Joe Cada
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Joseph Cada (born November 18, 1987) is an American professional
poker Poker is a family of Card game#Comparing games, comparing card games in which Card player, players betting (poker), wager over which poker hand, hand is best according to that specific game's rules. It is played worldwide, with varying rules i ...
player from
Shelby Charter Township, Michigan Shelby Charter Township, officially the Charter Township of Shelby, is a charter township located in Macomb County, Michigan, Macomb County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The township is an affluent northern suburb of Detroit. As of the 2020 U ...
, best known as the winner of the
Main Event In sports, a card lists the matches taking place in a title match combat-sport event. Cards include a main event match and the undercard listing the rest of the matches. The undercard may be divided into a midcard and a lower card, according to ...
at the
2009 World Series of Poker The 2009 World Series of Poker was the 40th annual World Series of Poker (WSOP). It was held at the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, and ran from May 27 to July 15. There were 57 bracelet events, culminating in the $10,000 No ...
(WSOP). By winning the 6,494-entrant Main Event at the age of 21, Cada surpassed
Peter Eastgate Peter Nicolas Eastgate (born 13 December 1985) is a poker player from Denmark, best known as the winner of the Main Event at the 2008 World Series of Poker. At the time, he became the youngest player ever to win the event. He was subsequently ...
as the youngest champion ever. Cada had two previous WSOP
in the money ''In the Money'' is a 1958 American comedy film directed by William Beaudine and starring The Bowery Boys. The film was released on February 16, 1958, by Monogram Pictures, Allied Artists Pictures and is the 48th and final film in the series. It ...
finishes, both in 2009. Cada had been a regular
online poker Online poker is the game of poker played over the Internet. It has been partly responsible for a huge increase in the number of poker players worldwide. Christiansen Capital Advisors stated online poker revenues grew from $82.7 million in 2001 t ...
player for several years prior to winning the live WSOP event. He is primarily an online poker player, with more than $500,000 in online tournament winnings at present. As of November 2024, his total live tournament winnings exceed $14,700,000. Cada became a representative of Team PokerStars in 2009 in the weeks prior to becoming World Champion. On June 18, 2012, he lost heads up in the 2,811-entrant $1,500 No Limit
Texas hold 'em Texas hold 'em (also known as Texas holdem, hold 'em, and holdem) is the most popular variant of the card game of poker. Two cards, known as hole cards, are dealt face down to each player, and then five Community card poker, community cards ...
event at the
2012 World Series of Poker The 2012 World Series of Poker was the 43rd annual World Series of Poker (WSOP). It was held at the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino in Paradise, Nevada, between May 27 and July 16, 2012, with the final table of the Main Event delayed until late Oct ...
. Cada is from a family of card enthusiasts, although his parents disapproved of his chosen profession. His agent dubbed him "The Kid" (although this is already
Stu Ungar Stuart Errol Ungar (September 8, 1953 – November 22, 1998) was an American professional poker, blackjack, and gin rummy player, widely regarded to have been the greatest gin player of all time and one of the best Texas hold 'em players. Ung ...
's nickname), and he has also taken on the role as a statesman of the profession in the media and political circles, where he is a proponent of legalization of gambling.


