Down economies…lower bonuses….no job? Ever considered poker? Hear me out....

I know a lot of poker pros our age, mostly students and some who chose poker over banking, and it isn't that simple. Your friends probably made a million, it's certainly feasible, but you don't get to spend that, that's your bank roll. I know some very very good players, and even with a great win rate you still will realistically be making at most 50k for your first several years, especially if you are young because you cannot go professional until a certain age. On a 1mm bankroll, you might think you can leverage that for higher returns, but the fact is you are going to encounter diminishing marginal returns; tables where you can place bets worth your bankroll are naturally only going to attract players who are also extremely talented.

That said, poker is a great part time job, and if you understand statistics at all you will do very well. I would highly recommend it; it is probably more of an S+T mentality. I personally find the opportunity cost of tying up both capital and my time is too high for my tastes, so I only play "casually."

you're not going to have that much free time once you start working, even in a down market. do you really want to spend what free time you do have in front of a computer playing poker? you do have to play a lot to make money via poker. that said, i'll concede if you're good, it's a great way to make money.

fyi, the 65k salary is more than enough to live pretty comfortably in NYC your first year out.

You make some great points, however, I would like to politely disagree with a few of them.

"Your friends probably made a million, it's certainly feasible, but you don't get to spend that, that's your bank roll." - Your bankroll is what you set it to be. For example, I have a friend that made 200k, cashed out 100k to pay for his tuition / loans, and plays with a 50k roll. The only important point regarding bankroll is to make sure you manage it well enough to be able to handle the variance in your stakes.

"On a 1mm bankroll, you might think you can leverage that for higher returns, but the fact is you are going to encounter diminishing marginal returns; tables where you can place bets worth your bankroll are naturally only going to attract players who are also extremely talented." - You don't really place bets worth your bankroll, and there is a systematic process to move up stakes to make sure your potential losses are minimized. For example, when you build up enough capital to move up from multi-tabling 100 NL to 200 NL (under the assumption that you can crush the competition at 100 NL), you might only play 200 NL and set a stop-loss of 200 big blinds, for instance, before you move back down.

"tying up both capital and my time is too high for my tastes" - Def. a fair statement, but I would argue that the time spent is perhaps not as much as you would imagine. The initial investment in time needed to study is pretty high but you can do decently grinding it out if you establish the correct fundamentals / system. For example, you could easily work your skill level to multi-table 100 NL for 2-4 hours a day and come up with 4-6K / month.

That being said, I'm not a poker pro...but I have been learning and experiencing much success from my friends. The cost of living in these large cities will be very expensive after I graduate; I have a lot of fun learning the game and want to supplement my savings to the extent possible before entering the work force.

True points all, I certainly didn't mean you have to be making 1mm bets with your bankroll; my point was more about diminishing marginal returns. Even 200NL doesn't really require that big a bankroll, and the competition will likely be better than at 100NL. Thus, as was pointed out, you really don't have to keep that million in; you can certainly be living off it, which I suppose is a good point.

You can certainly multitable 100NL, but I am not that amazing that I would feel comfortable throwing down thousand dollar bets with .5seconds consideration, so my return is more like 25-50 an hour - opp cost. I find most players I know spend a little more than 2-4 hours a day (more like 4-6), but it is also about when that playing is done; most of them find their win rates are highest in the late late evening, so consequentially have very odd schedules and frequently sleep to 3 PM.

from someone who has played poker online for 8 years, if it is going to be your only source of income you are going to want to have very little variance in your returns and are going to have to have a rather large bankroll...

very few players online have the patience to do this and most players online style of moderate aggressive play will eventually involve them going broke (the number of online players who have the skill to profitably implement an aggressive strategy over the long term are

if you have a big wad of cash lying around, why not just day trade in this market. you would probably do better.

