Andrew Elliot Bloch
(born June 1, 1969) is a professional
poker player. He holds two
electrical engineering degrees from
MIT
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...
and a
JD from
Harvard Law School.
Blackjack
While studying at MIT, Bloch became part of the
MIT blackjack team
The MIT Blackjack Team was a group of students and ex-students from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University, and other leading colleges who used card counting techniques and more sophisticated strategies to beat casinos at bla ...
, featured in the book ''
Bringing Down the House''. Bloch said he has made up to $100,000 in one session while playing
blackjack. He was one of the members of the team to play in
Monte Carlo
Monte Carlo (; ; french: Monte-Carlo , or colloquially ''Monte-Carl'' ; lij, Munte Carlu ; ) is officially an administrative area of the Principality of Monaco, specifically the ward of Monte Carlo/Spélugues, where the Monte Carlo Casino is ...
as detailed in
Ben Mezrich
Ben Mezrich ( ; born February 7, 1969) is an American author.
Early life and education
Mezrich was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of Molli Newman, a lawyer, and Reuben Mezrich, a chairman of radiology at the University of Maryland Scho ...
's ''
Busting Vegas
''Busting Vegas'' (stylized as ''Busting Vega$'') is a 2005 book by Ben Mezrich about a group of MIT card counters and blackjack players commonly known as the MIT Blackjack Team. The subtitle of the original, hardcover edition was ''The MIT ...
''.
Bloch was featured in the blackjack documentary ''
The Hot Shoe ''The Hot Shoe'' is a 2004 documentary film which also reveals the history and development of card counting. Director David Layton interviewed current and former card counters, including members of the MIT Blackjack Team, casino employees and gambli ...
'', as well as starring in his own instructional blackjack DVD, ''Beating Blackjack'', which explains
card counting
Card counting is a blackjack strategy used to determine whether the player or the dealer has an advantage on the next hand. Card counters are advantage players who try to overcome the casino house edge by keeping a running count of high and low ...
.
Poker career
Bloch started playing poker seriously in 1992, entering some small $35 weekly tournaments once a month. By the end of the year, he had won one of the World Poker Finals tournaments, a $100 entry fee no-limit
Texas hold'em
Texas hold 'em (also known as Texas holdem, hold 'em, and holdem) is one of the most popular variants of the card game of poker. Two cards, known as hole cards, are dealt face down to each player, and then five community cards are dealt fac ...
tournament. That was the first time he ever played
no-limit Texas hold 'em.
In
1997
File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; '' Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of ...
, Bloch skipped the last week of law school classes to play in the
World Series of Poker
The World Series of Poker (WSOP) is a series of poker tournaments held annually in Paradise, Nevada and, since 2004, sponsored by Caesars Entertainment. It dates its origins to 1970, when Benny Binion invited seven of the best-known poker p ...
(WSOP) Main Event. He was the guinea pig in a low-tech hole card cam trial. Tom Sims was looking for a volunteer to "sweat" and record all his hole cards, and Bloch agreed. His records turned into a two-part
CardPlayer Magazine
Card players are those participating in a card game. Various names are given to card players based on their role or position.
Position
Games of Anglo-American origin
In games of Anglo-American origin played in English-speaking countries, ...
article. After passing the
bar exam
A bar examination is an examination administered by the bar association of a jurisdiction that a lawyer must pass in order to be admitted to the bar of that jurisdiction.
Australia
Administering bar exams is the responsibility of the bar associat ...
in 1999, Bloch decided to delay his law career and went back to playing poker.
His law career got delayed even further after making two WSOP final tables in
2001, a first-place finish back at
Foxwoods
Foxwoods Resort Casino is a hotel and casino complex owned and operated by the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation on their reservation located in Ledyard, Connecticut. Including six casinos, the resort covers an area of . The casinos have more th ...
in 2002 (playing
seven-card stud
Seven-card stud, also known as Seven-Toed Pete or Down-The-River is a variant of stud poker. Before the 2000s surge of popularity of Texas hold 'em, seven-card stud was the most widely played poker variant in home games across the United States ...
), and two
World Poker Tour
The World Poker Tour (WPT) is an internationally televised gaming and entertainment brand. Since 2002, the World Poker Tour has operated a series of international poker tournaments and associated television series broadcasting playdown and the f ...
