Where did this thread get moved to? Are allegations of a massive coaching scam not suitable for the high content world of NVG? Should it be in the coaching advice thread? I don't get it. Any insight would be appreciated.

Moved for further discussion.

moved to where?

Mod forum.

I can understand the Mods moving this thread to discuss it. It is a pretty major post. I trust that they will make a good decision with how to handle this situation. I just want to make sure that the public is informed.

Would you be willing to out who you are in real life? One of the Admins has a problem with anonymous attacks.

We are a group of individuals who felt it was necessary to bring this information to the public. We created a shared message and followed it up with our individual stories.

Have you skype? You can mail it to me at the email address on this account. We will bring you into a conversation.

The cats out of the bag MODS, just go ahead and let the thread run its course. Don't make us go to another site. Oh, and popcorn.

The thread wasn't just one anon dude w/ a Jan 2010 reg date; it had testimonials from a bunch of new posters AND people who had been around here since 2006.
Unleash the beast.

word to yo momma

I can't find the thread but here is my story:

Summary:

The overwhelming majority of Jason's students have had worse results after his coaching than beforehand. Many winning players have become losing or break-even players as a result of following his advice.

a) I was a consistent, high winning 2/4 NL 6 max player before coached by Jason Ho.
b) I first paid Jason $4500 ($1500 +$3000) in coaching fees based on his StoxPoker.com reputation.
c) After first 2 months went well, Jason had me pay $10,000 upfront for a “2-week Intensive” course followed by another $10,000 fee based on profits and to be his “protégé” to mentor through high stakes.
d) After losing month in the “Intensive” course, Jason didn’t fulfill the agreement and asks for additional payments despite no profits.
e) Jason convinces me to open and add funds to a Full-Tilt.com account, loses about $11,800 and stops providing regular coaching as I struggle at 2/4 following his new playing styles.
f) Jason convinces me to do another profit-sharing agreement, doesn’t fulfill it and currently owes me $1000.
g) Jason’s uninformed advice and unethical behavior has cost me estimated losses of about $150,000.

To: StoxPoker.com:

I am writing to complain about how my affiliation with one of the StoxPoker.com coaches and lead instructors, Jason Ho (Code 7654321), has caused serious damage to my bankroll and confidence. I believe Stoxpoker.com bears some responsibility for not conducting an adequate background check on him.

I have been a paid member (through affiliates) of StoxPoker.com since around mid 2005.
Around November 2008, I decided to seek a coach to help me move up to play 3/6 NL 6max (“3/6”) and above and saw that Jason Ho “Code7654321” was advertising his services under the members-only “coaching forum” on your site. He also received good reviews from other lead instructors on your site, such as “mental coach,” Jared Tendler, which impressed me. Your site had also advertised that Jason won over $1 million in the past year playing online poker playing a “game-theory,” heavy mathematically-based style.

At that point, I had been a dominant winner at 2/4 NL 6 max (“2/4”). My poker career had begun with me grinding small limits at NL as well as limit hold’em, not having a losing month for about 24 months up until February, 2009. From 01/01/08 to 12/03/08, I won about $80,470 at 2/4. This would be a 4.36BB/100 win rate over 230,509 hands, which is considered to be very good. I had also won an additional $20,000 in other limits. I initially paid Jason $1500 for 5 lessons then $3000 for 10 more lessons. Part of the reason I paid for the additional lessons was because he told me he would only give a custom HUD (Heads up Display for Holdem Manager) only to students who paid for 10 lessons. In our first coaching session, Jason told me that he would have me playing 25/50 NL 6 max within a year. I was skeptical but based on his reputation, I was pleased to hear that.

The coaching initially went well in December and January, 2009. Under his guidance, I played 3/6, some 5/10 NL full-ring and won the same amount I had won in previous months although I sometimes doubted his advice. In January 2009, he told me that because I was a very strong player and he wanted to accelerate my progress, he would undertake a “profit-sharing” agreement starting in February 2009 with me. The agreement would be that he would give me free coaching for at least 2 weeks at 5/10 NL 6-max (“5/10”) and would take his coaching fees out of half my winnings. That seemed to be a great deal and I agreed to it.

Around January 20, 2009, Jason told me that his girlfriend didn’t think the deal would be fair to him. Instead he proposed a complicated agreement whereby I would undertake his “2 Week Intensive, 40 hour” coaching course whereby I would pay him $10,000 upfront, and another $10,000 from profits for a total fee of $20,000.