Poker career


Summary

Cada started playing
online poker Online poker is the game of poker played over the Internet. It has been partly responsible for a huge increase in the number of poker players worldwide. Christiansen Capital Advisors stated online poker revenues grew from $82.7 million in 2001 t ...
at about the age of 16. He twice staked accounts but lost all the money in the accounts that he shared with his brother Jerome. His first online account was with PartyPoker. Although he was not legally able to play in casinos prior to age 21 in the United States, he could play in Canada at age 19 and play online. After a brief sabbatical from the game subsequent to losing his money, he began to play at a
casino A casino is a facility for gambling. Casinos are often built near or combined with hotels, resorts, restaurants, retail shops, cruise ships, and other tourist attractions. Some casinos also host live entertainment, such as stand-up comedy, conce ...
in
Windsor, Ontario Windsor ( ) is a city in southwestern Ontario, Canada. It is situated on the south bank of the Detroit River directly across from the U.S city of Detroit, Detroit, Michigan. Geographically located within but administratively independent of Esse ...
across the Canada–US border from his Detroit-area home. He earned enough to enter contests in the Bahamas and Costa Rica. At the time of his WSOP success, he was playing approximately 2,000
hands A hand is a prehensile, multi-fingered appendage located at the end of the forearm or forelimb of primates such as humans, chimpanzees, monkeys, and lemurs. A few other vertebrates such as the koala (which has two opposable thumbs on each "han ...
per day online at
PokerStars PokerStars is an online poker cardroom. It is the largest real money online poker site in the world, controlling over two-thirds of the total online poker market, and can be accessed through downloadable poker clients for Windows, macOS, Androi ...
under the User ID jcada99. Cada had been a professional poker player for six years at the time of his world championship. Between the end of 2008 and the 2009
November Nine The November Nine was the name used to refer to the final nine contestants, or final table, at the Main Event of the World Series of Poker (WSOP) from 2008 to 2016. The winner of the WSOP Main Event is considered to be the World Champion of Poker. ...
, Cada had earned $551,788 online. Prior to the tournament, he had a $150,000 downswing that necessitated him finding a financial backer for the WSOP. Professional poker financiers Eric Haber and
Cliff Josephy Cliff D. Josephy is an American professional poker player from Muttontown, New York. At the 2005 World Series of Poker (WSOP), Josephy won a bracelet in the $1,500 seven-card stud event, defeating fellow professional Kirill Gerasimov in the fi ...
paid his entry fee in exchange for half of his winnings. Cada enjoys playing the "Sunday Major" tournaments at various online sites and says he honed his skill pursuing the knowledge and experience of better players at online training sites. He typically hosts many poker playing friends on Sundays to keep each other company while going through the grueling Sundays of playing the various majors. Usually, on Sundays, Cada hosts about fifteen friends to play online at his house. According to his ''
CardPlayer Card players are those participating in a card game. Various names are given to card players based on their role or position. Position Games of Anglo-American origin In games of Anglo-American origin played in English-speaking countries, ...
'' magazine profile, Cada used several similar aliases to play with various online poker hosts: jcada99 and Joe Cada on the
Full Tilt Poker Full Tilt Poker is an Irish online poker card room and online casino that opened in June 2004. Formerly privately owned by Tiltware, LLC and later by the Rational Entertainment Group, the site was acquired by The Stars Group (then known as Amaya ...
website, jcada99 on PokerStars, and JCADA99 on
Absolute Poker Absolute may refer to: Companies * Absolute Entertainment, a video game publisher * Absolute Radio, (formerly Virgin Radio), independent national radio station in the UK * Absolute Software Corporation, specializes in security and data risk mana ...
.


