Heads Up: Berry Johnston Versus Jared Hamby

Posted by One Angry Monkey | Filed under Heads Up

Welcome to another round of the Full Tilt Poker Heads-Up Challenge, where we deliver the best in non-poker related heads-up play. Today we’ll be bringing you the first of our 6 seed versus 11 seed matches, all of which pit some of our more “old school” players versus some of our “young gun” Internet players. This match features Berry “Classy and respectful is no way to play poker” Johnston versus Jared “I’ve been wearing the same hat for the past 10 years” Hamby. Old school versus new school, experience versus youthful exuberance – whatever you want to call it, this titanic clash of cultures should be a fun ride to take. Let’s get this party started:

Category	Berry Johnston	Jared Hamby	Survey Says
Career Earnings	Over $3.2 million	More than 1.3 million	Considering that Hamby has only been playing live poker for a couple of years and Johnston’s been playing poker since the days of Doc Holliday, the disparity in career earnings really isn’t that big. Even so, $3.2 million is still more than $1.3 – round one goes to Berry.
Major Titles	5 WSOP bracelets, including one for winning the 1986 Main Event.	None, although he did take second at the 2007 WPT Mandalay Bay Poker Championship.	Johnston is an old school trooper who’s been playing since they days of poker legends such as Johnny Moss and Amarillo Slim, plus he’s a cashing machine in the Main Event, having done so a record 10 times. So Hamby’s going to have a hell of a time catching up to him. But give the boy a few years and see where he’s at. Until then, this category belongs to Berry – he leads 2-0.
Tournament Play	Legendary tourney player.	Made an insane five-month run during 2007 where he won more than a million dollars in live donkaments.	Once again, give Hamby a couple more years and he’ll probably have earned more cash than Johnston playing live poker. But you don’t mess with a legend in a category like this, there’s no way I can give this one to Jared just yet. Berry increases his lead to 3-0.
Cash Game Play	Not really known for his cash game play, but I’m sure he can hold his own.	Also known more as a tourney player than a cash game specialist.	So both these guys are pretty dedicated tourney players, but my feeling is that Hamby’s aggressive style of play (he is a child of online poker after all) probably translates better to the cash games than Johnston’s more conservative approach. Let’s give this one to Jared and wipe that donut off the board.
Best Game	All the evidence seems to suggest that good old NLHE is Johnston’s best game, although he’s also won bracelets in Limit Hold ‘em, Omaha, and Razz.	Another faithful participant in the religion of NLHE.	Hmmm, NLHE versus NLHE. I think I’ll have to go with NLHE on this one. And since the practice of giving ties in any category has been greatly discouraged by my editor, I’ll give this one to Hamby in an attempt to make this a close match. The score now stands at 3-2 in favor of Johnston.
Playing Style	Old School Conservative	New School Aggressive	So I actually employ a more conservative approach at the table myself, but this is the online age and being a total nit doesn’t really always cut it (maybe that’s why I suck at online poker, or at least one of the reasons). I think I have to go with Hamby again on this one, his approach seems better suited to take on the masses that appear in the major tourneys these days. The score is now knotted at three apiece.
Nickname	Numbers	TheWacoKidd	I kid you not here folks, “Numbers” is Johnston’s nickname according to his Wikipedia page (and we all know that Wikipedia is never wrong). And while I have no idea what “Numbers” actually refers to (maybe he plays poker by the numbers, or maybe it’s a reference to his numerous WSOP cashes) it still beats the hell out of Hamby’s online handle, “TheWacoKidd,” which is obviously somehow related to Jared being from Texas. And we know how I feel about Texas, don’t we? (I’ll give you a hint: if Texas were a kid looking to get picked for a game of dodge ball, I’d choose him last.) Johnston takes this category and reclaims the lead heading into the final two frames of action.
Outside Poker	Helped build Rome	There’s life outside poker?	OK, so I’m not really sure what either of these guys gets up to when they’re not playing poker. I assume Johnston, being the nice and religious man that he is, spends time with his family and what not. Hamby, being the young kid with lots of money that he is, probably parties quite a bit when he’s not playing. Guess which way I’m going with this one? That’s right – rock and roll baby! Hamby takes this one down and evens the score heading into the final category. Can you feel the excitement now? Can you?
Favorite Movie	The Land Before Time	The Big Lebowski	Normally I’d go with “Best Pro Tip” for the final category, but seeing as neither of these gentlemen have written a pro tip for us yet, that would be problematic (especially considering that the final category actually means something this time around). I tried to come up with a few “serious” categories to no avail, so I just went with the stupidest one I could think of (hooray for serious competition!). While The Land Before Time is probably not Berry’s favorite movie (I just needed to get another old guy joke in there), I did read that The Big Lebowski is one of Hamby’s favorites. All I can say to that is “you never fuck with the Jesus.” Jared takes down the final category and the match as well.

So there you have it, TheWacoKidd takes down Numbers by a close score of 5-4. This probably wasn’t exactly a fair fight as I’m obviously a little biased toward the young guns, but that’s my right and I choose to use it. Check back next week for more fun and games as we continue the march from 64 players all the way down to one.

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