GENERATION NEXT: Timothy Reilly

Timothy Reilly has only been around poker for a few years now – however, he has quickly made a name for himself – most recently earning a huge payday making it to heads-up play in the EPT Deauville High Roller tournament, a breakout performance for the young Massachusetts native who now splits his time between the US and Europe.

I sat down with Tim here in Jacksonville, Florida where he attempting to win his first major event on the live tournament circuit, the WPT bestbet Open.

Reilly opens up on living in Europe, the infamous Vanessa Rousso hand and how his people will always be “Boston Strong”…

Nice to be talking to you, Tim.  How did you get your start in the game?

Technically, I learned io play live and then moved to online.  But the majority of my learning was done online.  I was just getting into playing online and Black Friday hit.  I hadn’t even put in a full year playing online.  But I didn’t instantly move out of the country.

I played live games in Boston and in local tournament for over a year until I moved to Europe shortly after the 2012 World Series of Poker.

Your life in poker allowed you to meet your girlfriend, French poker player Nesrine Kourdourli?

We randomly met at a party this past summer in Vegas and hit it off.  I was already contemplating moving to Europen, now  I had more of an excuse to go!

She’s from Paris, she has a lot more history than I do in the game.  She has helped me tremendously since I met her.  She helps me with the psychological part of the game and helps to keep me balanced.  We get to support each other.

You were living your new life in Europe and then suddenly you both came to America a short while ago?

We were planning on surprising some friends at a concert in Miami a little over a month ago.  We were going to stay for a few days and then head to Mexico.  We (instead) decided to stay a little while longer and try and figure out some long-term solutions so we can both go back and forth (between Europe and the US) and have no issue with immigration.

You enjoyed a breakout performance earlier this season at EPT Deauville with performances in the Main Event and a second place finish in the High Roller event…

That was the biggest festival of my career.  I cashed in the Main Event and decided to play the High Rollers at the last minute.  The final was really good – I think I had the worst position at the final table with Vojtech Ruzicka and Martin Jacobson will all the chips my left.

I was patient; I was really handcuffed early on with those two on my left.  I had to wait and hit some spots and get a big enough stack to play back at them.  I made a few moves, ended up heads-up, got coolored JJ vs 1010 and he (Ruzicka) took the chip lead after that.

But the experience I took from that tournament was awesome.  I feel that since the WSOP last year my game has improved so much from talking to other players, learning from their experiences.

You played a hand with Vanessa Rousso in Deauville that could very well go down as one of the most talked about hands in the history of the European Poker Tour?

That hand has been talked about a lot.  I know I made the made the wrong decision in that hand but I still think, the way it was played, I still think it’s the right fold at that point in the tournament.

I’m not so sure I even got bluffed.  I’ve come to the conclusion that she had J5 of diamonds and she got me off a chop.  When I asked her “show me a bluff” she looked at both cards and showed the 5.  At that point, a bluff is a bluff.  I feel she was value-shoving a Jack then made it look like a brilliant decision.

You have played a ton of live tournament poker both in America and in Europe, what are the differences between playing on each continent, how do you adjust your game?

People in America have this perception that Europeans are huge fish.  I’ve got a huge surprise for America, they’ve had online poker for two years more than Americans now, and they’ve caught up.

Germany has some phenomenal players; France has a bad reputation but there are some very good players there, there are some very good players in Italy.  They’re the ones travelling the EPT’s and they’re the ones playing all these High Rollers.

The thing is they do have more of the BIG fish, they don’t care, they’re there to bluff you, they want to have some fun with it.

I feel the European tournaments are better value although the play is similar (however) players in Europe tend to be more aggressive, good or bad.  You have to be a bit selective.

A week ago tomorrow, the city of Boston was the target of bombings during the Boston Marathon.  You’re from the Boston suburb of Natick, can you tell me what you were feeling when you first heard the news and talk about how the city has banded together since?

That was really scary, it was right after WPT Seminole Hard Rock Poker Showdown in Ft. Lauderdale.  I was at the beach and just randomly decided to check Facebook and saw a post from my brother’s girlfriend who works near that area.  I instantly got on the phone wanting to call home talk to mom and dad and my brother Chris – cell phones were jammed up, you couldn’t get through, everyone was just panicking.

Boston is a brotherhood.  You don’t know the person next to you but if they go down, you’re right there.  Everybody wants to be that guy who found the guy on the boat.  This guy saw blood on the ground and decided to look in the boat and then was like “yep, found him, I better call it in”!  That guy is going to be a hero forever now.

People in Boston think about the city first, it’s not a city where there are a lot of transplants.  Boston is a real tight, tight city.

One transplant however got the city back on its feet with a strong statement.  How did you feel when Big Papi, David Ortiz, announced “This is our f*****g city”?

What he said was awesome.  Only in a city like Boston can a father be sitting next to his 8-year old daughter at Fenway telling her to stand up and clap.  It was something to bring the city together.

Thank you, Tim.

Be sure to follow Tim on Twitter @TimReillyPoker.

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