It’s hard not to award November 2013’s Poker Boss of the Month title to the World Series of Poker Main Event winner, Ryan Riess, a man who won an incredible $8,3 million dollars and a bracelet  rumored to be worth $500,000 to boot. However, before taking a closer look at the third Michigan State native WSOP champion, Ryan Riess (after Tom McEvoy in 1983 and Joe Cada in 2009), it would be unjust not to credit a few other players who tagged impressive achievements to their name last month.

Our Poker Boss of October, Daniel Negreanu, has been taking the poker rankings by storm, yet again. After he locked his second Player of the Year award in October, he went on to top the famous Global Poker Index ranking in November. Niklas “ragen70” Heinecker, our August Poker Boss,ranked first in the High Stakes Data Base Online Poker Results for November with incredible style. Not only was he the only multi-millionaire winner of month, but his $2,436,939 in winnings for November put him over $2 million above Sankler’s $318,768, who came in second. Then there was Allen Kessler who won the Heartland Poker Tour Player of the Year in late November and finally, how could we neglect poker pro Eric Riley, who escaped two $1,000,000 robbery attempts on November 30th… like a (Poker) BOSS!

Nevertheless, East Lansing, Michigan state native Ryan Riess has rightfully claimed the PokerFaceNews Poker Boss of November 2013 title. The Main Event wasn’t his first big win either, just over a year before becoming the World Series of Poker champion he bagged the title and $223,063 at the Horseshoe Hammond in Chicago during the WSOP circuit. He put up a hell of a fight too, running through a 17 hour marathon heads-up battle against Joshua Williams, the eventual winner.

Unlike the typical young and rash poker player, our shaggy, blonde haired Poker Boss did not instantly give up his studies as a result of the big win, but instead spent the next couple months completing his BA in Business at Michigan State University. Nonetheless, he did give up his job as a part time poker dealer on the day of his victory, and when asked if he ever considered putting his degree to work, he responded simply with,

“No. It was poker the whole time.”

Ryan Riess, a 23 year old current Las Vegas resident was introduced to poker at the age of 14, very soon after the dawn of the Moneymaker era. It was a $10 home game that he ran twice a week in his basement with friends which kick-started his passion for poker. When speaking of it, he revealed,

“I won all the time which I thought was kinda weird so I thought maybe I should do this more often.”

He further claimed in an interview that he took poker very seriously, and studied his opponents at the Main Event final table vigorously in the months leading to November 2013. Indeed, Riess “The Beast” has a total of 22 live recorded cashes to his name, all within just over a year’s time, including four WSOP cashes and one WPT cash in the Borgata Poker Open Main Event. All these cashes led him to entering the GPI 300 in early November, ranking 236th with 1369 points. As of the 2nd of November, he has further bumped himself up to 199th place with a total 1,429 points.

“I’ve just been trying to improve my game every day, I’m still learning. All of my friends are absolutely amazing at poker. Loni Harwood, Jonathan Taylor, Jonathan Hilton, Bryan Campanello, they all won bracelets this year. The list goes on, I could name 100 of them.”

Ryan Riess is the first 90’s born poker player to win the WSOP Main Event and follows Detroit sports religiously. Do you agree that Riess deserves this month’s PokerFaceNews Poker Boss award? If not who does, or who was the closest second?