About You

1. What is your name, age and where are you located? What is your personal twitter account?

Sascha Alexas/ 32/ Germany / Twitter: __xaxa__ but I rarely tweet…

2. What are Your online poker Screen names?

I guess the only one people might recognize is xaxa which i had at UB

3. How would you define yourself as a poker player? / What poker games do you normally play? Are you learning any new games?

I am half German half Greek so there is a thin line between a genius and a total psych^ I guess that describes my behavior at a Poker table pretty well.
I switched from NLHE to PLO couple years ago and never ever went back. So PLO Cashgame is my main game. Unfortunately I had to drop in limits.
no I love PLO too much!

4. What do you most enjoy about your job?

I do have a fulltime job / poker is just a hobby for some extra money. If I were a poker player, I’de enjoy the freedom the most.

5. Who are the top 3 players in your main game from your home country in your personal opinion?

Tough one… there are so many MTT beasts (Reinkemeier, Gruissem, Ruthenberg, Holz (CrownUpGuy), . “George Danzer” is the best allrounder imo. But obv I have to go with M.O.P.

6. What reg in your game do you respect most? Can you briefly describe why?

I recently switched to Stars so not too much history with the regs there.

7. Besides yourself who do you think the most underrated poker player is?

Dave Burn instead of SNE chaseing he crushed all the European sites in the past (midsatkes & highstakes). I was super excited railing him (at PLO10k and PLO20K) back when they had those stakes.

Past

1. Why and when did you start playing poker? Do you still play for the same reasons?

I guess i was victim of the Moneymaker boom. Started playing SnG back than with friends at home for 5 or 10€.
I played at PartyPoker for playmoney. One day I won a MTT with >50k entrants. I was like, damn If I ever could bink a real money MTT. So that’s when I decided to deposit.
Today I still play for the fun & challenge.

2. What were the best and worst months of your poker career? What happened?

September 2010. I made $8,5k from PLO200 adding the bonus the total was ~$11,5k
I don’t think I ever had a month where I lost more than $3k.

3. Are you satisfied with the last 12 months of your poker play?

Not really but I like how I improved the last 3 months.

4. How did Black Friday impact you? How did you adapt after Black Friday?

Black Friday was the beat of my life. I had 90% of my Bankroll at UB/AP (Cereus Network) I was about to play Poker as a fulltime job. I never came back to rebuild a roll to play PLO Midstakes comfortable.
For those who don’t know players from UB/AP still haven’t seen a single $ since black Friday (basically because there is none or just 10% of it but the case gets handled differently as FTP)

5. What was the biggest factor in your development as a player?

Plomaha.com
It was a site where i met guys like Dave, Gavz101, GodlikeRoy. I got really good advice there. There was absolute no trolling in the forum. The owner of the site scammed Gavin though and the site fell apart.
Also the site DeucedCracked had some nice PLO content.

6. What was the biggest mistake(s) you have done as a poker player?

OBV playing at UB/AP instead of FTP / Stars / Euro Sites

7. What’s your biggest prop bet?

Never done any or took part

Present

1. How do you prepare for your poker activities?

definetly only play when i feel like it. Usually take a break after ~2 hours. Work out (TRX training).
When i am done for the day i go through some hands and make notes.

2. If you could pick the brain of anyone in the world for 3 hours, who would he/she be?

hmm ben sulsky maybe and run up my roll?!

3. What 3 poker pros should PokerStars sign to their team online roster?

Joey Ingram, Magnus Carlsen, Max Kruse (german football pro) whos fav game is PLO.

4. What is your favorite way to relieve stress when running bad?

Cash out… (joke) usually just tell myself it’s only money.

5. How much volume are you playing on Eurosites?

Like 95% till april. iPoker changed there rakeback and i got sick of all these bots anyways… (good thing I moved to Stars lol)

6. Why are you not playing mid/high stakes already? If you are, what are the 3 most important things that got you there?

I am working on it due live expenses (wedding) I cashed out my roll at Ipoker and going to rebuild at Stars.

7. What is the most important positive change you’ve made to your poker approach this year?

Decided to quit being a rakeback whore, studied a lot, analyzed and worked on my game.

Future

1. What are your poker and other goals for the next 12 months?

Building a roll to play comortable PLO100 & PLO200

2. Are you confident that you will meet those goals? Why?

I hope so I am going to put more volume in studying and improveing. Also maybe cash out less…
3. Do you see yourself still playing poker in 10 years?

As a hobby sure.

4. Do you have any ambition to coach/teach other players?

If I am broke maybe… no srsly I don’t think that I would be good in coaching, also i hate cutting my winrate.

5. What’s the poker dream for you?

That Phil Hellmuth pays back all players who have/had money on UB.
Other than that binking a Scoop PLO Event would be nice.

6. How do you see the poker landscape changing in the next five years?

It will be still around. People will still cry that the games got so tough but there will still be lots of money out there.

7. How much time are you putting into studying financial issues like investing. What are your preferred sources for this? What investments are you making with your poker winnings?

I started about 2 years ago. My dad is my preferred source because he has shitloads of experience. There are so much information out there, I guess you need to filter all those.
I am going to invest in a house.

Other

1. Do you have any regular non-poker hobbies? Whats your favorite way to spend your spare time?

Sports: Football & TRX. I just love spending time with my future wife, friends. BBQ & drinking good german beer!

2. If you could give you from five years ago (make it ten if over 30) one major piece of advice, what would it be?

Get your ass up and grind. Just avoid UB

3. What are the 3 things everyone should have on their bucket list?

Eat sleep plo?!
1. Travel as much as you can
2. learn a foreign language
3. be open minded for new things

4. Do you follow any poker podcasts or poker players on Twitch?

I watched Shuller_A1t playing the micros and one or two of GodlikeRoy’s vids
I like Joey Podcast obv

5. If you could change one thing with online poker, what would that be? What if you could change one thing with live poker?

Online: No scams/bots/MA/Colluding etc…
Live: 4 colour deck!

6. What is the best place and the best restaurant your have ever visited?

Places:
Ask me again after the honeymoon.
I have been to California with my GF in 2012. We made a roadtrip and saw lots of cool places. As a half Greek I can recommend Greece! So many beautiful islands.
Restaurants: Tough one.. there are so many good restaurants. I loved the Tommy Bahamas in Naples, FL but I guess eating the same steak at home would not have tasted that good.

7. Who do you challenge to do the Poker Player Snapshot next and why?

Dave Burn aka mrbiond / super inspiring