(WPT) final tables during its
first season, finishing third both times. In 2005, Bloch chose to
boycott the WPT in protest of its player release process. Bloch returned to the WPT after a lawsuit initiated by seven high-profile poker players, including
Chris Ferguson and
Phil Gordon, was settled in 2008.
Bloch was the
second season winner of the
Ultimate Poker Challenge
The Ultimate Poker Challenge (UPC) was a series of weekly poker tournaments acting as super-satellites into the series semi-finals.
The first and second seasons are available on NTSC DVD. In the United States, it was a syndicated program.
Form ...
.
He was a member of "Team Full Tilt" at
Full Tilt Poker
Full Tilt Poker is an Irish online poker card room and online casino that opened in June 2004. Formerly privately owned by Tiltware, LLC and later by the Rational Entertainment Group, the site was acquired by The Stars Group (then known as Amaya ...
prior to the site closing down.
At the
2006 World Series of Poker
The 2006 World Series of Poker (WSOP) began on June 25, 2006 with satellite events, with regular play commencing on June 26 with the annual Casino Employee event, and the Tournament of Champions held on June 28 and 29. 40 more events in various ...
, Bloch finished second in the $50,000
H.O.R.S.E. event against
David "Chip" Reese. The heads-up battle lasted 286 hands and was the longest recorded in WSOP history.
In 2006, he defeated
Phil Laak
Philip Courtney Laak (born September 8, 1972) is an Irish–American professional poker player and a poker commentator, now residing in Los Angeles, California. Laak holds a World Poker Tour (WPT) title, a World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet, a ...
heads up to win the
Pro-Am Poker Equalizer
The ''Pro-Am Poker Equalizer'' is a televised poker tournament in which professional poker players play Texas hold 'em against celebrities which began airing on ESPN in January 2007. In order to "equalize" the playing field, the celebrities sta ...
, taking the grand prize of $500,000. The tournament was broadcast in early 2007 on
ESPN
ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). Th ...
.
In March 2008, Bloch finished runner-up to
Chris Ferguson in the NBC
. He would defeat Ferguson later that year in Season 5 of ''
Poker After Dark
''Poker After Dark'' is an hour-long poker television program that originally aired on NBC, premiering on January 1, 2007. ''.
Bloch finished runner-up to
Nenad Medić in the $10,000 Pot-Limit Hold'em World Championship at the
2008 World Series of Poker
The 2008 World Series of Poker was the 39th annual World Series of Poker (WSOP). Held in Las Vegas, Nevada at the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino, the series began on May 30th, 2008, and featured 55 poker championships in several variants. Al ...
, earning $488,048.
As of 2020, his total live tournament winnings exceed $5,300,000. His 24 cashes at the WSOP account for $2,149,821 of those winnings.
Bloch won his first
WSOP bracelet
The World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet is considered the most coveted non-monetary prize a poker player can win. Since 1976, a bracelet has been awarded to the winner of every event at the annual WSOP. Even if the victory occurred before 197 ...
on June 2, 2012, in a $1,500 Seven Card Stud event. The event started with 367 players and ended with a final table that included
David Williams and
Barry Greenstein
Barry Greenstein (born December 30, 1954, in Chicago, Illinois) is an American professional poker player. He has won a number of major events, including three at the World Series of Poker and two on the World Poker Tour. Greenstein donates his ...
. He defeated Greenstein in heads-up play to win the bracelet and $126,363.
World Series of Poker bracelet
Charities
Bloch donated 100% of his winnings on Full Tilt Poker to various charities around the world. After qualifying for the 2006 World Series of Poker Main Event via a tournament on the website, Bloch decided that any money he won in the event would go directly to charity. He is also contributing $100,000 of his winnings from the Pro-Am Equalizer to charities working in
Darfur.
Craigs Journal - PokerWorks.com
Notes
External links
Official site
HoboTrashcan.com interview
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bloch, Andy
1969 births
American poker players
World Series of Poker bracelet winners
American blackjack players
Living people
MIT School of Engineering alumni
Harvard Law School alumni
Poker After Dark tournament winners