Doug Polk is concerned about the abundance of sports betting advertising:
– It appears sports betting is now going to be on every game and sports show moving forward. As someone who has been a professional gambler for my entire adult life, let me guide you through this process with this important guide:
1) You're going to lose over time.
There is too much edge to the house, and the lines are too efficient.
There are people with advanced strategies who win. They are very rare.
You arent going to win because you "know basketball". The line already factors in your thoughts.
2) Price matters.
There is a big difference between +105 and +115.
Shows seem to throw these numbers around interchangeably, but we are talking about almost 10% more payout on your win.
If you are going to bet often, you need to shop around for the best price.
3) Understand what you are paying.
Use a vig free calculator, and check the difference to the price you paid to know how much you are paying to the house. You can find free ones online.
Try to bet placed where you van get that number as low as possible.
4) Just because something happens 3 times in a row doesn't mean its unlikely to happen again.
I hear this one all the time, a team wins 3 games and someone says "it's really hard to win 4 games in a row"
Past doesn't impact the present. Every game is an individual instance.
5) Everyone is being paid to give you "picks". These are not good decision
Whether it's a "Same Game Barkley" or your favorite pod, the logic on why something will happen is virtually always already factored into the line
Why would people give you free money? (They wouldn't)
6) Sports media personalities are in the business of making things interesting.
They will come up with all kinds of crazy takes and stats that will seem compelling to bet on. Trust me, these guys are talking heads for a reason.
Finally, if you enjoy having a bet on a game and bet a responsible amount, knowing over time you will lose, that is fine.
Don't be a delusional sucker who thinks they have an edge. You don't.
The black streak of popular blogger Ethan “Rampage” Yau continues. At the beginning of the year, we talked about his high-stakes adventures.
After asking fans to stake him and promote himself, Ethan faced backlash. The now-deleted video was filmed in Sydney, which isn't the most humble place to ask for money. His followers didn't miss the irony of someone on a multi-week vacation asking for money via social media.
Ethan then thought about refusing to participate altogether, but he successfully played several sessions and even received an invitation to the Million Dollar Game. But a couple of weeks ago he recused himself :
“Backing out of this game, sad to not be able to play but hopeful to be in a better position next year🤞🏻
Looking forward to seeing all the action unfold end of May! Will 100% be tuned in
Online, things aren’t going smoothly for Ethan either :
Everyone’s favorite, loss porn! My results through 750 online tourneys this year.. a fun graph!
Wait a second..
I’m starting to think maybe I got sponsored by WPT Global to reward all the other players on the site🤔
Kabrhel replied:
The Million Dollar Game will take place from May 28 to 31. Play will be $500/$1k/$2k with a minimum bid of $1 million.
Tony G spoke about the epic cash game that is taking place these days on the Triton series:
– 7.11 am finally the game is over, can rest. Has been an epic run. Coming to a time where rest is required. Action has been epic and adrenaline pumping hard!!!
“Brewer looks like he just went into about $2 million in makeup,” a Twitter commenter noted.
“Love Chris,” Tony replied.
– what stakes Tony?
– NLHE $1k/$2k with $3k super straddle.
“Biggest game I ever played. Wild/tough night, but a very fun group,” Chris wrote under the tweet.
The next day was Omaha:
Patrick Leonard was disappointed in Mystery bounty tournaments:
"Mystery bounties are the stupidest format of poker ever created. The more they take over schedules the worse. If people want to just call any two vs jams with chance of binking huge just offer them a table game with the same parameters? It’s very bad for low/mid stakes regs where the variance is infinite & also very bad for recs who want to “enjoy their tournament experience” of course I see the benefits of gambling side of it."
“Usually agree with you but way off here imo,” wrote one of the commentators, “we need recs and this brings them in."
“the recs get crushed even harder both short and long term. strategically and financially, in every way.” Patrick objected.
A few hours later, Patrick won the 8th SCOOP title in the Wednesday Mystery $530 buy-in tournament:
– Fantastic format 🫡🫡🫡🫡🏆.
Niall Farrell described his participation in the Mystery Bounty with a meme :
At the WPT Montreal Series, local players Jikai Zhang and Adam Kader shared the victory in the $1,000 buy-in.
Kader amazed everyone with his youthful appearance.
