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Paul Wasicka could nearly be considered a prodigy in the cutthroat world of poker, not only because he has not been playing the game for very long at all, but also because he is only 29 years old. Born on February 17th in 1981, this Dallas, Texas native is known as "Kwick Fish" when he is throwing down the chips. He did not begin playing the game until 2004, at the young, tender age of 23. Prior to his success at the game, Wasicka had work as both a restaurant manager and a bartender. But these are merely a few facts about this famed up and comer.

He has come a long way in a relatively short amount of time. Remember, he began playing six years ago, in 2004. A mere two years after he started playing, in 2006, Paul Wasicka played in the 2006 World Series of Poker. Out of more than 8,700 other players, and at the young age of 25, he won second place, winning over six million dollars in the process. The very next year, Wasicka won $500,000 in the NBC National Heads-up Championship game. This year, he also won the World Series of Poker Circuit Event, which took place in Tunica.

Returning to the subject of the 2006 World Series of Poker, Paul Wasicka ended up playing against Jamie Gold in a heads-up competition. He took the first hand, in spite of the fact that the odds were highly stacked against them. However, Gold took the second hand after going all in right after the flop, after which he by all intents and purposes began goading the rookie. Still, by all accounts, Paul Wasicka's second place finish was beyond remarkable.

Wasicka has a number of other noteworthy finishes in big name tournaments. For instance, in addition to his second place finish in the Main Event of the 2006 World Series of people, in 2007 he had a fourth place finish in the Main Event of the 2007 LA Poker Classic. That same year, he also had a first place finished in the aforementioned NBC Championship.

Fans may well be interested to know that Wasicka considers himself a bit obsessive, a trait which likely led to a love affair with internet poker. Upon discovering it, Paul also realized that he could rather easily win a lot of money -- thousands of dollars -- at the high stakes tables specializing in "sit and go" games. However, he found he could lose all of that just as easily, requiring bail outs from a good friend.

No Paul Wasicka biography would be complete without some personal trivia. The player's last name is pronounced "WAH'-sih-kah." Until early 2006, he managed Via Toscana, a restaurant in Louisville, Colorado, belonging to his brother-in-law. Two years prior to the 2006 World Series of Poker, Wasicka estimates that he played anywhere between three thousand and seven thousand hands of poker a day, much of them on the internet. He considers his abilities in the game of poker to be blessings.