World Series of Poker, Not Just a Man's Game

WSOP: Poker, Not Just a Man's Game

Single mom makes the most of her first game with Bodog as she earns trip to the Main Event in Las Vegas

June 1, 2006

By Jake Gosselin
Bodog Nation Contributing Writer

Andrea Mosiej might one day have the pleasure of explaining to her son that the reason his education is paid for and they live in a beautiful home on the water is because mommy bluffed Phil Hellmuth and then went all-in with the nut flush.

You see, Mosiej is going to the WSOP, where big dreams become reality and unknowns turn into superstars.

The 2006 World Series of Poker will feature approximately 8,000 players from around the world, and will award more than $70 million in cash prizes and a grand prize of $10 million. This year, Bodog is sending 700 of its most talented online players to the WSOP, which runs from June 25-Aug. 10. All of the games are played at Harrah's Rio casino and hotel.

The Main Event, poker's showcase tournament, is scheduled to begin July 27 and Mosiej will be there as a member of Team Bodog.

Originally from San Diego, the 34-year-old Mosiej moved to South Bend, Ind., three years ago. As a single mother who works full-time as an operating room nurse, Mosiej understandably finds it difficult to come up with the time and money to pursue poker, which she has come to love in the one year that she’s been playing. But on Mother’s Day, after putting her 10-month-old son Chase to bed, she treated herself to her first Bodog experience with a semifinal WSOP qualifying tournament. Mosiej went out early on a bad beat. However, she had been playing well and felt she deserved one more chance.

Mosiej tried another WSOP Main Event qualifier (Bodog has 40 each weekend) and decided to play a tight aggressive game. Going against the theory of her friends that you can’t “read” online poker competitors, Mosiej resisted the urge to multi-task and focused her entire attention on other players’ betting patterns. It paid off and she held a 3-to-1 chip lead against the combined stacks of her last two opponents.

Mosiej has been playing cards for nearly her whole life. As a child she learned games like hearts and pinochle. It was only last June, when she was nine months pregnant, that she picked up poker. She was finding that she tired easily and was not interested in the usual night out, but poker was a perfect fit. She liked it immediately and her new hobby was born.

Mosiej has found both advantages and disadvantages to being a woman in a game dominated by men. While she likes the fact that men occasionally underestimate her, she says she's had difficulty breaking into the “boys club”.

Last fall, Mosiej and her best friend went to a nearby casino boat to try a weekday tournament for the first time. While waiting for it to start, she decided to try a cash game.

“The gentleman told me where to go but I didn’t hear him tell me that it was a ‘limit’ game. On the first hand I tried to raise three times the BB [big blind] and was informed it was limit and the dealer explained the betting to me. I was embarrassed and angry thinking why no one told me it was limit. A couple hands later the guy sitting to my left asked me if I knew what I was doing in a very condescending tone. I told him that I was new to casinos but not to poker. He'd roll his eyes when I would raise and tried to intimidate me,” Mosiej says.

“I was getting flustered by the older men around me and their comments about my style of play. One player told the dealer to turn my cards up. I stated that I didn’t think you could do that without calling but they insisted it was allowed once an hour. The player said he wanted to know what kind of hands I was playing since I raised him out of the hand and he would have had the winner. His 'winning cards' were 9,3 off. I was getting more upset and frustrated so my best friend encouraged me to break and go to lunch real quick. After a few minutes I agreed and cashed out. We sat downstairs discussing the incidents and how the men were very demeaning to me and felt partially because I was a woman and new. We sat and tried to re-focus for the tournament coming up.”

Mosiej then went on to play in the tournament and finished first and second with her best friend. “I laughed as I left and glanced back at the men who were already out and sitting back in 'their' cash game. It felt great and so we went back a week later to place two more times. Although poker was a 'man's' game, it certainly isn't any more!”