PocketFives had the opportunity to talk with Jeffrey japhy Pinyan (pictured), who is a programmer by trade, but hits the virtual felts in New Jersey by night. Mostly a micro-stakes grinder, he surrounds himself with successful online poker players in the New Jersey community to help him get better and move up in stakes.

Pinyan qualified to play in the $3,500 buy in WPT Borgata Open Championship. Some notable cashes include an 11th place in the PartyPoker/Borgata $10,000 Guarantee, which he free-rolled into, second in the network’s $1,000 Guarantee bounty, and a win in the 888 Poker$500 Guarantee for a total of $650. Visit PocketFives’ New Jersey poker community for the latest news and discussion from New Jersey players.

PocketFives: What got you started playing online poker?

Jeffrey Pinyan: In college, I played a fair amount of low-stakes poker with my fraternity brothers: $20 cash games, $10 tournaments, things like that. I remember playing on PartyPoker occasionally during one year of college, probably 2002. When I moved to Ewing, I learned that Parx was less than a half-hour away, but I quickly realized that I needed to learn a lot more about poker before I could become profitable at $1/$2 and my tournament record was abysmal.

Once online poker became regulated in New Jersey, I was eager to get back into the game at lower stakes that my bankroll could afford so that I could actually build a dedicated poker bankroll instead. I still didn’t know at this point how little I actually knew about poker theory.

PocketFives: What are your favorite New Jersey online poker sites to play and why?

Jeffrey Pinyan: In the first few months, I played on the PartyPoker/Borgata network most frequently because they offered so many tournaments for $5 and less. I remember their evening $1 Pure Bounty tournaments, their $2 Ante-Ups, and their lunch-time Hyper-Turbos. Those were good for building a bankroll.

WSOP’s offerings are too often unlimited rebuys, which discouraged me at first, but I’m starting to come around to them. 888 gets the vast majority of my attention now because they have so many tournaments for $10 and under, which has been my typical price point until very recently.

PocketFives: How many hours do you dedicate to poker each week?

Jeffrey Pinyan: I have a full-time job as a software developer and my wife teaches at Rutgers Newark, so I don’t have the luxury of a lot of hours to spare on poker. I probably get in three to five hours a night, four nights a week.

PocketFives: Since the launch of regulated online poker in New Jersey, what has been your most memorable cash or win?

Jeffrey Pinyan: My most memorable cash was a live one recently, a 5-way deal for $3,900 at the Parx Big Stax Turbo. My most memorable online cash would probably be 11th in the Sunday $10,000 Guarantee on PartyPoker a couple of months ago for $291. That doesn’t sound like a lot, but I was freerolling because of a ticket I received in what I consider my most memorable online win.

That would be the Borgata Invitational Freeroll that ran in June of this year. I qualified for it because I ran well in the 1pm $4+$1 bounty a handful of times one month. In the freeroll, I was chip leader once we were three-handed, but I busted in third. That might not be a “win,” but I scored a $100 ticket to the $10,000 Guarantee that had just started running and a $3,500 ticket to the WPT Borgata Open Championship event at the Borgata, so I think it qualifies.

PocketFives: Is there anyone who helped change how you approach the game of poker?

Jeffrey Pinyan: After I joined the PocketFives community, I met a number of players with bigger bankrolls and better results who reached out to me and offered to help me improve my game. I’m involved in regular conversations with Jonathan FrickenWacko Ludwig and his wife Maureen Redhotmomma Ludwig. I’ve been receiving insight, encouragement, challenges, and the inevitable commiseration from them.

PocketFives: What do you do away from poker? What else interests you?

Jeffrey Pinyan: I’ve been a programmer since high school and I’ve been working in the programming industry in one way or another since sophomore year of college. I work with a cyber-security company doing database management and application development for our investigators and our clients. My wife and I have a burgeoning garden and we do a lot of cooking, preserving, and canning.

I have also written a couple of books on Catholic liturgy, which underwent some changes in the English-speaking world a few years ago. And since my wife competes in triathlons, she’s gotten me into running and I participated in my first 5K in July.