World Series of Poker


2009 World Series of Poker

At the
2009 World Series of Poker The 2009 World Series of Poker was the 40th annual World Series of Poker (WSOP). It was held at the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, and ran from May 27 to July 15. There were 57 bracelet events, culminating in the $10,000 No ...
, he had three
in the money ''In the Money'' is a 1958 American comedy film directed by William Beaudine and starring The Bowery Boys. The film was released on February 16, 1958, by Monogram Pictures, Allied Artists Pictures and is the 48th and final film in the series. It ...
finishes (all in
No limit No Limit may refer to: Music Record labels *No Limit Records, a record label founded by Master P *No Limit Forever Records, a record label founded by Romeo Miller, son of Master P Albums * ''No Limit'' (Art Pepper album), 1977 * ''No Limit'' ...
Texas hold 'em Texas hold 'em (also known as Texas holdem, hold 'em, and holdem) is the most popular variant of the card game of poker. Two cards, known as hole cards, are dealt face down to each player, and then five Community card poker, community cards ...
): 64th in the 1,088-entrant June 5–7 Event 13, $2,500 No Limit Hold'em, which earned him $6,681; 17th in the 2,095-entrant June 16–18 Event 35, $1,500 No Limit Hold'em, which earned him $21,533; and 1st in the 6,494-entrant July 3–15, November 7 and 9 Event 57 $10,000 World Championship No Limit Hold'em, which earned him $8,546,435. Prior to his final table victory, Cada earned a $1 million contract with PokerStars that pays for all his hotels, travels, and some of his buy-ins. His signing with PokerStars resulted from an interview on
ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...
with Phil Gordon where he expressed an interest in signing with that specific company. His agent had already procured him offers from UltimateBet and PokerHost as a result of his November Nine qualification. Cada was represented by
agent Agent may refer to: Espionage, investigation, and law *, spies or intelligence officers * Law of agency, laws involving a person authorized to act on behalf of another ** Agent of record, a person with a contractual agreement with an insuran ...
Dan Frank. In the main event, Cada was the tournament chip leader after day 1C, which was the third of the four opening day sessions, but he began the final table with the fifth largest chipstack. In the 122nd final table hand Cada's stack was reduced to 2,275,000—enough for only four big blinds and about 1.2% of the combined total stack at play—due to calling Jeff Shulman's "all in" pre-
flop Floating point operations per second (FLOPS, flops or flop/s) is a measure of computer performance in computing, useful in fields of scientific computations that require floating-point calculations. For such cases, it is a more accurate measur ...
with against . No
community cards Community card poker is any game of poker that uses community cards (also called "shared cards"), which are cards dealt face up in the center of the table and shared by all players. In these games, each player is dealt an incomplete hand face dow ...
hit either player, and Shulman was rewarded by his better high card. Cada later went all in twice pre-flop with small pocket pairs and was dominated by higher pocket pairs on both occasions, once with vs. and the other with vs . Both times Cada flopped the winning three of a kind. By the time the field was reduced to two players he had 135 million chips to 58 million for
Darvin Moon Darvin Moon (October 1, 1963 – September 19, 2020) was an American self-employed logger and amateur poker player who was the runner-up of the 2009 World Series of Poker, (WSOP) US$10,000 no-limit Texas hold'em Main Event. It was his first tim ...
. During the final heads-up duel, Cada surrendered the chip lead, but he eventually climbed back to 120.1 million before the last hand of the heads-up with Moon. He regained the chip lead on the 80th hand. His winning hand was , which he got all-in pre-flop against Moon's , which was a classic race situation prior to the flop. The board ran . This hand was the 88th hand of heads-up play between Cada and Moon. These three events account for his total cumulative career live event earnings of over $8.5 million. With the November 2009 victory, which occurred just over a week before his 22nd birthday, Cada supplanted Peter Eastgate, who won at age 22, as the youngest World Series of Poker Main Event champion. He was 340 days younger than Eastgate had been at the time of becoming world champion. In the week following the WSOP win, Cada made numerous publicity appearances as a poker ambassador. His media events included appearances on
CNN Cable News Network (CNN) is a multinational news organization operating, most notably, a website and a TV channel headquartered in Atlanta. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable ne ...
,
CBS News CBS News is the news division of the American television and radio broadcaster CBS. It is headquartered in New York City. CBS News television programs include ''CBS Evening News'', ''CBS Mornings'', news magazine programs ''CBS News Sunday Morn ...
,
CNBC CNBC is an American List of business news channels, business news channel owned by the NBCUniversal News Group, a unit of Comcast's NBCUniversal. The network broadcasts live business news and analysis programming during the morning, Day ...
, ''
Late Show with David Letterman ''Late Show with David Letterman'' is an American late-night talk show hosted by David Letterman on CBS, the first iteration of the ''Late Show'' franchise. The show debuted on August 30, 1993, and was produced by Letterman's production com ...
'', numerous ESPN outlets including '' First Take'', ''
The Scott Van Pelt Show ''The Ryen Russillo Show'' was a syndicated sports talk radio show hosted by Ryen Russillo. It was a part of ESPN Radio from 1 pm to 4pm, with all three hours also simulcasted on ESPNews. On April 26, 2017 Danny Kanell was let go by ESPN ...
'',
ESPNU ESPNU is an American multinational digital cable and satellite sports television channel owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between the Walt Disney Company (which owns a controlling 80% stake) and Hearst Communications (which owns the remain ...
,
ESPNews ESPNews (pronounced "ESPN News," stylized ESPNEWS) is an American multinational digital cable and satellite television network owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between The Walt Disney Company (which owns a controlling 80% stake) and Hear ...
, ESPN Inside Deal, and
ESPN.com ESPN.com is the official website of ESPN. It is owned by ESPN Internet Ventures, a division of ESPN Inc. History Since launching in April 1995 as ESPNET.SportsZone.com (ESPNET SportsZone), the website has developed numerous sections including ...
as well as a taping for ''
SportsCenter ''SportsCenter'' (SC) is an American television sports news broadcasting show broadcast by ESPN. Originally anchored by Chris Berman, George Grande,  Greg Gumbel, Lee Leonard, Bob Ley, Sal Marchiano and Lou Palmer, it premiered on Septem ...
'' that was never aired plus a visit to ''
WWE Raw ''WWE Raw'', also known as ''Monday Night Raw'' or simply ''Raw'', is an American professional wrestling television program produced by WWE. It currently airs Live television, live every Monday at 8 p.m. Eastern Time (ET) on Netflix. The show fe ...
''. During the publicity run, Dennis Phillips served as Cada's advisor.


