Mission WSOP

Christmas is a mere hours away and I noticed that there was some unfinished business in my blog.  I never really did give you my take on online poker staking sites and I figured with me (for the first time ever) being ahead of the game in Christmas prep, I would sit down and write it tonight.

As I returned to playing online poker recently, I never really knew a lot about the ins and outs of it.  First, I never heard of Sharkscope or thepokerdb or Official Poker Rankings.  I was also only vaguely familiar with poker forums online… most notably the official Full Tilt Forum and Pocket 5s, neither of which was I very active.

I started my blog soon after my return to online poker and being the attention whore that I am, began jumping around from forum to forum shamelessly plugging my blog.  While most forums were strictly online communities used to discuss poker strategy, bash Chris Moneymaker and whine about being doom switched (or in the live poker world, receiving a bad beat), I started noticing forums that were mainly created to provide stakes to online players.

Staking seemed somewhat interesting with the WCOOP right around the corner and I thought I would get involved in a couple of sites to see if I could possibly get enough cred on the site to get staked in one of the WCOOP events.  I never really got into any of the sites until I happened upon Surfers Poker.  Surfers intrigued me because they seemed to have a good amount of events and they weren’t overrun by freeroll whores.  What I realized is that the major difference between Surfers and most other staking sites is that Surfers is a poker discussion site with staking built in unlike most others which are focused on staking 24/7.

Now, here’s the good news/bad news on staking sites.  The good news is that if you are a staker and stake the right people, you can make some money.  And if you are a person with some proven online success and a small bankroll, you could get some opportunities to start to build a bankroll.  The bad news is it is on the Internet and in the faceless sea of names that you see on these sites, it is hard to tell the legit players from the non-legit players (i.e. someone looking to scam you).

A couple of things I’ve noticed that might help you avoid a scam if you decide to join a stake site.

1. Establish a relationship with the site members before jumping into the staking part of the site.
On some of these sites, it is easier said than done but it is good to make sure that the major players on the site know you are not just a bottom feeding stake runner.

2. Beware of the player that starts off by being a frequent staker.
You always want to be cautious of these new forum members.  My short experience shows me these are usually the members most likely to run a scam.  Be especially cautious if they stake just anyone and don’t particularly do research on who should be staked on the site.  This is usually a set-up for devious behavior down the road.

3. Get a trusted third party involved when trading money from site-to-site and do it in small increments.
If I want $100 on Poker Stars and I have $100 on Full Tilt, I should have no problem shipping it in $20 increments… or even $10.  And if I’m the one who wants to make the deal, then I should be willing to initiate the first transfer.  If you run into players willing to help you but want you to send more than you are willing to first or require you to go first even if it is their request, I’d be careful.

4. If you fall victim to a scam, the online poker site will not help you fix it.
Unfortunately, there is no recourse is someone were to rip you off on a stake or a money transfer on one of these staking sites.  The only minor satisfaction one can gain from being ripped off is to report the scam artist to the forum and they will most likely be banned.  The money, however, is gone for good.

5. There’s no such thing as an emergency.
The major theme of a scam is usually some sort of emergency where the scam artist needs money right now.  But think about it… even if it were immediately, a cash out on an online site usually takes a day or two to be processed if not longer.  The first place you turn to for a monetary emergency is not your online poker account and your online poker friends.

6. Like the poker table, people are usually the opposite of whatever they tell you initially.
At the poker table, a pretty hard and fast rule is that someone who acts strong is usually weak.  Very similar things occur on a staking site.  If your potential business partner acts like a rich fat cat, they are probably broke.  If your potential stakee acts like they don’t need or care about the money, they probably need it very badly.  And if your potential horse acts like the greatest poker player since Phil Hellmuth, they probably couldn’t play their way out of a brown paper bag.

7. If you stake someone and they can instant message you… they probably will ask you for a stake (every day, all day).
One thing I’ve noticed is that if you stake someone, they can become relentless in their quest to get you to stake them again.  I have not run a stake for very many people but those that I have rarely don’t ask again for a stake… or again and again… or again and again and again.

Hopefully, this gives you some insight on what I’ve learned over the past couple of months.  Personally, I don’t ask for stakes ever and I rarely apply for one when they are posted.  I may request a BAP (Buy-A-Piece) down the road for a bigger tournament but that’s about it.  I also don’t stake people very often and only do so when I’m bored and want to be entertained by seeing what people would actually go through to earn a stake. 

Finally, in a totally unrelated subject, I thought I’d list my favorite 10 songs of 2007:

10. "Stronger" - Kanye West
9. "Crank That (Soulja Boy)" - Soulja Boy Tellem
8. "If You’re Reading This" - Tim McGraw
7. "Big Girls Don’t Cry" - Fergie
6. "The Sweet Escape" - Gwen Stefanie
5. "Umbrella" (cover) - Mandy Moore
4. "Our Song" - Taylor Swift
3. "What Goes Around… Comes Around" - Justin Timberlake
2. "Piece Of Me" - Britney Spears
1. "Stay" - Sugarland