WSOP Shares Available - Staking (Long Post)

This is a long post, excuse the typos because I wrote this in a hurry and will proof read it later when I have more time. Anyways, ’m going to be in Vegas June 29th till at least June 4th and will be hitting up some family and friends for stakes, to be clear I can afford these buy ins, I’m just looking to reduce variance and play more events. Before going to friends I figured I’d throw up a few posts first to see if I an save them for a different opportunity. So:

I’m offering shares on the WSOP side of my trip if anyone is interested:

Event #52 $1500 Buy-in NLHE
Share Value: 90 cents on $ invested
Shares available: 5 @ $100 each
Share Stake: 6% of tournament cash

I will be paying $1000 of my own cash to enter this event and will own 50% of myself. 20% is swapped with a friend who is playing another event, 30% is going to those who purchase shares.


Event #53 $1500 FLHE Shootout
Share Value: 90 cents on $ invested
Shares available: 10 @ $100 each
Share Stake: 6% of tournament cash

I will be paying $500 of my own cash to enter this event and keeping 40% of myself. 60% is going to share holders who are fronting 66% of the cost

Note: Its not certain that I’ll play this event. If 90% of the field is gone in event #52 and I’m still in it this will be a skip. I’ll refund all share holders promptly if I do no play

$1060 Buy-In Mega Satellites

Detailed Explanation below:

There are 4 of these available for me to chose from 1PM, 9PM on both the 2nd and 3rd. This is a satellite to the main event, to be clear this stake is for the first one of these that I play. I might play a second one if I am not successful the first time around and another opportunity for staking comes up.

If I win a seat its going to requires me to be in Vegas an extra week at least a few more nights and to book a new home as well, I’m on budget airfare that might not be able to be changed. For this reason share pricing is a bit less:

5 shares available @ 6.5% each of my main event should I qualify via this satellite.


About Staking

I will draw up a simple contract and email it to each staker. If you’d like it sent in paper form via overnight express this is fine but you’ll need to add $15 to the payment to cover the overnight shipping fees.
Payments Options: PokerStars, Full Tilt, Cash, Western Union, Money order etc. I have no preference.

About me:

I’m 29 years old and have been playing poker practically my entire life. I realize everyone says this and they’re referring to their kitchen table games, but my example is different. I spent half my child years staying at my aunt and uncles house and they were professional card players. They owned there own house, had five children and while they lived tough they made their living on card. Poker was a big part of it, but pitch and rummy bar room tournaments were also a huge part of it. At that house we took cards seriously and its about all the kids there ever did. I hung around most of the time with my cousin who was my age and another who was a little younger, but there were three others 3, 4 and 5 years older. Here friends came over all the time and we’d play – all sorts of games, but cards were in my hand almost ten hours per day from age 7-16.

In 1996 when I was 17 years old I first heard of the World Series of Poker, I did not know nor would recognize the acronym WSOP at that time. I set out with the goal in mind that some day I would win a bracelet. Over the next couple years I heard a lot of people making jokes about it and it kind of rubbed off on me.. I was then making good money in cash games, and people joked about tournament players sitting around all day making no money.

A few years later when the World Poker Tour popped up I bubbled a satellite to play the Foxooods Event at the time it did not bother me because I had a massive bankroll and a great internet marketing business (was not gambling related at the time), but I bring this up because this is what first started to spark that goal I had when I was 17 again.

A little after this time I had lost a couple million in business and things had gone bad. I found myself for the first time in my life needing to live off poker. Prior to this time I had lived off poker, it was one of my first sources of income, but this time around I was not a teenager anymore and I was a single father, with serious bills, serious debt and had no other source of income. About a year into grinding it out for a living I played a satellite online to win a $17K prize package. There were 2000 people in the field and the top 17 got seats. When there were 18 left I was 8th in chips and then watched for 2 straight hours (this was a fixed limit tournament) short stacks double, and double again – over and over. I finished in 18th place and got $680 or something like that rather than the seat, it took me years to realize how much I let this affect me subconsciously. I never wanted to feel that feeling again at the time, and I stopped playing satellites. I still did well in MTTs but never took shots at winning anything big.