2010–2017

Cada finished second in the 2,811-entrant June 16–18,
2012 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...
$1,500 No-Limit Hold'em Event #31, which earned him $412,424. He won a bracelet in the 264-entrant June 14–16,
2014 The year 2014 was marked by the surge of the Western African Ebola epidemic, West African Ebola epidemic, which began in 2013, becoming the List of Ebola outbreaks, most widespread outbreak of the Ebola, Ebola virus in human history, resul ...
$10,000 No-Limit Hold'em 6-Handed Championship Event #32, which earned him $670,041.


2018 World Series of Poker

At the
2018 World Series of Poker The 2018 World Series of Poker (WSOP) is the 49th annual tournament, and took place from May 30 to July 17 at the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. There was a record 78 WSOP bracelet, bracelet events. The $10,000 No Limit Hold ...
, Cada earned two more bracelets and a fifth-place finish in the $10,000 No Limit Hold'em Main Event, which earned him more than any of his non-main event bracelet victories. He won the 363-entrant May 31 – June 2, 2018 $3,000 No-Limit Hold'em Shootout Event #3, which earned him $226,218. When Cada made the 7,874-entrant July 2–14 $10,000 No Limit Hold'em Main Event final table for the second time (earning $2,150,000), he became the first former champion to do so since
1995 1995 was designated as: * United Nations Year for Tolerance * World Year of Peoples' Commemoration of the Victims of the Second World War This was the first year that the Internet was entirely privatized, with the United States government ...
winner
Dan Harrington Dan Harrington (born December 6, 1945) is a professional poker player, best known for winning the Main Event at the 1995 World Series of Poker. He has earned one World Poker Tour title, two WSOP bracelets, and over six million dollars in tourna ...
reached the
2003 2003 was designated by the United Nations as the International Year of Fresh water, Freshwater. In 2003, a Multi-National Force – Iraq, United States-led coalition 2003 invasion of Iraq, invaded Iraq, starting the Iraq War. Demographic ...
main event final table (although
2001 The year's most prominent event was the September 11 attacks against the United States by al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror. The United States led a Participan ...
champion
Carlos Mortensen Juan Carlos Mortensen (born 13 April 1972, in Ambato, Ecuador) is an Ecuadorian professional poker player of Danish descent and the first South American Main Event winner of the World Series of Poker. Mortensen is known for his loose play, blu ...
made the unofficial final table in
2013 2013 was the first year since 1987 to contain four unique digits (a span of 26 years). 2013 was designated as: *International Year of Water Cooperation *International Year of Quinoa Events January * January 5 – 2013 Craig, Alask ...
, finishing 10th). After being eliminated from the main event, Cada entered the 3,120-entrant July 12–15, 2018 The Closer – $1,500 No-Limit Hold'em (30 minute levels) – $1 Million Guarantee Event #75, which he won for $612,886 for his 4th career bracelet, and his 2nd of
2018 Events January * January 1 – Bulgaria takes over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, after the Estonian presidency. * January 4 – SPLM-IO rebels loyal to Chan Garang Lual start a raid against Juba, capital of ...
. These finishes gave him a third-place finish in that year's WSOP Player of the Year, behind
Shaun Deeb } Shaun Frank Deeb (born March 1, 1986) is an American professional poker player from Troy, New York. He has three World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP) player of the year titles and six World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelets. Career Deeb s ...
and
Ben Yu Ben Yu (born January 8, 1986) is an American professional poker player, commentator, and writer. He has won four World Series of Poker bracelets and appeared at 15 World Series of Poker final tables. Yu, who grew up in Los Angeles, California, a ...
.


