Dan Smith
About Dan Smith
| Current Residence | Las Vegas, NV, United States |
| Born | February 23, 1989 |
| Birth Place | Manalapan Township, NJ, United States |
| Total Winnings | $39,347,109 |
Dan Smith Trivia
- Was considered the strongest player without a bracelet until 2022.
- GPI Player of the Year in 2012.
- Currently 8th on the world’s All-Time Money list.
- Nicknames: King Dan, Truck Dan, Cowboy Dan.
- Online alias: Danny98765.
| PLAYER SCORE | 9,4/10 |
|---|---|
| Aggressiveness | 9 |
| Looseness | 9 |
| Limit | 9 |
| No-limit | 10 |
| Side Games | 9 |
| Steam Control | 9 |
| Against Strong Players | 9 |
| Against Weak Players | 10 |
| Tournaments | 10 |
| Short-Handed | 10 |
Dan Smith is one of Americas finest card players around. For a decade he is already part of the High Roller scene and travels all over the world to compete to the best poker players on earth. Smith, started off his career when he was just 16 years old. Two years later, when he reached the legal age to play poker, he dropped out of school to pursue his poker career. He was studying in college and was let in based on a chess scholarship.
Poker Career Starting Off With a Bang
His first cash dates to 2008, where he won the Heartland Poker Tour Main Event in New York, for a whopping $101,960. The first cash in his career and another 173 cashes would follow, which is an extraordinary number, even for a poker professional. The first two years of his live poker were productive and decent, but it took until 2012 where he took down the $100,000 Challenge during the Aussie Millions, beating the likes of Tony G, Joe Hachem and Mikhail Smirnov. Not long after, he did something what nobody has achieved ever before, he won 3 major events within the range of 5 days.
Dan the Millionaire Dollar Man
In April 2012, during the EPT Monte Carlo Grand Final, he won first the 5K 6max turbo event for a little over $200,000, one day later he scooped the victory in another 5K Texas No-Limit Hold'em event for $330,724. 3 days later he took down another 5K 6max event for $155,790. An impressive result and it would become even better throughout this special year for him.
Dan Smith was until this year, where he won a bracelet in a Heads-Up tournament, famous about being one of the few best players in the world who didn’t manage to win a bracelet during the World Series of Poker. In 2012 he was close with a 3rd place, but it wasn’t enough. After the WSOP, at the EPT Barcelona he managed to take down the 50K high roller event for $1,183,100. The European Poker Tour had been very nice to him, and to finish it off in style he took down a 5K 6max event during the EPT in Prague, the last stop of that year. Dan was on a heater and got awarded as GPI Player of the Year due to six tournament wins and many other cashes. Online he had also cashed big, winning the Sunday million for example for $219,504 in November.
The next year he won with the World Poker Tour in Las Vegas another big event, collecting $1,161,135. Fast forward to the next year where he won again an amount above the million dollars. During the Super High Roller in Las Vegas with a buy-in of $102,000 he managed to leave the whole felt behind him and taking it down for $2,044,766. As mentioned before, he didn’t win a bracelet until 2022, but he was very close many times. In 2016 during the WSOP event #62 he became third, and two days later he became 2nd in the High Roller for One Drop after losing the Heads-Up battle from German poker sensation Fedor Holz. With his 2nd place came a prize of $3,078,974. This type of tournament is the biggest buy-in level in the world, so was the event in 2018 where the buy was One Million dollars. Again, he was very close with a 3rd place, and quadrupled his investment, losing again from Fedor Holz, and from later winner Justin Bonomo.
Triton Poker Tour and Charity
In August 2019 it was time for event #2 of the Tritton Million for Charity event in London. The event had a buy-in of one million dollars. The total prizepool was over 65 million dollars and Dan became 3rd for his biggest ever cash to date, $8,765,628!! The controversial Bryn Kenney became 2nd and the Chinese Aaron Shu Nu Zang took down the event after having made a deal with Bryn.
During the corona pandemic period there was a short stop on live games Dan Smith, who is also a regular at the online real money poker sites, crushed the events hard with 3 major wins. In 2022 alone, his number of cashes is already on 19, including his bracelet win during the Heads-Up event of the World Series. He bested a field of 64 entries and won the final heads-up against another German poker star, Christoph Vogelsang. There are not many players in the world who are besting the results of Dan Smith in poker. With all his success, he is above all, a very nice personality and is collaborating with ‘The Life You Can Save’ foundation, to raise millions for people in need. All this via his own organization called ‘Double Up Drive’.
Dan Smith Tournament High Scores
| Date | Tournament Name | Buy-In | Place | Cash Prize |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan/12 | Aussie Millions 100K Challenge | $ 100.000 | 1st | $ 1,041,828 |
| Aug/12 | European Poker Tour, Barcelona | $ 50.000 | 1st | $ 1,183,100 |
| Jun/14 | Super High Roller, Las Vegas | $ 100.000 | 1st | $ 2,044,766 |
| Jul/16 | WSOP #67 For One Drop, Las Vegas | $ 111.111 | 2nd | $ 3,078,974 |
| Nov/17 | WPT five Diamonds High Roller, Las Vegas | $ 100.000 | 1st | $ 1,404,000 |
| Jul/18 | WSOP #78 The Big One for One Drop, Las Vegas | $1.000.000 | 3rd | $ 4,000,000 |
| Feb/15 | Triton Poker Super HR, Jeju | $ 255.000 | 3rd | $ 1,732,572 |
| Aug/19 | Triton Poker Million for Charity, London | $1.050.000 | 2nd | $ 8,765,628 |
| Jun/22 | WSOP #6 Heads Up NLHE, Las Vegas | $ 25.000 | 1st | $ 509,717 |
You want to follow Dan Smith and his poker career? Make sure to follow him on one of his socials:
www.twitter.com/DanSmithHolla (47,7K followers)
www.instagram.com/KingDan23/ (9,2K followers)
Image Credit: onlinebettingacademy.com