The agreement was also that he would provide me unlimited coaching to ensure that I would feel comfortable playing 5/10 above and beyond the 40 hours of the course. One kicker would be that he agreed to play 15-20 hours/week on my account. The final kicker was that after the course. I would be his “protégé,” meaning I would have unlimited access to his coaching, specialized documents he would produce, and that he would eventually have me be a winner in 25/50 NL 6 max in return for a monthly fee of $5000. I asked for a traditional staking agreement instead whereby he could take some of my profits in exchange for covering my losses but instead he sold his agreement to me as a “no-lose” proposition.

We also talked about how a player at StoxPoker.com, known as Matt “Mbolt1” Bolt had recently moved from micro-limits to winning over $100,000/month at medium to high stakes with the help of Dusty “Leatherass” Schmidt, another well-regarded high stakes StoxPoker.com coach and lead instructor. Jason led me to believe that I would be a similar success story. Relying on his reputation as a well-regarded StoxPoker.com coach who had also won over $1 million, I agreed to this deal.

The 2 week-Intensive sessions did not go well. Throughout the course, I felt uncomfortable during the coaching sessions as he would have me playing differently than he had coached me at 3/6. He explained that good play at 5/10 was much different than the lower limits so I accepted the unorthodox lines he had me play. For instance, at 2/4 and 3/6, I had been continuation-betting the Turn with about 25% frequency, but Jason emphasized that such low frequency was too passive and exploitable. He recommended instead that I continuation-bet the Turn with about 50% frequency.

He also forwarded me some emails between him and Kyle “Cottonseed” Hendon, another well-regarded, high-stakes StoxPoker.com coach where Cottonseed praised his analytical abilities after Jason provided him with a customized “leak-analysis” report. He also told me Cottonseed was paying him $1000/hr for his coaching and had sent him his entire database. He also told me that Leatherass was also seeking his coaching and had also sent Jason his entire database. He told me that Leatherass’s database indicated he was a “brute-force” player who did not play optimally.

In fact, Jason told me he had made more than Leatherass did in 2008 while playing substantially fewer hours. He also told me that he was in the process of preparing a document that would “virtually solve” NL 6 max by being “game-theory optimal” and this strategy would be “unexploitable.” He expected to be able to sell this document to high stakes players for over $100,000 each. He would work on this document during coaching sessions and appeared distracted many times.

During the course, I lost about $15,000 combined during our coaching sessions and playing on my own. On the last day of the sessions, he had me look up the PLO tables, said that he saw a “big fish” at 10/20 PLO 6 max and had me play him at a 6 max table. I had never played PLO at that point so he directed every single move (During the sessions, he had mentioned that he had made more lifetime earnings in PLO than NL and that eventually, he would teach me PLO since he thought it was more geared towards my tight, playing style). I merely followed his instructions at the PLO table. The session ended with about $6000 in PLO losses.

Following that day, Jason made about $13,000 that weekend on my account in about 5 hours of play. He then immediately asked for the remainder of the coaching fees of $10,000 even though our agreement had specified that the remainder of the fee was to be from profits. I told him so but he was very insistent so I agreed to immediately pay $5000, expecting he would continue to have similar success playing on my account.

However, that would be all the play he would do on my account except for a few isolated 2/4 and 3/6 sessions in the upcoming months. For the remainder of February, I was left to play on my own and finished the month losing about $5000 plus the additional $15, 000 I paid Jason for a total loss of about $20,000. This loss affected my confidence and bankroll and I moved back down to playing 2/4, feeling an enormous amount of disappointment and feeling let down by this coach was supposedly going to mentor me to being a high stakes winner.

Consequently, I struggled when I went back to playing 2/4 trying to incorporate the new strategies Jason had taught me. Around mid-April 2009, Jason advised to open up a Full-TiltPoker.com (“Full-Tilt) account under his affiliate and I would receive a favorable rakeback deal. He also said he felt bad for my struggles and he said if I put money in the account, he would play 2/4 there to boost back my bankroll. I deposited $12,000 in that account and asked him if that was enough since it was 30 buy-ins. He said it was. A few days later, he told me he lost it all, except for about $150. I was shocked since Jason had told me that most of his students played at Full-Tilt and I assumed he knew how those games played. He even declined my offer to provide data-mined hand histories beforehand. He also told me afterwards that 30 buy-ins was not enough for his mass-multi tabling!

