Dani Stern Bio
Dani “Ansky” Stern got his start in poker the same way many young pros did: he played with friends in high school. Finding that he always lost, Stern started to study the game, posting his hands on online poker message boards like twoplustwo.com and reading books and articles written by the greats of the game. By the end of high school, Stern had gone from being a losing player in a daily $20 no limit hold’em game to having a $6,000 bankroll with which to start his poker career.
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From there, Stern never looked back, seeking out higher stakes and bigger challenges. After first boosting his bankroll by winning $3,400 in an online tournament, Stern moved away from tournament play. Since then, he has mostly focused on cash game play, playing in no limit games with stakes ranging from $5/$10 to $25/$50. In the world of cash games, information is key, and that’s where Stern really excels; according to him, he tries as hard as possible to remember every hand he’s ever played against a tough opponent, and then use that against them.
Given his emphasis on cash games, Stern isn’t as known as a tournament player as many of his Brunson 10 compatriots. However, that doesn’t mean he’s not capable of making a big splash when he does decide to sit down at the tournament table. In fact, Stern has cashed in three different World Series of Poker events, making two final tables. His biggest score came at the 2009 World Series of Poker, where he participated in the $40,000 No Limit Hold’em Event, which was held in honor of the World Series’ 40th anniversary. Stern made it all the way to the final table, finishing 4th and taking home nearly $550,000 in one of the toughest tournament fields ever assembled. Stern followed this up with another WSOP final table at the 2010 Series, finishing 5th in the $10,000 Pot Limit Hold’em Championship. Despite not being a tournament player primarily, Stern has also done quite well in online tournament play.
But Stern’s real strength is in cash games, and that’s where he’s most feared. He has made his mark on several televised poker shows, most notably on the PokerStars.net Big Game. In a recent episode of the show, Stern took down a profit of over $185,000 at a table with such notable players as Phil Hellmuth, Daniel Negreanu, Jason Mercier and Prahlad Friedman. He was also one of the stars of 2 Months $2 Million, a television show that aired on G4TV in which Stern and his housemates tried to make $2 million playing poker over the course of two months. While the group came up short, the $676,000 they did win was still quite an impressive feat.
As a cash game player, Stern brings a different perspective to the Doylesroom Brunson 10, and shows that you don’t have to be a tournament player to stand out as a bright young star in the poker world. While tournament poker might be what fascinates the public, cash game poker is where the consistent money is made, and there are few players who dominate cash games like Dani Stern.
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