It has been just over a month since “Black Friday” completely changed the landscape for many American poker players and one young player by the name of Jordan Jayne was hit very hard by the actions of the American Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
20 year old Jayne lives in the small town of Lisle in Illinois and until April 15 had been a professional online poker player, one who was quite successful, having built up a bankroll of $70,000. However, the passing of Black Friday completely shattered his plans, as not only was online poker his only source of income, but due to the laws in his state he is too young to play live poker, and will be for another year as the legal gambling age is 21-years old.
Just as it looked like Jayne was going to have to go out and find another form of employment, the Heartland Poker Tour decided to host a stop in Mount Pleasant (Michigan) at the Soaring Eagle Casino and Resort, where the legal gambling age is only 18-years. Despite having to travel five hours to participate, Jayne was not deterred and he made the trip for the $1,500 buy-on Main Event.
Jayne was joined by 385 fellow hopefuls including three former World Series of Poker Main Event Champions in Tom McEvoy, Greg Raymer and Jerry Yang, who helped create a prize pool of $554,554 to be shared out amongst the top 39 finishers. It almost seemed Jayne’s destiny to win this tournament and he did just that, outlasting all 385 opponents to scoop the first prize of $165,462, which should tie him over nicely until he becomes of legal age to ply his trade at the live poker tables in his state and in Las Vegas.
His heads-up opponent, Max Weinberg, was also primarily an online poker player but had the proverbial rug pulled from his feet when the American authorities came down hard on the owners of PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker and Absolute Poker on April 15. Weinberg is in a more fortunate position having turned 21-years old in April and has already got a big tournament score under his belt- $300,000 for his seventh place finish at the 2011 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure.
Final table payouts
1st: Jordan Jayne: $165,462
2nd: Max Weinberg: $82,732
3rd: Stan Miller: $49,639
4th: Brad Albrinck: $38,608
5th: Cody Nguyen: $33,093
6th: James Casement: $27,577
