Mendieta19

The Swede is one of the most consistent MTT players in the world but his real identity remains a secret….

‘mendieta19’ is a sick tournament player.

When an unknown Swede final tabled the FTOPS Main Event in November 2007, placing 3rd for $152,985, no-one knew anything about mendieta or his game. And certainly no-one could have envisaged that the Pocket Fiver would have put his bankroll to such good use and establish himself as one of MTT pokers toughest players in such a short space of time.

As with many Swedish internet players, his real identity is unknown, but when you have been posting results like this guy has then your chips can do the talking for you. On PokerStars & Full Tilt combined, he has tournament prizes of over $1.8million in the space of just over 18 months and continues to put fields to the sword with his hyper-aggressive tactics.

When he took down a P5’s Triple Crown in March ’08, with victories in the PartyPoker $20k GTD, the PokerStars $50 Cubed and the Full Tilt $100 Cubed, it was clear that we weren’t just dealing with a one-trick pony. Since then, he has proceeded to be a fixture at the Stars high stakes final tables, with a 2nd & 5th in the Stars Super Tuesday (over $80,000 combined), 2 victories & two runner-up spots in the $100 Re-Buys (over $145,000 combined), as well as a 15th in WCOOP Event #5 ($10,000 NLH) for a further $35,310. Over on Full Tilt, he has also taken a 3rd & 4th in the $1k Monday (over $72,000) as well as a second in the Sunday Mulligan ($32,148). And almost exactly a year after his FTOPS Main Event exploits of 2007, he sat down at Event #21 ($500 NLH Heads-Up) and fought through 896 players to finish runner-up to Greg ‘DuckU’ Hobson for a cool $52,000.

Though he is one of Sweden’s top ranked tournament players by a distance (and is also chummy with the rest of ‘Team Sweden’, including eisenhower1 & Tomgus456), he is not as well known on the tournament scene as a Chris Moorman or an AJKHoosier. Perhaps this is because for all his substantial cashing, he is yet to take down a Sunday major or WCOOP/FTOPS Event in his own right. Part of the reason for this could just be pure bad luck: after all, he faced off with one of the best players in the world (DuckU) in the FTOPS heads-up battle and also lost out on a 3rd $100 Re-Buys crown on Stars by being taken down 2-handed by the excellent Laurence ‘rivermanl’ Houghton. Whoever he is, there is no doubt that he is a fantastic player and it is surely a question of when and not if he makes this right by winning one of the net’s biggest tourneys. Just look out for him when your on Full Tilt or PokerStars because he is probably coming for your chips.