First of all, there's no way you'll have time to play poker enough to make substantial supplemental income in IBD. You would be playing long after the fish have gone to sleep and probably only an hour or two a day because you have to sleep sometime. Considering that time frame, you would want to be playing pretty substantial limits to see any economic benefit, requiring a huge bankroll and a tolerance for extreme swings.

My roommate sophomore year dropped out of college to play poker. He would go to bed as I was leaving for class and ended up dropping all of his classes. He played NL40, 6Max for a summer and made enough to pay rent/food and increase his bankroll, playing 6-8 hours a day. Then the swings caught up to him and he lost half his money in the space of 2 weeks. His parents refused to pay for anymore college so he went from going to a top 30 school to one just outside of the top 100. He claimed "financial firms" look for poker players but I doubt he could make into SIG.

One option that some of my friends who play do is basically poker consulting. They run online services and charge people starting out to teach them the basics, around 2k for a weekend of 1on1 tutoring. Basically zero risk if you go that route

I'm not advocating bad bankroll management (its an extremely important concept that I am fortunate my friend's taught me early) which I would be happy to share.....those that go broke consistently are usually playing at stakes they simply cannot handle and are not prepared for. I would argue that, given the right fundamentals / conceptions, the risk is minimal.

I am also not advocating quitting everything else in life and becoming a professional online poker player. What I am advocating is that the average person on this forum is perhaps smarter than the general population, can pick up and learn concepts pretty well and employ them. It sure beats retail or most of the jobs you can find at school.

You mention

If you are looking for great poker advice, I'd suggest the forums at 2+2 poker. Great poker players and also really active and intelligent forums in general.

In a lot of ways, this post explains exactly why banks have so much toxic paper on their books and why the credit markets are a mess.

Pokerdizzle, I've recently started playing a lot more poker and I am absolutely hooked. (been playing for ~4yrs) I love the fact that the game involves quick math and psych...especially patience.

I have been reading anything i can get my hands on: Harrington on Hold'em volume 1 and 2, Hanson's every hand revealed, full tilt guide to tourney poker, etc.

I prefer the tournament format bc cash can be such a grind and I've done well online but I've been playing VERY low stakes until I improve the speed of pot odd calcs, read on betting patterns, etc. (ie max I've played is a $20+2 tourney). I've only played a few hundred tourneys so i'm still a relative newbie but I plan to continue improving.

Do you have any suggestions that would help me with pot odd calcs and/or how to quickly calc winning %s from different hands matched up. like a cheat sheet I could just memorize? Especially live, I've found that I have a great read of playing styles, and know when to make a move and when to lay a good hand down.

thanks, Patrick

Calcing winning%s, you can use the 2x+1 rule - for the limits you're playing, it is accurate enough.

Take the number of outs you have, 2x+1 it and that's the percentage chance you have of hitting.

From that, pot odds is easily calcable (if you're playing online).

Also be careful of using pot odds for tourney play; a 1000k has very different values at different stages of the tournament, your position, your chip stack, etc.

There are like 3 or 4 VERY standard online betting patterns that you absolutely need to master that are relevant to both tourney and cash games.

I'm not suggesting you shouldn't play poker. It's just that having poker be a viable source of supplemental income could be very difficult, especially when IBD hours pick up. And no matter how much advice you get from high-limit players, 2+2, books (all great stuff, btw), it takes time to adjust to new limits and you'll have to be playing some very high ones on very little sleep if you want to compensate for lack of a better bonus. It's probably wiser to focus on getting top-bucket (as small as it may be) than getting a few extra dollars a night and potentially sacrificing exit opps.

I'm not hating on poker though. Back when I played regularly I loved it, it's just that seeing my roommate ruin his college career for it kind of put a damper on my playing.

what about all the bots out there just playing the odds?

also, you don't know whether the other players are instant messaging about their hands. hell, the whole table could be in on it except for you.

Out of curiosity, I remember being a TAG (Tight-Aggressive) was the style you wanted your stats to point to a few years ago. Then being a LAG (Loose-Aggressive) became the best way to make money because of the number of fish. What is it now?

