning twice and his Las Vegas WSOP trips have not produced the same level of success as his trip in 2007.  The closest he has gotten to a second bracelet was bubbling the final table of two events: the $1500 Limit Hold’Em Shootout in 2009 and the $1500 HORSE Event in 2016

Ben the Casual WSOP & WSOP Circuit Grinder

Ben is still active on both the WSOP in Las Vegas and various circuit events.  He has 15 recorded cashes at the annual series for $672k including a cash at this year’s series in the $800 NLH Deep stack event, and 8 Circuit cashes for an additional $36k, his best result there was in 2019 in Hammond when he ran up his $1700 entry into the Main Event to $3100 and a top 100 placing.  He is also a regular on the Heartland Poker Tour when it rolls through Chicago, as Ben has an additional 7 cashes for $12k.  Overall, Ben has lifetime earnings of over $753k.

Fame And Fortune After the Bracelet?

Today, Ben spends much of his time as he did when he got into poker in the early 2000’s.  He still works in the radio industry, although now he’s a general sales manager with Audacy which owns over 230 radio stations across the US.  He is now the President of the Sheridan Carroll Charitable Works Foundation and is still working hard at eradicating poverty and hunger in Chicago.  His kids are teenagers now, but the poker driver is still alive and well within Ben.  Only time will tell if he’ll be able to re-discover his youth and a bit of luck to hold a second WSOP Bracelet again.

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