Jonathan Plens – therookieqq9

Jonathan Plens is another MTT superstar off the Canadian production line and is very highly rated by those in the know….

“Jonathan is one of the most underrated players that there is online but he’s been crushing it for a while now and is starting to get the recognition he deserves.”

These were the words of Sorel Mizzi describingJonathan Plens during the closing stages of the 2008 WSOP Main Event: though he busted in 42nd for $154,400, there is no doubt that Plens has received the plaudits Mizzi felt he deserved since then.

Known online as ‘therookieqq9’, Plens, from Toronto, Canada, is unsurprisingly good friends with fellow countrymen Mizzi & Russell ‘rdcrsn’ Carson and he has clearly learnt from two of the world’s very best MTT players. Despite being 29 years of age, Plens is showing the appetite of a hungry 18 year-old for the online game and it is showing in his results.

‘therookieqq9’ has shot into the Pocket Fives Top 10 Rankings after winning the monthly PLB race in November 2008, showing some of the hottest form seen anywhere in recent months. In fact, starting in August he took down the Poker Room $100k GTD for $30,510 before the biggest score of his career just 7 days later: victory in the Party Poker Birthday Million, an enormous 2,078 runner tournament with a buy-in of $640 – that was worth a staggering $233,775 for his troubles.

As if making over a quarter of a million dollars in a week wasn’t enough, he was the number 1 ranked player in November and has been the talk of the community ever since after some outrageous consistency.

He enjoyed an incredible weekend of 9th-10th when he took down the PokerStars$100k GTD ($320 NLH) for $24,948 on the Saturday before not only final tabling the Full Tilt Sunday Mulligan on the Sunday (6th, $10,152) but then going on to outright victory in the holy grail of donkamanets – the Sunday Million, good for another six figure score of $188,920. Combine this with two $100 Re-Buys final tables (for $32,000 combined) & runners-up finishes in the FT $80k GTD ($18,316) & Party Poker High Roller $30k GTD ($11,050) and that’s almost$550,000 made in just 4 months! This led to a Pocket Fives thread devoted to his achievements and full of praise from some of the games top talents, initiated by none other than Alex ‘AJKHoosier’ Kamberis.

Plens doesn’t exactly fit the mould of an online superstar – despite getting into the game in the Moneymaker boom of 2003, he was already 25 & didn’t even take up the game seriously until 2006. After his Party Poker 6-figure score he told P5’s: “I really would love to get a big live score under my belt. I really enjoy playing live tournaments. They allow me to focus on one table. I can sit back and absorb all of the information I’m getting from my opponents.”

After his phenomenal recent run, it would be no surprise to see ‘therookieqq9’ achieve his live ambitions at the 2009 WSOP.