Hockey Player Josh Marvin Checking the Competition on Day 6
Josh Marvin may not be a name most poker fans recognize, but on Day 6 of the WSOP Main Event, he sits behind a mountain of more than 14 million chips, good for seventh as the event reached the dinner break with only 43 players remaining. If he can continue his run, Marvin has a chance to make a major mark on the poker world this summer.
A recreational hockey player who plays a few times a week back home in Sterling Heights, Michigan, Marvin hopes to keep skating past the competition. He played seven events this summer, but this is his first-ever WSOP cash �� and it was certainly well worth the wait.
Marvin, 27, is normally a cash game player but mixes in a few tournaments each year. The Hendon Mob database lists eight tournament cashes for this rounder, but he notched a win for $724,200 in a $1,650 no-limit hold��em event in his home state in 2015.
While his regular game of choice is pot-limit Omaha, so far, Marvin has held his own in Texas hold��em on the game��s biggest stage and is enjoying his time as the action gets closer and closer to the final table.
��I don��t play many tournaments a year, so this is kind of fun,�� he says. ��I normally just focus on cash games. I fired a few bullets in the Milly Maker and played a few PLO events, but no luck until the Main Event �� but this is the important one.��
A graduate of Oakland University in Auburn Hills with a degree in Finance, he now crunches numbers of a different sort. As play continued on Sunday, Marvin��s stack fluctuated a bit before gathering some nice pots with a fortuitous run of hands.
��I had a couple that vaulted me up and one that vaulted me down,�� he says. ��I chipped up to about 10 million, then went south to about 9 million, and then lost with kings to aces for about a 9-million-chip pot. Following that I had kings and queens three or four times in 10 hands, so I chipped back up. They were small pots, but they all added up.��
What��s been the reaction of friends and family back in the Great Lakes State to his streak through the Main Event?
��They��re all blowing up my phone nonstop,�� he says, laughing. ��My mom doesn��t really understand poker, so she��s been nervous since Day 3. If I final table, they��ll fly out here.��
If he can continue his big roll, stay sharp, and bring home a big score, Marvin hopes to put that Finance degree to good use.