What Poker’s "Professional Best Friend" Is Up To These Days

Jeff Gross has climbed to the very top levels of poker with over $3.15 million in live and $1.2 million in online tournament earnings. During his highly successful career he earned more than just money - he became friends with poker’s biggest stars such as Phil Hellmuth, Antonio Esfandiari or Bill Perkins.

His social circle goes even beyond the world of cards and chips  - he was roommates with 14-time Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps.

His famously pleasant presence earned him the nickname “professional best friend”, or just PBF for short.

He recently sat down with PocketFives.com for an interview. 

Gross, as many poker pros, likes to stream on Twitch so the questioning started with asking about the popular video game Fortnite - the game that took over the streaming platform. Gross, however, is not tempted by the potential views and haven’t actually streamed or played it yet - something that Lex Veldhuis has done.

Gross did say that Fortnite seems “fun”, but called it “a time stuck”.

Fortnite wasn’t the only off-topic question the American poker pro got. He also talked about his favorite sport, soccer and the upcoming Esfandiari vs. Kevin Hart boxing match. 

As for poker itself, the biggest topic covered was the new tournament structure, the big blind ante. This is when the big blind posts the antes for every player at the table in each round. 

Gross claims he has been told by Matt Savage that even next year’s WSOP Main Event is could be played with those rules. Gross is happy with the change as it speeds up the tournament play.

“It makes a lot of sense to me personally. Especially the early levels with 25 antes or 75 chips… It’s one of the bigger innovations and kinda just better all around moves in poker I think that’s happened. That’s something that actually moves the needle with recreationals and people are like ‘alright, this speeds up the game’" - Gross told PocketFives.