I wouldn't worry too much about collusion in all honesty, really think the difference is marginal and there's so many fish out there it doesn't even matter.

I think your poker style depends on your personality, etc. Personally (and I am no poker pro) I find a LAG strategy to be profitable as a whole at lower stakes (stealing a lot of blinds, playing in position, 3-betting a bunch).

That being said, I see a lot of TAGS out there that are still turning consistent profits. I also see a bunch of nit grinders rounding out the bunch that, for example, only raise 8% of their range preflop.

if you are loose aggressive, speaking strictly about online cash games, then you have to have huge variance in your returns, and there is a very good possibility that you are not a profitable player in the long run...

i used to play LAG on the the $2-$2 NL with $100 behind and it feel great when i would run it up to $1400 in a couple hours, but after missing draw after draw for 20 hands in a row with like Jc8c, you start to understand why people grind it out.

if you really want to make a lot of CONSISTENT money online, open like 6 tables at once and just fold all but premium hands. There are enough idiots online who will still give you action.

Haha there's some funny posts in this thread. I'm sure this is what it is like for my interviewers when I try to sound like I understand the market.

Anyways, I'm one of those "six figure college kids" and I doubt poker would be a good part time option for most people. It's definitely not rocket science, but the issue is that it requires a certain mentality to be able to achieve long term success. Smart people can pick up on the basics quickly, and the intermediate/advanced stuff eventually, but learning to completely disconnect your emotions from your actions is easier said than done.

Though if you are the type of person that wouldn't be affected by someone else making a stupid decision, getting lucky, and taking a large chunk of money from you -- hundreds of times per month -- then ya maybe you should try poker part-time.

If you're a bad lag, sure, you aren't going to be profitable in the long run and may have extremely high variance (for instance shoving in situations on flop with flush draw and little fold equity against a guy with a tight range that dominates yours)

i dont think you understand loose aggressive.... as in there is NO WAY to play LAG and not have comparatively high variance in your returns.

Why not just go straight for drug dealing? Pretty sweet RoI if you know the right people.

ive been playing online poker seriously for almost two years and have done pretty well. And to be honest if you have little to no experience playing poker then I wouldn't even start, assuming you're doing it solely to supplement your income. I used to think that anyone could develop a system and become successful at low stakes (200nl and below, and even at "low" stakes you can make 4-5 figures a month no problem), but ive had friends try and learn poker and they had tons of trouble so not everyones cut out for it

99% of the posts in this thread are retarded just fyi

HOly shit what a epic thread. A REAL DISCUSSION TOO!?! wow.

So basically for those of you that know me, you know that I am a junkie that will bet/make markets on just about anything possible. It fits my personality pretty well. Poker and trading are very much alike to me.

I do not think it is feasible to supplement your income if your working in ibd, just requires way too much time. I do think its possible to make a living as a poker grinder and potentially make mid 6 figures but your going to have to be dedicated.

Now I will digress with some boring calculations regarding if you actually want to grind poker for a living.

Assuming your treating this like a business you will probably have 4 screens. A reasonably good cash game grinder can play 24 tables at a time.

At $200NL a winrate of 4bb/100 is not unreasonable over a gigantic sample. = 4bb * $2bb = $8/100 hands

24 tables for 8 hours a day 60 hands per hour per table = 11520 hands per day (call it 10k)

10000/100 * 8 = $800/day * 250 days a year = $200,000

$400 NL and $600 NL I think you could reasonably expect the same sort of results.

Trading is bad enough watching the market tick by tick but poker your talking about grinding something forever, at 24 tables your constantly involved in a hand at some point.

As for me I am a lowstakes MTT recreational player, I play a couple nights a week but when i sit I will play every tourney thats within my bankroll. I have seen some pretty crazy swings as a player, definitely could not do this for a living but for now its decent supplementary income until my job starts.

24 tables at a time? really?