Because of this hit to my bankroll and confidence, my game suffered and I consequently have had numerous breakeven and slightly losing months after not having a losing month in about the past 24 months before the February Intensive coaching. Frequently, I also lost some motivation to play, since it seemed that I was constantly either losing or at best, breaking even. I felt at times that despite, my best efforts, I was constantly regressing. I did not play the amount of hours I was accustomed to playing. When I told Jason about my struggles, he told me that I had simply not experienced regular “variance” in my game and that my previous success may have been that I was running over expectation and that I merely had to keep “plugging away.” He would regularly advise me to play different styles as I continued to struggle.

Since then, Jason has advised me to play PLO and coached me for a few sessions in return for potential profits from playing PLO. He bragged that he had multiple students who were 4BB/100 winners at PLO. I have lost about $7000 in PLO and have stopped playing it since. Despite Jason’s coaching, I did not feel comfortable playing PLO and frequently did not know what the “correct” play was in many situations. Finally, around October, 2009, he told me he had extensively studied the game of “nanonoko,” a dominant 2/4 NL 6 max player on PokerStars.com.

He said he felt bad about losing my $12,000 on Full-Tilt in April and wanted to make it up to me. This time, we would contribute $5000 each to my account and he would play 2/4. He promptly lost that as well but told me that he had taken shots at 5/10 PLO to build up the $10,000 and he would pay me back. I have received about $4000 back and he has owed me $1000 for about a month. On 12/24/09, Jason transferred $1000 from my account to his account, “zenconcept” and told me about it afterwards. He paid back $1000 about 2 weeks later and currently, still owes me $1000.

In short, I won approximately $110,000 in 2008, with only $10,000 of it coming after Jason coached me. I was still improving and highly confident of doing better in 2009. Instead, in 2009, overall my results are that I have lost about $15,000. Needless to say, Jason’s flawed advice has cost me much in terms of coaching fees and lost potential earnings. I estimate my true losses to be at least $150,000. Before coaching with Jason, I was a dominant 2/4 player. Because of my results in 2009, I am currently playing 1/2 NL 6 max.

Having now spoken to some of Jason’s students and reanalyzed the coaching advice he gave me, I believe that Jason only knows enough about poker to appear to be an expert player. I believe that StoxPoker.com has advertised and given credence to someone who, at best, gave me dangerous, uninformed and untested advice, and at worst, purposely and knowingly gave me wrong advice for unknown reasons.

No doubt.

Admittedly, I just want the drama bomb and subsequent train wreck. Nevertheless, 2+2 shouldn't be in the business of deleting threads just because the subject is upset about the content.

In sort of before dumpster fire.

like casper repost your testimonials in this thread using your real accounts and not that one so we can read without them being deleted please

Hi Guys.

As the manager from StoxPoker I can tell you that:

1. The allegations here are something that I first was told vague details on about a week ago. I was told by a 3rd party and the people directly involved wanted to remain anonymous.

2. After about a week of getting no where on substantiation, I started a thread on StoxPoker two days ago which basically said "if there are issues out there please come forward here and let the community and StoxPoker management know about it.

3. Now that people have come forward on StoxPoker this evening, I will be contacting each one of them privately to personally find out their side of the story and try to substantiate claims where possible.

4. We will contact Jason Ho privately so that he has an opportunity to respond.

It would be inappropriate for me to comment further before directly investigating the claims and then giving Jason an opportunity to respond.

Thanks

Jim

I feel for you, Casper, but my thoughts are the following:

- There's no way in hell you can claim that anyone other than you is responsible for losses suffered when you were at the controls. If JH was advocating a style you were uncomfortable with, you should have test-driven it at lower stakes. That's like a MLB baseball slugger complaining that a new batting stance advocated by his hitting coach cost him millions because he didn't enjoy as much success with it as with his old batting stance. He should have test-driven it more in batting practice and used his own noggin to think critically about it, keeping what worked and throwing out the rest.

- You're admitting to cheating by allowing someone else to play on your FTP account...?(!) Obviously this doesn't excuse JH's actions, as reported, but you're not exactly endearing yourself her either.

- You gave the guy, who had already begun showing signs of serious shadiness the password to your poker account?

Anyway, I'll quit giving you a hard time. I'm sorry you lost so much. I look forward to the drama bomb once the main thread gets re-opened. I just couldn't help but think, as I read through your post, that there were like a dozen or more red flags that would have sent my 'run-forrest-run' antennae a-blazin'.

