Jon "PearlJammed" Turner plays online at Full Tilt Poker. Away from the table, Jon spends much of his time at home in Las Vegas with his girlfriend or travelling to hear his favorite band, Pearl Jam.
Like many other young pros, Jon "PearlJammed" Turner credits Chris Moneymaker with jump starting his career. While still a Computer Science student at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, Jon watched as the amateur Chris Moneymaker defeated established pro Sammy Farha to win the 2003 WSOP Main Event. The characters, drama, and simple fun of the game piqued his interest and soon, he began playing Freeroll tournaments play money games online.
Eventually, Jon "PearlJammed" Turner decided to begin playing with real money, and slowly began building a bankroll by playing low-limit ring game tables, Multi-table tournaments, and Sit & Gos. While he found the online games enjoyable and educational, it wasn’t until he started playing live poker with several of his friends that he truly got hooked.
Jon "PearlJammed" Turner bubbled in his first small live tournament, but walked away with a new-found desire to pursue poker full time. Jon "PearlJammed" Turner quickly became involved in regular games and tournaments around Raleigh and soon quit his job at Circuit City when he began making more at cards than he did in retail.
As Jon's local games grew in size, he realized he might be able to earn a living playing cards. While continuing to hone his skills around Raleigh, he soon began travelling to Atlantic City and Las Vegas where he would test himself against more experienced competition. Again, Jon "PearlJammed" Turner found that he was winning more than he lost, and in 2005, he made the move to Las Vegas to pursue his new-found career.
Jon "PearlJammed" Turner played his first WSOP events in 2005 and finished 18th in the $3K No-Limit event, pocketing $20,000 that helped cement his growing bankroll.
In October 2005, Jon "PearlJammed" Turner discovered high buy-in online tournaments and hasn’t looked back since. Since October 2005, he has won more than $1.6 million as an online tournament pro known as PearlJammed, and has racked up 21 tournament victories on Full Tilt Poker.
In live events, Jon "PearlJammed" Turner is equally impressive, having earned third-place finishes in both the 2005 WSOP Circuit event at Bally’s and the 2007 $2,500 WPT event at the Borgata.