24 for grinders, starting out good luck playing 4 at a time....

For those of you that are interested http://www.wallstreetoasis.com/group/the-poker-group

I would love to get a WSO private tourney set up on Stars for those of you that are interested.

I used to occasionally play poker at the Straddle Club before it was shut down last year...anyone know of any other underground card rooms in the city? if so, PM me...

I would be down for an online tourney with other members but schedules are tough

HAHAHAHAHA 24???? Find me one decent player who plays 24 tables. What a joke.

I used to play a lot but haven't in a few years.

For those of you who play a lot (and by a lot I mean at least a couple hours a day), are you using any software like this:

It seems like statistical and historical data on opponents would give you something of an edge, but I'd like to hear from anyone who has tried this. Is it too cumbersome in real time?

I know of 3 good 24-tablers on pokerstars that make a living of it. It's very rare. For the vast majority of winning regulars, 4-12 tables produces a better hourly.

As for the software, most regulars use holdem manager or poker tracker for cash games.

WSO what you said about adjusting between lag and tag is exactly right. It always depends on your opponents, your relative position with them, and general game flow.

anyone here played at WSOP before?

Speaking of sports, does anyone play Streak for the Cash on ESPN?

naturally ideating you find a way to argue with me.

Ship it son.

24 might be impossible for most but 16 is much more feasible. There are several people playing right now that are 16 tabling $400NL. The people that we are talking about that are making 6 figures grinding poker can definitely play 12+ tables at a time. 24 is for a more elite crowd and action junkie.

Does anyone have any links to some sites that explain how to play using pot odds? I understand the general concept, but I never really learned the exact way. Does it really work? I could probably do my own googling, but I thought someone here may know a good site. I'm going to Vegas next weekend...wouldn't mind trying it out.

Also, I could never rely on poker as a legitimate means of supplemental cash. Entirely too speculative. Then again, I never made more than a couple hundred bucks in one session. I love to play, but I'm horrible.

24 is high but doable, probably thrown out to make a bit of a point. Agree most players don't do that many tables at once, but that's not to say there aren't players succeeding at 24

I was throwing out a hypothetical situation which someone could grind poker and make 6 figures. In no way am I saying thats a likely scenario or a "base" case. I was saying it was possible. Please grow up and stop arguing with everything I say.

playing 10k hands a day $200NL with a winrate of 4bb/100. While 24 may seem astronomical to you the 4bb/100 winrate and 60 hands/hour is pretty conservative I think.

Reading these comments makes it pretty obvious why Wall Street is in the mess it is in (or why you guys are all unemployed!). I doubt many people, if ANYONE actually makes a living, or even a large/predictable amount of money through online poker. It is strange how you only hear about these (otherwise skill-less) people making substantial amounts of money, but nobody seems to lose money. At the end of the day, this is at best a zero-sum (if the websites fund themselves through ad revenues) or, more likely, a negative-sum game (in the more likely case that the websites fun themselves through a rake). Why would you play this game? Any financial market is a better investment, since atleast you are dealing with earning (or atleast in the long-run appreciating) assets. Unlike poker played face-to-face in a casino, you cannot "read" people, you cannor see people get fatigued and frustrated. And, even if you believe these stories, then people in online poker games are all sharks (highly skilled, or running tables my cooperating at the same table) - and why would you play with them? I hear my assistant tell similar stories about her son, so I think about this quite a bit...

You are are not even a poker player yet you are proclaiming what is and isnt possible? Reminds me of my finance professors that said technical analysis is a sham.

Poker is a negative sum game (after rake) but the bad players out there more than make up for this fact. There are some truly truly horrible people out there that just dont know what they are doing.

On being able to read people, that is not really the case. You can pick up on their betting patterns, timing, etc... Online is a lot more mathematical/odds based.

With that being said I bet that 90% of poker player lose money, 5% make money but nowhere near enough to support themselves, 4% make good money but they only make enough to support themselves. And that last 1% of poker players are the really solid player.

