3:11pm: Someone asked what my story was in the forums. Another member asked me in an email about 3 weeks ago. This was my reply to him, and the response that is posted in the forums - for those of you who just check the front page.
Enjoy!
Things that have changed since this story was written:
(a) My total profit is now > $17,000 on PokerStars (see my graph)
(b) My apartment has burned down since this was written
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I actually began playing poker back in 2003. At the time, I was trying to make it as a professional blackjack player playing the Martingale method (if you dont know what it is, do yourself a favor and DONT look it up, lol), but needless to say, that didn’t work out for me very well. Then one night, I saw my GFs step dad playing poker online, and I honestly didn’t even know you could do such a thing at the time. I asked him about it, he referred me to PartyPoker. However, I contemplated for a while before making a deposit. During this time, I did a lot of research into whether or not poker would be a game that could be beat in the long run. I bought the book Internet Texas Hold Em by Matthew Hilger, and also Harringtons blue book. I read them and decided that poker sounded like a good thing to focus on instead of blackjack.
My first deposit was $50 on PartyPoker in November 2003, where I played I played .5/1 LIMIT hold em (absolutely no concept of bankroll management or discipline at the time - but I was actually just trying it out just to get used to the flow of the game). Needless to say, I lost the $50. I deposited $100 the next time, and lost that as well. I then deposited $200 the next time, and actually built that up to like $1200 by playing 2/4 LIMIT hold em. For the next 3-4 months or so, I was finally making consistent money playing poker, and I decided that if I could grind out like $50 a day playing 2/4 limit hold em that I would look into no limit once I got up to about $3,000. Once my bankroll was up to about $1,500 - I got stupid one night and decided to give 2/4 NL a try (once again, no BR mgmt skills at ALL at the time). Well, I lost $400 of it, decided to take a small break and start fresh playing 2/4 limit again, however it was at that time Hurricane Katrina hit in New Orleans, and I had to retreat to Texas before the storm hit.
I was stuck in Texas for a whole month because we weren’t allowed to go home before then. In Texas, I wasn’t able to work (I was a bartender/waiter at Chilis) obviously because of the hurricane. I then got a cell phone bill for $400 because of everyone using my phone during the month of the storm. With the last $1,100 to my name, I got stupid and sat in at a 5/10 NL table online. Then, one hand changed my life -
I had QcQd, and someone raised to $60 pre flop. I made it $200 to go, and he called. The flop was Qs 10s 10h. I checked and the guy bets like $120, I just called. The turn was Js.. I check again, he bets $200, I call. The river was 5s.. but time I bet, $400. He puts me all in for my last couple hundred or so, and obviously I call because I know hes got the ace of spades and caught the flush. The moment he put me in I called and jumped up and down in excitement because I just knew he doubled me up. I didn\’t even have to look at the hand because I had the nuts in my mind. So I go back to the screen and see that I have $0, and immediately I freaked out. I go back and look at the hand history, and see that he actually won the hand because like I said he had the ace of spades - and the king of spades to go with it for the royal flush. It was at that moment that I officially had a negative net worth, and there was no way I was going to be able to pay the $400 cell phone bill.
My parents decided to help me out a little, and my mom gave me $200 toward the bill for everyone having used the phone. I didn’t know what to do about the last $200 as i had absolutely nothing, and then magically one day I wake up and have $2,000 in my bank account. It was from FEMA - they gave everyone $2,000 in relief after the storm. It was literally the best thing that ever happened to me because I wouldn’t be here talking about having made it if not. I decided to take some time off, reform my ways and look into practicing proper bankroll management. After paying off some bills, I still had about $1,500 left to spare, so I decided to look into heads up sit n gos, because I had heard heads up is where you have the biggest skill edge. However, this time I deposited my money ($100) on Ultimatebet instead of PartyPoker because party\’s rake was ridiculous for heads up sngs. I started out playing $10 heads up sit n gos, and would deposit again in $100 increments, if needed.
Well, little did I know that would be my last deposit, ever. I won 56% of my heads up matches on UB, and played about 20 games a night at the time, and probably averaged $30 profit a day or so, which was good enough to just survive on at the time. I eventually went back to work, and they promoted me to bartender, where I was making like $150/night, so I was able to move up to the $20 heads up sit n gos. However, I decided to give Full Tilt a try this time. My winning percentage went up a % point despite me moving up in stakes, and I was in love with full tilt. I was able to save up $2,000 in about 4-5 weeks of playing $20 heads up matches, and with that $2,000 I decided to just take a shot at my local casino playing 2-5 NL.
This is where I truly realized how much potential i really had. Although I was still completely out of my mind for trying to play 2-5 NL with $2,000 - long story short I was able to build that $2,000 up to about $30,000 within the first 9 months of me playing. At that point, I decided my time was worth more to me playing poker than bartending, so it was at that point that I quit and went pro. With that $30,000.. I bought a new car, and used the rest of it as a bankroll for $100 heads up matches on Full Tilt (Sharkscope me if you’d like - trujm). I was able to make about $8,500 on there, with a win rate of 57%, even at the $100 level. However, I caught an extremely bad run of cards, and within a week I had lost $3,000 of the money I had made. At that point, I wasn’t mature enough to handle variance in poker, but i was smart enough to know myself at this point, so I decided to cash out $5,000, leaving me with just $1000. I took a break from heads up, and went back to playing live, and I made another $15,000 or so in about a 6 month span, but this time practicing really strict bankroll management. I was probably regarded as the best 2-5 NL player at Harrahs New Orleans during this time due to me just being extremely consistent and getting more and more disciplined by the day.
I saved up enough money to move out of my parents house, and then moved in with my GF in April of 2007 in an apartment about 5 minutes away from downtown New Orleans, for quick access to Harrahs. I underestimated the cost of living on my own, and also had to use about $10,000 of my bankroll into furnishing the apartment, leaving me with about $20,000 and some change to work with. Well, I went through a really shitty run of cards at Harrahs, lost about $5,000 and decided to take a break and go back to playing heads up. I decided that I didnt like the blind structure on full tilt anymore, so I decided to deposit $2,000 on Bodog, and $2,000 on PokerStars and leave the original $1,000 on Full Tilt, and pretty much haven’t looked back since.
I was able to make about $10,000 in 3 months on Bodog, and have made roughly $17,000 in 6 months on PokerStars. My win rate is now sicker than ever, 61% - and Im playing completely within my bankroll and would never think of ever going back to the way I was before.
