Our Verdict:
Someone who is most definitely set to dominate the high stakes MTTs this year is Randal Flowers aka RandALLin. He has been playing poker for about three years and has played professionally for the past year.
Since he turned pro the 18-year-old from Greenville in North Carolina has been burning up the online felt and has trousered tournament winnings of over £300k in the last six months alone.
Among his bigger wins you will find a first place in the UltimateBet $200k Guaranteed (good for $46k at the beginning of February 2007), second in the PokerStars $100 rebuys (16k in January), first in another $100 rebuy on Stars ($20k last September) and first in a $30 rebuy tourney on Paradise ($23k at the end of August last year). Add to that multiple final tables and decent cashes in all the big MTTs on Ultimate, Stars and Full Tilt and you will see that young Randal is no fly-by-night.
Like many teenage American ‘phenoms’ (dreadful word so apologies) RandALLin isn’t old enough to set foot in a US casino yet so doesn’t have much live experience yet. His one live performance as in this year’s PokerStars Caribbean Adventure where he failed to cash.
He did write a blog about the tournament though which makes for entertaining reading as well as providing an insight into his playing style.
If you do find yourself playing against him on Ultimate or Stars never show your cards to him as this guy is an information junkie, as his blog reveals:
“After fluctuating between 18k and 22k for the first level or two I was settling into the zone and was playing very well, being patient and nailing the hand ranges that I had on strangers at the table just from reads etc. I found it to be extremely helpful to notice every hand played even when I'm not in one, because it is a chance to pick up a weakness to exploit or a tell.
“I love it so much when idiots who are dealt kings preflop, play it some odd/terrible way, then show it to me. It's just like they held up a sign in front of my face telling me how inexperienced they are and that they want me to bust them when they play a huge hand similar again, because most of these players are not capable enough to play kings different the 2nd time around they get them,” he writes.
If you’re over the age of 25 you’re in trouble too against young Randal because he has an uncanny ability to use his extreme youth to outfox or outplay you. Youngsters are smarter, see.
“I used some irrational judgement about my bluff-like image and somehow talked myself into thinking maybe he thought I was 2 barrelling which is fucking retarded because old people are dumb and have no idea of logic like that,” he writes about one beat he took.
And should you find yourself heads-up with young Randal after a particularly gruelling six-hour MTT don’t think about asking him for a deal.
When two-handed in a $50 freezeout on PokerStars his opponent, JJmack, enquired about the possibility of a deal. The chat went as follows:
JJm