Mark Seif: Lawyer Turned Poker Champion

Mark Seif is a former attorney who rose to stardom in the poker world last summer with two tournament victories one week apart in June in the 2005 World Series of Poker. Readers may debate whether transitioning from law to poker qualifies as a "success story," but we were quite intrigued by what Seif had to say in an interview with Poker News, in which he explained how his legal training has helped him excel at poker:

My legal background played a huge part in the forming of my poker skills. It seems attorneys are very good because of the things that they learn from their legal background. All you have to do is look at people like Greg Raymer, Dan Harrington and Andy Bloch, who were all attorneys and have had great success at the tables.

The reason for lawyers being good at poker is because the skills that you use as an attorney are similar to those that you would use in poker. You have to be very intelligent and you have to prepare yourself for a tournament, much like you would prepare for a trial. You also have to work off of incomplete information in the legal profession, which works directly into what you do at a poker table.

Lawyers do well in poker because they have to constantly work at their job and they are always watching their opponents. You are always reading people when they are testifying, determining if they are being truthful, and this, once again, is directly relevant to the game of poker.

Read the full interview with Seif in Poker News, the "Independent Online Poker Authority."