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Chris Fargis

published on 03/18/06 at 11:42 am

Chris Fargis has excelled in a game that has received little poker publicity. The 2005 WSOP Triple Draw circuit winner won his gold ring at Tunica, thus being labeled the unofficial champion. The Brooklyn native travels to Las Vegas frequently and through his blog, Twenty-One Outs Twice, enthusiasts can read up on his adventures and poker stories.

Who taught you the game of poker? What types of games did you play growing up?
I picked up poker for the first time in college. It started with a weekly game that went all night. We played dealer’s choice so it was a mix of normal casino games and crazy games in which galf the deck is wild. As time went on we started playing more frequently and making trips to Foxwoods which is a couple of hours away from where I went to school. I moved to New York City after graduation and my friends and I had a great home game a couple of nights a week. We also started going to Atlantic City fairly regularly. I got my poker education in those college games and home games.

What types of stakes do you play? How many hours a week live? Online?
I’ve been playing a lot of $150-$300 and $300-$600 online this year. When I travel, I play mostly black chip mixed games. The biggest game I’ve ever been in was a $500-$1000 triple draw game during a recent tournament at the Commerce in LA.

My hours aren’t very regular. If I’m at a tournament and the side action is good, I might play 50 or 60 hours in a week. If I’ve got other things going on in my life I might take a whole week off. The ability to take time off if you don’t feel like playing or are busy with other things in your life is a great benefit to being a professional poker player.

You seem to play a much wider variety of games than most other professionals. Do you attribute this flexibility to anything specific to you, or is it just a question of choice that others don’t? Which one is your favorite, the most profitable, the most in need of assistance?
When I started playing for a living, I only played hold em. I spent a year and a half playing one game and got a little burned out. Honestly, hold em got boring to me. At that point I started experimenting with other games to keep poker fresh and exciting.

Early last year I found the triple draw games on UltimateBet and I’ve been focusing on the game since then. Triple draw has become my favorite game. It is also the one I feel I am best at and the most profitable one for me lately.

I think stud is the game with which I need the most assistance. I’m very inexperienced at the game but I’m trying to learn because stud is included in many higher stakes mixed games. To be successful in these games, you really have to master each game in the rotation.

When did you write “Repeat After Me” (posted 02/22/2006)? What inspired you to write this? Do you read it yourself everyday?
As is the case with most of my writing, I wrote that post immediately before publishing it. I had been losing every day for a week or so and I got the idea to write the post sometime during that streak. I was doing a lot of thinking about losing streaks and running bad and I wanted to get them all down in one place.

My readers use my blog for entertainment and strategic ideas but the writing process is also very helpful to me. A professor I had in college told me once that you don’t really understand something unless you can explain it to someone else. Writing my blog helps me focus on specific things and get strategic concepts straight in my head. People really liked this particular post and I got a lot of good feedback from it.

I don’t read it every day but it’s something that I can come back to when I am losing to give me a little lift and help me focus on the right things.

You mention the recent Ultimate Bet site outage. Is this the only site that offers Triple Draw that you play on? Did you specifically seek it out or did you find it by accident?
There are a few other sites that I know of that offer triple draw. 24H Poker and GamesGrid are the two that come to mind off the top of my head. But the only games available at the stakes I want to play are on UltimateBet. I found the game while I was reading and experimenting with a variety of non-hold em games. I remember reading the triple draw section (written by Daniel Negreanu) in Super System 2 and then trying to find a place where I could learn the game online. I found the UB games and I’ve been playing them ever since.

What is the best piece of advice you can give to any potential Triple Draw players?
I think that position is by far the most important element of play in triple draw. Position is important in all poker games but the advantage of knowing how many cards your opponents are drawing before you have to decide on your own draw cannot be overstated. I advise people to play more hands on the button and in the cutoff and to think of creative ways to use position to your advantage.

Are there any other professionals you talk to regularly? Do you bounce strategies or ideas off each other?
I’ve become friendly with a lot of other pros both playing online and traveling the circuit. We talk about strategy all the time. Talking about hands and strategy with players you respect is one of the best ways to improve your game.

One of the fundamental differences between professionals and amateurs seems to be in the propensity and willingness to bluff. Do you agree with this statement? How much is bluffing a part of your game?
I think a lot of amateurs fall in love with the idea of bluffing after watching no limit hold em on tv. In limit poker, good bluffing opportunities are relatively rare. If you sense that an opponent is weak in a no limit game, you can make a big bet and be confident that he will fold if your read is correct. But in a limit game, you can only bet one amount and that big bet bluff has been taken away from you. The size of your bet in a limit game is usually much smaller than the size of the pot, so an opponent will often call your bet even if he’s weak because of the odds the pot is offering him.

Bluffing, or “snowing,” is a key element in higher stakes triple draw games. Knowing which opponents will call you down with a weak hand just in case you’re bluffing and which ones will only call you on the end if they make a decent hand can make a huge difference in your results.

Do you prefer the sheer excitement of tournament play or the more methodical cash game? Why?
I definitely prefer cash games. The cliche that tournaments are “hours of boredom followed by moments of sheer terror” has a lot of truth to it. The consistent action of cash games is more up my alley.

What tournaments do you have coming up? Any predictions? Targets?
In April I’ll be at the WPT events at Foxwoods and Bellagio. Honestly I haven’t looked at tournament schedules after that. I tend to plan these trips at the last minute. One thing I know I’ll do this year is spend a lot of time in Vegas during the World Series. I’m trying to play more $10k tournaments this year in addition to all the cash games.

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