Being a Legend Doesn’t Make You The Best in the World: Imari Love AMA on Reddit

The Best of Imari Love’s AMA on Reddit

Q: Do you play poker professionally, if so how long have you been doing it? What made you take the leap?

I don’t play full time. I have a job that allows me to take shots here and there and allows for plenty of vacation time. Tourney poker is awesome to play when you DON’T need the money and you don’t have to worry about month to month variance screwing with your ability to pay bills, etc. Plus I have a wife and 2 teenagers, and to do tourney poker right, it would mean a ton of travel and I don’t want to do that.

Unless I win the main event or something and no longer worry about bills.

Q: I guess my question is how did you get into playing competitively?

Just start by playing in some wsop circuit events or MSPT type tournaments. There are also a ton of smaller competitive events at all the Vegas casinos like Aria, Wynn, Venetian on a daily basis.

Q: Did you play with any of the big names? Phil Ivey, baby Phil Hellmuth, Daniel Negreanu, Doyle Brunson, any of the dudes you see in the big cash games on TV? Are they THAT much better than everyone else?

All of those legends chase the bracelet events, so they pretty much play in all of these big ones (although rarely at the same table as these are massive fields). I don’t have any memorable big pots vs one of these legends.

Those guys aren’t amongst the best players in the world in 2026. Maybe Ivey is if you consider all the variants they play (short deck, mix games etc) but when it comes down to just No Limit Holdem tourneys, none of those guys has a meaningful edge on me or other elite players.

That said, they are also too rich to care. Negreanu sponsorship deals through GG fund his buyi-ns so it’s all gravy. Negreanu is still a very strong MTT player. Don’t get me wrong. Just not the best in the world tier. Once you get that rich though, it’s kinda hard to force yourself to be studying all the time to keep up with the young guns.

Q: What surprises you about poker?

Q: Who are some of the toughest opponents you’ve faced and why?

Alex Foxen prolly the toughest I faced. Just keeps applying pressure preflop, feels like has to fight for every inch postflop, and you know he has millions of dollars behind him so it feels like he could care less if you fight back.

Q: But I read somewhere that European players kind of dominate tournaments now. Is that true?

Strong players everywhere (Brazilians are very aggro), the guy I beat heads up for my bracelet was from Slovenia I think — and won 2 bracelets earlier in 2025. 

I try not to generalize/stereotype too much, but sure, I’d rather see 7 americans at my table than 7 euros.

Q: What are some unknown tips and words of advice that you personally benefitted from in regards to the grand scheme of the main event?

Start labeling them with specific behaviors (and what you are going to do to counter that behavior) eg ‘seat 5 always c-bets every board even the ones that are bad for him–and thus, we can check raise him wider, ‘seat 8, only 3bet once and showed AA–and thus we can raise his blinds a lot and overfold when we he does 3b’.

These videos on youtube below are PHENOMENAL to get a feel for the mistakes people make in the Main:

• WSOP Main Event Study Session with Nick Petrangelo and Ben Heath 
• WSOP Main Event Study Session with Thomas Boivin
• WSOP Main Event Study Session with Jon Jaffe and Nick Petrangelo
• WSOP Main Event Study Session with Daniel Dvoress and Ben Heath
• WSOP Main Event Final Table Study Session w/ Daniel Dvoress and Ben Heath

Q: How do you categorize players at your table?

I categorize people by their play behavior/tendencies. It’s not all that useful to just label someone as ‘weak’ or a ‘fish’ or a ‘TAG’…it’s much more useful to say ‘oh he’s weak because he doesn’t value bet thin enough’..,or ‘he only 3bets with premium hands–never bluffs there’ or ‘she doesn’t defend her blinds wide enough’… understanding those tendencies and then making multiple offset adaptations because of them is EVERYTHING in poker.

Q: Do you always play the same style and hands or do you have to change it up to catch people off guard?

If I see you don’t defend your big blind much, then I’ll double my normal frequency of raising vs your blind etc. If I see you fold too many times on the river, I’ll bluff you more. If I see you like to make hero-calls with bluff catchers, I just won’t ever bluff you.

So for the most part I stick to GTO opening ranges and don’t play much trash but there’s always times to deviate (and my bracelet winning photo shows I won with 83offsuit!).

Q: Do people try to cheat during these events?

There’s always going to be forms of cheating. In tourneys, it’s too hard for people to do it in a way that’s going to be consistently effective.

Most people today cheat by using RTA (charts, solvers, etc) when playing online but their impact is overblown because those solver outputs are predicated on a model with ranges nobody actually uses (no human plays perfect GTO).

Q: Are all of the players at the final table complete douche bags?

Ha. Nah. Especially when I make a FT. I will say one of the guys who made the WSOP main event final table last year was a definite douche bag. Joe Serock. Prick wears a lot of racist t-shirts to try to trigger people. Scum bag,

Q: How legitimate is the act of reading other players for tells and how much different is the game online as a result?

It’s less about their hand shaking or how hard they swallow….and more about how often they re-raise pre-flop without premium hands, and how often they value bet thinly on the river.. understanding (and exploiting) those tendencies — is everything.

If someone twitches or shakes because they are nervous — you never know if it’s because he has it or because he’s bluffing.. unless u play with someone for hundreds of hours (never the case in a tourney) u wont have a strong enough sample size to draw any meaningful conclusions on stuff like that.

We make our decisions based on their betting behaviors, e.g. how often they 3bet non premium hands, how often they value bet thin, how often they fold to c-bets, etc.

And it’s both easier and harder online. Harder because you can’t see them and hear them talk about hands.. but easier because most times you have a HUD display which can track how often they raise, call, fold, etc. and that’s necessary because you’re playing 5-10 tourneys simultaneously online (some play 2 dozen at a time).