– "Who is this prodigy, and how loose are the gaming laws in Canada?" – Matt Berkey was surprised. – "WPT is about to have its first pre-teen champion 🤯."
“Guy is 35” said Tony Dunst, “I spent much of the broadcast mistakingly calling him 25. When he first walked on set, I thought he was the 18 year old who FT’d.”
– 35?!?! – Berky was amazed. “Gonna need whatever secrets he's keeping.”
“Not being a degenerate in Vegas is step 1,” Joe Ingram shared his wisdom.
“Living in Montreal is # 2,” another reader added.
Chance Kornuth revealed one of the offline secrets:
"If a guy sits down at your poker table with his girlfriend behind him.
Look at her shoes.
Ifykyk"
Readers began to speculate what Chance meant. Half an hour later he himself gave the answer:
“the taller her shoes, the worse he is.”
Cole South wins the San Diego Open Jiu-Jitsu Championship:
"Picked up 🥇🥇 at the San Diego Open this weekend.
Had a solid kneebar finish in the gi and won a super close no-gi match with a score in the final 5 seconds vs a very tough opponent."
Will Jaffe asked readers to remember the wildest poker bets.
Tiffany Michelle:
– When an unnamed 20-something female poker player / poker host, who had never touched a drug or smoke a day in her life (natural or otherwise) and got paid $10,000 to try ecstasy one night in Vegas 🤔🤷🏻♀️
Tony Dunst:
– Timex/Jason Somerville betting if either wins a bracelet, the other has to wear it all summer. Jason wins a week in, Timex spends all summer getting congrats and asked what event he won.
– Falafel crossing weight with his skinny roommate. 20k to 1 million.
Ed. – Matvey “Falafel” Natanzon, a Soviet emigrant, was considered one of the strongest backgammon players in the world in the mid-2000s. He lived by the principle: “if I claim something, then I’m ready to put money on it.” According to rumors, he and his friend won the bet (initially Matvey weighed about 130 kg, his friend almost twice as much), but then quickly returned to their previous appearance. In 2020, Matvey Natanzon died of brain cancer.
PuntingStacks:
– Dude who got boob implants for 100k. Only had to keep them in a year to win and still has them 25 years later lol.
Burrow_Szn_9to1:
– Table once told a guy they’d chip in and let him keep as many $25 chips he would shove in his mouth and hold them in there for 5 mins. If he failed the 5 minutes, he owed that amount back.
Neil Channing:
– Roland bet Ivey $100k that he couldn't go a year without a haircut. Sounds pretty easy right? He soon realised what he might look like and bought out.
NativeSegwit:
– Ivey getting 200:1 to hole in a shot out of the bunker 150 yards away for basically Joe Cassidy’s entire bankroll at the time.
Ed. – Ivy himself spoke about this bet in one of his interviews:
“He was losing me, I think, $11,000, and my ball was 80 yards (73 meters) from the hole. I asked what odds he would offer me for completing it in one hit. I wanted to bet $1,000 for 200 to 1. At first he said: “No, no, maximum 100 to 1.” But then I agreed to 200 to 1, that is, I bet $1,000 for $200,000. I had a sandwich and hit the ball, it hit the ground once and disappeared. I walked up to the hole and couldn’t believe the ball was there. I just wanted to round up his loss, I thought of giving him this $1,000 as a friendly gift. At that time, his business was not as great as it is now, so I said that he could pay when he had the money, because the amount was simply wild. He looked like he was about to cry, it was funny.
MonkerGuy:
“In the 80s, a guy named Running Ron bet that he would run around the room in circles every time a new hand was dealt. We played 5-card draw limit for several hours. That's how he got his nickname.
The author of the first poker solvers, Oleg Ostroumov, recalled how poker legends prevented him from getting rich:
"Little did he know, but the old shark Doyle Brunson has recognized my work.
During WSOP 2019, my longtime customer and friend Timofey 'Trueteller' was playing $3000/6000 11-game mix game with Doyle Brunson, David Oppenheim, Gus Hansen, and Patrik Antonius
Soon, they realized that Trueteller is crushing them too hard. So they voted to play "anti-Timofey mix" (direct quote), which had no NLHE, PLO, or Draw games.
That made me feel poor but really proud.
I made less money with my piece.
But this was the ultimate recognition of the Draw Solver dominance."
“Oppie rigged the vote, north remembers,” Timofey added an important detail.
