By Paul Seaton
Twelve years ago, Jonathan Little (pictured) won his very first World Poker Tour Main Event, taking down the WPT Mirage Poker Showdown in Las Vegas in Season VI on his way to winning the Season VI WPT Player of the Year race. The following year, he headed to Foxwoods with the intention of doing so again. Incredibly, he did just that, winning his second-ever WPT. Both those WPT titles have proved his best tournament results to date.
We looked back on one of the defining hands from that second victory with the man himself and asked Jonathan Little about his feeling upon becoming a WPT champion so early in his career.
“The first one [at the Mirage] was very exciting because it was my first title,” says Little. “I’d presumed that was the only time I was ever going to make a final table because players just didn’t make a lot of them, but I continued running hot in that time period and it felt amazing to win.”
Heading to Foxwoods [in Season VII] and prevailing again was a different feeling for Little, not least because it came so soon after his maiden victory on the tour.
“To do it again a year later was fantastic. I knew that you could run poorly, because my first year of live poker, I lost every tournament I played, but I don’t think I fully appreciated exactly how well I was running back then. If I won two tournaments for a million dollars now, I would be significantly more happy and grateful. I was a young, dumb kid and you don’t fully appreciate your opportunities.”
As Little points out, the tournament landscape has changed a bit since then. Back in 2007 and 2008, everyone showed up on time, there were no late entries or re-entries into tournaments. The poker world was different.
“I liked it better back then. Nowadays, with re-entry tournaments, you can’t apply so much pressure on Day 1 or Day 2, because people know they can bust and don’t care [because they can re-enter]. I played the Seminole Hard Rock this week and on Day 1, two people just bluffed off their stack.”
Little couldn’t be happier with how his career turned out, and looks back on the hand in question with fondness. He likes his check on the flop, being out of position to Jonathan Jaffe.
“It’s a good check, because this is a board which could very often hit the big blind, so you want to be checking a lot as the pre-flop raiser.
The jack on the turn changed that. Suddenly, Little’s hand went from two high cards on a low board to top pair, top kicker. Jaffe’s 200,000 bet still merited a call only, however, according to Little.
“Definitely do not fold, do not raise unless you think he’s an extreme calling station. Typically, if you think your opponent bluffs too much, which back then I definitely did, you want to give them every opportunity to continue bluffing.”
Jaffe might have made a two-pair or straight hand every now and then, as Little says, but the original raiser as Little was, with this hand, wins the pot ‘80% of the time.’ He wouldn’t favour the raise, however.
“You don’t want to raise because if I do and then he goes all-in, I’m in a pretty bad spot unless he’s absolutely insane. Jonathan Jaffe is certainly very creative and very aggressive and could get out of line, but on average I’d rather keep the pot manageable, because ace-jack is a very strong hand, but not a ‘nut’ hand if a lot of the money goes into the pot.”
The river was a four pairing the board and leading to a check from Jaffe. Little’s bet of 300,000 was raised by Jaffe, giving the former a big decision to make.
“I have the best hand here every time. I want to make a bet that he can call with a six or a five, or maybe pocket nines or queen-jack. It’s certainly a spot where he could check-raise some hands on the river. I just have one of the best hands I can have here. I block hands like random J-4 suited that may have made a full house.”
While Little concedes that Jaffee could have been check-raising for ‘super-thin value’ with king-jack, there are a lot of bluffs available.
“Any seven or eight didn’t get there on the river. When I bet 300,000 which isn’t a particularly big bet, it often signifies a range of marginal good made hands like a jack or pocket tens. I’m never folding here and he’s overly aggressive. If I was against a player who was very tight, passive and straightforward, then I would have considered folding, but that’s not Jonathan Jaffe, he’s good and strong.”
Looking back on the event, Little is extremely proud of the win, and not just because he took down the title.
“It was very long match.” Little says with fondness. “Talking to Jonathan later, he said one of the things I did that he didn’t realize I was doing was when he raised a lot, I, in turn, was going all-in-a lot. We started deep stacked and ended up very shallow stacked at 4 a.m. It was the longest heads-up match on the WPT at that time, so they moved it from two-hour levels down to 30-minute levels. We changed the game because we played all night!”
Little loved the match-up, and it’s clear that the player who has become as known for his ability to win millions of dollars at the live felt – he has banked over $7 million in live tournaments – as he is for helping millions of new players discover the game, has a lot of time for his opponent.
“It’s always great to play a long heads-up match against one of the best SNG heads-up players online and it was good to beat the master at his own game.”
Jonathan Little became a household name thanks in no small part to plays just like this, where he reads his opponent’s strength and plays directly against it.
Step Back in Time with the World Poker Tour next time in another classic hand from the WPT archives.
Want to see your name on the WPT Champions Cup? Check out more advanced tournament poker strategy to gain the tools to become a WPT Champion on LearnWPT.com.