My stats for 2008 were in the top 95% of players according to a website that tracks over 1million online poker players and didnt have a good year.

We can debate this more if your like, I am willing.

I don't think there is much to debate. Broadandwall has absolutely no idea what he is talking about.

If you guys want to see what kind of money the top cash game players make, check out www.tableratings.com. It has been tracking all the cash game hands on the major sites since September. You can see graphs of winnings also which should give you an idea of the variance involved. It's also fun to see how much money the biggest degenerates are losing.

I'm thinking about getting back into playing, but I haven't played online since before the ban went into effect. Back then I was playing at Pacific Poker the most.

What are the best online poker rooms (for real money, obviously) and how do you fund the account now that the new laws are in place? Now that I live in France, it's no big deal over here, but I don't know anything about any of the French sites.

Pokerstars is the most reputable IMO. Best customer service, security, software, game selection, etc. Full Tilt is popular as well.

I haven't deposited since 2006 so I'm not sure of the best ways to deposit. It kind of depends on your country and the amount of money you want to put on. Your best bet would be to email pokerstars support, they usually respond within minutes.

Agree with jnxpn, Stars and Full Tilt are great.

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Agree, Pokerstars and Fulltilt are where you should look to get back in

get real jobs, stop wasting your money. My wisdom to you. I am out like your fat sluts in dodgeball.

And I actually do play poker, but never online.

You should consider playing online broad- that is, if you like the game and not just the social interaction. The games move a lot faster (no waiting for slow dealers), and are more 'fundamental'- without faces to read your cards and the other persons bets are the only info you have.

That being said, clearly making money playing online poker is hard. IF it was too easy more people would get into it, work harder at it, and make it harder. I'm surprised that anyone on here has time to make even moderate money ($20k/yr) since I assumed everyone either had a finance job or was going to school.

Even if you don't make money though, I think online poker is a lot of fun. I used to be a competitive chess player and even though I'm not as good at poker (or maybe I am now, haven't played chess in years), I still think the game is ten times richer.

OP. what are some of these resources that you're talking about? i enjoy playing poker every now and again and like it to be a hobby. i agree, bankroll management is essential, one of many things that i need to work on.

All of you should be ashamed. Just days ago my unemployed 17 year old son withdrew $600 from my checking account without my knowledge, and with it he made a deposit on a website called Full Tilt Poker. Over the course of three days he managed to whittle that initial sum down to a mere $36 dollars. Amazingly when I confronted him he said that he wanted to continue playing, insisting that he was experiencing a temporary “downswing” and “bad beats.” When he directed me to this website after I asked him where he got such an idiotic idea I was unsurprised. Of course the same clowns who got our economy into the mess it is in today are the ones who are propagating such harebrained get-rich-quick schemes. No doubt I have laid the hammer on him, but I am not overly upset by the amount of money that I lost. For my son it is a lesson better learned now than later, when his own family’s money is at stake. What is more upsetting to me is the utter lack of discretion you all have shown in discussing this dangerous topic. I have respect for the game of poker but for Christ’s sake, I cannot think of a worse way to make money than by gambling money away. If there are those of you who believe that this fool "pokerdizzle" is not peddling something then you are helplessly gullible, trust me it is as if I have developed a sixth sense for detecting such vile characters. Overall I am completely astonished at what I am reading. I have noticed that you all like to refer to yourselves as monkeys, and indeed that is an appropriate characterization given the ridiculous way in which you all act. My purpose in writing this message is that if I can save 1 kid from making the same mistake, and 1 father from suffering my emotional grief, then I will be happy. To all young students who read this, do us all a favor and consider pursuing a profession that produces value in the world not misery. If you think it is a wise career choice to slave away 100 hour work weeks for a little bit of money then your mind is not in the right place. I know that I will be responded to with the usual venom, so I will not be returning here.

Michael Hunt IV HBS ‘76