The past year I’ve been looking back at all the big tournament stars and been thinking heck I player with all these guys.. I used to final table with them all the time when big stars and party MTT where in their infancy. Others I played with live have gone on to become big celebs as well… and over the last year I realized that is what I want to do. I love tournament poker, I love the competition the win or go home.. the fact that there is a winner and a loser.

This trip here is my first step to doing what I always wanted to do. I have no intention of going off an trying to live off tournament poker. I’m still going to build my residual and keep growing the business. I have a decent enough income now where I can afford to start a part time tournament poker career. I’m going to get my feet wet with a few $1500 tournaments first and $1000 super satellites to main events, but by next year I see myself playing a lot more of the Series and by the year after that playing all the bigger buy in events.

Okay long expliantion to say where I’m coming from and my goals.. but this is all to say this:

1) I don’t have stats to share – When I was last playing poker seriously online OPR, PokerDB, SharkScope etc, etc did not exist at the time.

2) I’ve been playing poker a long time
3) I take poker very seriously.

Which events are best to stake me in?:

My biggest edge will be in the Fixed Limit Shoot out, but seeing as it requires winning a 10 player SNG to start the variance is high. I am sure I am +EV in that event.

If I get into the Main Event that would replace my highest +EV edge: I’ve played and cashed in a lot of bigger buy in tournaments online.. Bodog 100K I’ve played six times cashed 4. PokerStars Sunday Millions have played 3 times and cashed all three. So this field and structure is favorable to me – but also I have great reads and sense in live poker, I make a lot more in live cash games on a per hand basis than I do online because I earn extra bets by paying attention. I do get a bit of adrenaline rushes early in tournaments and also deep in tournaments, but for the most part I am calm. I have thousands of hours of live poker play where I have an edge over those less experienced playing live.

The Super Satellite I might be slight –EV towards chances of winning a seat. I have some issues with satellite play, not fundamental but with distractions and triggers.

The $1500 NLHE event – I will be playing this one to win. The chip counts are small, it’s a huge field and I won’t be grinding my way into the money. There might be other players who have a better chance to cash then me. There is +EV poker games to be played a Ceasars, another event starting the next day etc.. This is a tournament there is not time to be patient. I won’t play like a Maniac but I won’t be scared to race either (which is not at all my normal strategy). If I get chips I like my chances to go deep, I’m winning to bust to take a chance at making a run in this event.

That’s about all for now. Anyone interested send me a PM – I think I made it clear this is a gamble – there are better staking opportunities on the market.

Also I have a friend who is not really resourceful but he is a GREAT live poker player. His online stats are not all that impressive overall, 11% ROI for 2008, but he has a couple decent cashes this month where his ROI has jumped over 100% - for live play this calendar month he’s one for two on foxwoods events making final tables – for online play this calendar month -. A $11 + Rebuy 4th place finish for $4078 and a $650 cash in a $33 freezeout, and another final table I can’t figure out his username at that site off hand to look it up. His big strength is live play. His bankroll is only $15K and I really had to pull teeth to get him to come on this trip with me, he had offered me a $1K share in this event and I only passed because I was considering selling shares in myself – I was not going to Vegas I would stake him. In his last dozen or so Foxwoods daily tournaments I would guess he’s final tabled about half of them. He is a great card player and if he took the game a bit more serious, read books, watched videos used forums etc, something he doesn’t do, he could probably be a great, he has more potential than any player I ever taught poker too. I’m sure he won’t go asking for stakes to strangers, but if arranged one for him I’d bet he’d accept it as he is a total bankroll nit and has never spent more than $500+$35 to enter a tournament before so this is a huge jump.

I'm willing to help. Count me in for 1 stake at event # 52.

Remaining Shares

Event 53:
0 pending sale
8 Sold
2 remaining

$1060 Mega Satellite:
2 sold
3 remaining

Event 52 = Sold out, Thanks

I got my shares, Go JIMBO!

Thanks to everyone who has contributes for far. I've now sold 15 of the 20 shares, leaving 5 remaining. I have a very busy day tomorrow and my availability will be limited. In order to save time if anyone is interested in purchasing shares please let PM me with:

Full Name
Location - city, state country
payment method

This way I can save a step in asking for this information in order to construct our custom agreement with payment information.

Thanks again guys I appreciate those who contributed very much.

Jim