EDIT: PS Jim from Stoxpoker > did you guys do any sort of diligence on JH's claim of being a 1M+ / yr winner or just take him at his word and let him advertise himself as such? It seems that a common comment from the cheated folks is that he didn't come across as much more than a mediocre player, if that.

Casper, when did you send your recap to Stox?

Seems to me this was just a failed coaching experiment. If Jason Ho was truly a crook he would have just stole money out of your account when he got your password. Sorry you lost your money, but to me this is just a coaching arrangement that ran on the bottom side of its variance.

All of the accusations were made by anonymous posters hiding their identity used to slander Jason Ho. When 2+2 management gets wind of something like this occuring we will always shut it down, regardless of the truth in the matter; we cannot allow the forums to become a "bully pulpit" to pick on a target anonymously, the target has the right to know who is accusing him. Everyone who posted anonymously will be banned, the anonymous accounts aren't welcome here. From what I have read so far the accusations are pretty serious by the motive of the accusers (with the exception of CasperW) seem to be disingenuous, why hide behind an anonymous gimmick account if your trying to have the losses repaid?

You can contact the management at Stoxpoker who have been willing all along to help you solve this issue. Coming into 2+2 with an anonymous account to slander Jason Ho, even if the accusations are true, will not help your side of the story.

NotAJasonHoFan - CasperW has nothing to hide, this is how it should be done.

Jim has been trying to solve this problem over the past week, creating this thread in NVG doesn't help Jim find solutions faster - contacting Jim directly either here on 2+2 or via Stoxpoker is the best solution.

This is very serious, I applaud Jim's willingness to investigate and address the issue, if you were affected in this matter please contact Jim privately to help him resolve this issue as fast as possible. In the meantime I am moving this thread to Coaching Advice where it is most topically relevant, any NVG'ers who want to continue to follow the thread are welcome to follow along.

Who spends that much money on a COACH for POKER? WOW. A card game ffs.

How does this differ from any other coach?

Aren't most coaching videos done by losing players?

Aren't most coaching videos done with the idea of upselling people to hourly coaching and other coaching programs?

Errr, this feels a little heavy-handed. Anonymous slander is certainly nothing to laugh at and I'm glad that 2p2 has some threshold for moving something to the mod forum until they decide what to do with it, but as I wrote above, this wasn't just a single anon Jan 2010 reg user coming on to say that XYZ has cooties; these were very detailed, admittedly serious, descriptions attested to not only be some new obvious gimmick-acct posters, BUT ALSO posters who have been around here for 3+ years. Ban the Jan 2010 posters if you must, but I think this thread was credible enough for discussion, no?

Why was this moved to the coaching forum Mods? This is News. I could understand if you wanted to cross post this but to just take it out of NVG is wrong IMO.

TT, it's not slander if it's true. I can understand NotaJasonHofan posting on a gimmick. He was probably embarassed and knew the multiaccounting and other shady activities would come out and didn't want to be embarrassed. I can also understand locking the thread because of the seriousness of the allegations being made by a new poster. But with Casper coming forward I believe his statements add weight to the original OP and should be moved back to NVG as a public service. My 2 cents.

Teddy -I am listening to your POV, and I do understand where your coming from. With that said you may not have seen what we saw, there were some complaints from legitimate users (and these can be reposted in this thread by the users who made them) but there were also far too many anonymous gimmick accounts. What bothered me personally is the coordination of the attack when Jim Varnon of Stoxpoker had already come forward asking for information but none was provided until after the coordinated attack - two rights dont make a wrong IMO, the best first step would have been to contact Jim so he can investigate and find a solution.

Its slander if the accused cannot face his attacker. We have a rather firm policy on issues like this, 2+2 doesnt want to be used for anonymous attacks.


If NotaJasonHofan's goal is to be reimbursed then how is hiding behind an anonymous gimmick account going to help him? As stated earlier two wrongs do not make a right, any of the accusers are free to post their experiences here - provided that they are not hiding behind a gimmick.

As for NVG, once there has been some movement in the right direction then the thread might move back to NVG, for now its more relevant to the coaching advice forum. Taking it out of NVG allows it to remain a serious topic, I think that is in the best interest of the accusers so they can focus on communicating their experiences and finding a solution rather than posting wild innuendo or tarding up the thread, I feel that by moving the thread here we are actually helping the people involved a lot more than if we left the thread in NVG.