Jeremy Becker is not one to back down from a challenge. Almost every day over the last four years, Becker has set out to find a poker tournament that will offer a challenge and an opportunity to win. He became the poster boy for grinding out dailies in Las Vegas, taking down more tournaments at Wynn Las Vegas than anyone had any business doing in 2023.
Along the way as he continued his persistent grind at buy-in levels all over the spectrum, Becker caught the attention of Daniel Negreanu, who offered Becker a financial opportunity to take some bigger shots and prove his successes could carry over into more bigger buy-in events. By the end of last year, Becker had earned the biggest win of his career at Venetian, and started popping up at the PokerGO Studio to take some shots at high rollers while competing among some of the game’s best.
“He has ‘it,’ and he just loves to grind,” Negreanu said of Becker.
Aside from Becker’s results, which include more than 400 cashes listed on his Hendon Mob profile since January 2019, Becker clearly made an impression on Negreanu – so much so that Negreanu initiated a passive ploy to generate some action around his fast-rising protégé when he sent out a tweet of potential summer head-to-head showdowns.
On that list, opposite Becker, was Landon Tice, another promising up-and-coming player who has a support system of his own which includes Matt Berkey. Team Landon immediately took the bait and responded with interest in making a bet.
The result was a cross-book bet between Tice and Becker with some potentially serious financial repercussions. Every single tournament that each of them play will go towards a running total, and whomever wins more money by the end of the summer gets the added bonus of winning the bet and pocketing an additional sum equal to the difference in winnings between the two players.
Both Becker and Tice have been taking their prep work leading into the summer seriously. Tice won a Wynn trophy of his own, poking some light fun at Becker in the process, and then jumped on WPT Voyage to get some more major events under his belt.
Becker had a rare down stretch, which briefly weighed on him, before going on to put up two of his top four career live cashes together in just the last couple of weeks.
“I’m feeling real good,” said Becker. “I was actually getting a little bit bummed out, I felt like I kept getting screwed pretty late in some of these bigger buy-in events. It was getting to me like, ‘Oh man, I’m gonna bury myself before the World Series [of Poker]. But now I’m feeling good. Mentals are right, and I think it’ll be exciting for sure.”
In late March, Becker got heads up for his first WSOP Circuit ring in Las Vegas, ultimately falling just short against Adam Hendrix. And after logging a pair of third-place finishes in PokerGO events back in January, Becker returned to battle it out on the high roller streets to try to sharpen himself against world-class competition. It didn’t pay off with more results during the U.S. Poker Open, but Becker is all too happy to take the lessons from tournaments that don’t turn out the way he hopes.
“I’m definitely trying to get more experience in the higher buy-in events,” said Becker. “I feel like it helps me when I go back to the lower buy-in stuff, too. I mean, I was just playing PokerGo events for a few days, and then I came down here and immediately got my biggest score ever – $76,000 for second place in a $2K.”
“I just feel like it really locks me in and gets me better when I play different competition, for sure.”
Being in the PokerGO Studio also gets Becker more face time with Negreanu, along with some time in the trenches going head-to-head in a live fire environment. In getting to see Becker up close, Negreanu likes what he sees.
“I have played with him at the studio, and he has an excellent table presence – phone away, paying attention, focused,” said Negreanu.
Even when he’s not at the same table as Negreanu, Becker has had a chance to spend some time with Negreanu in Las Vegas soaking up some wisdom and life lessons. When he’s in a tournament, be it in Vegas or on the road, Negreanu’s only a text message away with some sage advice.
“Honestly, whenever I feel like I may have messed up in a hand, I text him and we talk about it,” said Becker. “And he says he loves it because it gets him better to think about hands. And he always responds right away. I mean, we’ve got a pretty good relationship going and hopefully, we’re gonna make a lot of money this summer.”
After binking a career-best score earlier in the WPT Seminole Hard Rock Poker Showdown festival, Becker bagged chips on Day 1B of the SHRPS $3,500 Championship event. After building up chips on Day 2, Becker set himself up to cash as he eyed a deep run down in Florida. Funny enough, Tice put himself on a similar trajectory by building up a stack heading into the Day 2 Dinner break.
A win or a final table of the magnitude of the WPT SHRPS would mark a major step forward in Becker’s career and set him up with a boatload of momentum heading into a busy summer.
Regardless of how things go in the coming days in this tournament, Becker has a solid game plan in place for how he’s going to attack the summer schedule. He’s built his reputation and his bankroll by steamrolling daily tournaments, and after some negotiations, those smaller buy-in events will count towards his cross-book with Tice.
But if you spend more than a couple of minutes with Becker, you won’t be surprised to find out he doesn’t intend to take the easy road to victory.
“If I wanted, I could just play a daily every day and try to win it like that,” said Becker. “But I’m actually going to go for the glory. I’m going to try to play the bigger stuff. And if I do bust out during the day, and registration is closed, then sure, you might see me in a daily at night – but the plan really is just to play big stuff.”
That mentality seems like a big positive for Negreanu, who is carrying 100% of the action on Becker’s side of the crossbook. As the stakes get higher and Becker continues to hold his own under the brightest spotlight of tournament poker, Negreanu feels good about Becker’s chances of a true breakthrough summer.
“He just needs to keep doing what he is doing, and he is in for some big scores this summer,” said Negreanu.