Personal life

Ann Cada, Joe's mother, was a
blackjack Blackjack (formerly black jack or ''vingt-un'') is a casino banking game. It is the most widely played casino banking game in the world. It uses decks of 52 cards and descends from a global family of casino banking games known as " twenty-one ...
card dealer A poker dealer distributes cards to players and manages the action at a poker table. Professional dealers Any casino with a poker room must hire a staff of dealers. Casinos generally pay dealers minimum wage. However, a dealer's primary source ...
at the
MotorCity Casino MotorCity Casino Hotel is a casino hotel located in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It was opened on December 14, 1999. The $825 million MotorCity complex contains a historic building that housed the Wagner Baking Company, makers of the bra ...
. Cada has an older brother, Jerome, two older sisters Theresa and Jillian, and one half little sister Alex. Cada's father, Jerry, was affected by the
late-2000s recession The Great Recession was a period of market decline in economies around the world that occurred from late 2007 to mid-2009.
when his automobile industry job was eliminated in a layoff. During the 2009 World Series of Poker's
November Nine The November Nine was the name used to refer to the final nine contestants, or final table, at the Main Event of the World Series of Poker (WSOP) from 2008 to 2016. The winner of the WSOP Main Event is considered to be the World Champion of Poker. ...
, dozens of Cada's fans wore T-shirts with
Michigan Wolverines The Michigan Wolverines comprise 29 varsity sports teams at the University of Michigan. These teams compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA's NCAA Division I, Division I and in the Big Ten Conference in all sports except wo ...
team colors (
maize Maize (; ''Zea mays''), also known as corn in North American English, is a tall stout grass that produces cereal grain. It was domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago from wild teosinte. Native American ...
and blue) with the words, "PokerStars Michigan Joe Cada 'The Kid'" emblazoned across the front and Michigan baseball caps with "The Kid" on the back. His agent came up with the nickname "The Kid". In an interview in ''
Time Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...
'', Cada estimates he had about 100 friends in his cheering section. In the ''Time'' interview, Cada expressed his thoughts on legislation related to the legality of gambling: "I support the right to play poker online. Poker isn't gambling. It's a hobby, an activity, a game. It's not about luck—it's about logic, decision-making, math. We all should be able to play poker on the Web if we want to, and I believe that making it illegal strips us of our rights. This is an important issue, and hopefully we'll see it resolved soon." Outside of poker, Cada also plays
indoor soccer Indoor soccer or arena soccer is a form of five-a-side football, five-a-side or six-a-side version of minifootball. It is derived from association football and adapted to be played in walled hardcourt indoor arenas. It differs from the FIFA, FIFA ...
. , he was considering purchasing a second home in
Las Vegas Las Vegas, colloquially referred to as Vegas, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and the county seat of Clark County. The Las Vegas Valley metropolitan area is the largest within the greater Mojave Desert, and second-l ...
,
Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...
and possibly opening a bar.


References


External links


Card Player profileGlobal Poker Index profile

Hendon Mob profile

WSOP profile

BLUFF profileWPT profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cada, Joseph 1987 births American poker players World Series of Poker Main Event winners World Series of Poker bracelet winners People from Macomb County, Michigan Living people