Post Black Friday Update (4/18/2011)
Monday, April 18, 2011 at 4:18AM Black Friday being April 15th, which I'm sure anyone who reads this blog already knows about. The Department of Justice has indicted the three major online poker sites. This includes PokerStars, which I had a Supernova status on. I haven't updated because I've really been in a state of shell-shock from the entire situation. Friday it was confirmed as I received the message:
"We are sorry, but playing real money games is not allowed in your area"
As for my plan I have no idea. I had a lot of money online and was generating income playing online around 25 hours per week, not to mention around 8k of my assets are indefinitely frozen which I couldn't really afford to lose. I was actually going to withdraw 2k to go towards living expenses/rent in May. It took me a year and a half of busting my ass to get where I was online. For periods of time I had no life, now it's all gone in overnight. My plan was to possibly shift 90%+ of my play online by next year.
I've never been more disgusted. All I can do is wait for the dust to settle and see what happens. Hopefully I can somehow get my Stars money out eventually and start over online somewhere. I tried to wire a $1,000 out of my Stars account. If the transaction ends up going through I will try to wire the rest out, but I'm expecting to lose it all.
Meanwhile, I have to go all live, I have no choice. I might make more short-term weekly, but every week I'm not online hurts my growth as a poker player. I'm also not sure if I can play live poker 50 hours per week. Maybe 35-40. Online was obviously a big part of my plan going forward.
The only good news in my life is I'm on a mini-heater live right now. I don't want to get into it much because I don't want to jinx myself. I'll just report results when April ends, or when a down-swing comes. It's been my best profit month as a pro and it's only April the 18th!
Every time something has gone incredibly wrong in my life a new door has opened. Maybe the new door this time will be focusing 100% on live poker. It shouldn't hurt my net profit at all, if anything online was bringing that down in the short-term. Maybe it will be good to focus on one format (live poker) for a month+ straight. It should be interesting to see how the live games change. You would have to assume an influx of former online pros will now be playing at brick and mortar casinos. They certainly won't be lining up for 9-5 jobs.
Man how life has changed in a week.
-bag
Reader Comments (2)
I got updates from my online pro friends saying it was almost impossible to get a seat at Borgata all weekend - good luck, man.
I have a lot of cash stuck on Full Tilt now - the most I've had online in 2 years. What shitty timing for us all.
Thanks man good luck to you as well. I normally don't say where I play, but I was at the Borgata all weekend and had no trouble getting seats. The games were good as well, but it was a weekend and the Spring Open is going on.
-bag