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Originally Posted by ChakaZulu23
I do not know much about the current landscape of cash games, tourneys and the like as I have been stuck in Bovadaland for the last year so I appreciate your responses. Just give me some good advice for starting this journey and thanks again
The landscape depends on where you live. Are you down the road from Commerce or Bay101, or are you down the road from some Oklahoma casino with 1/2 blind NL that typically has $75 average stacks? If your local casino doesn't regularly spread 2/5 or 5/10 NL (or some version of 40/80 limit games), what are your plans to move someplace that does?
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My biggest question is what is the best starting track to take for someone that would like to eventually play poker for a living? How hard is it? Would you do it all over again and what would you do different? Best skillset to have?
Best advice? Have a 6 figure engineering, marketing, or programming job. Make so much money playing poker on Friday nights and the weekend that it doesn't make sense to have that job. Have a year of living expenses plus an oversized poker bankroll. Then, talk to all your pro buddies about whether they think your game is good enough to quit your job. Take a sabbatical to play poker for 6 months and see.
I think it is easier to get one of those jobs than to make it as a poker pro. If you're really talented at poker and work hard at it, the money will take care of itself in the long run and you'll
know you should be a pro. It is like being a skateboard pro, once you're in the top 20 in the country the questions answer themselves. Your sponsors tell you that you should quit your day job. Poker? The fact you make more money playing poker does.
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playing online for the past year with mixed results
What limits, how many hands, and how isn't this a huge warning sign to pro aspirations? Live poker is easier. Live poker is also way more expensive. Good games tend to be NL200, except some of them let you buy in deeper. If NL20 is getting you down, how's your financial situation for buying in with $200 bullets?
Serious answer. If you don't have your real life job figured out and squared away, poker is a waste of your time. If you were the next Phil Galfond, you'd have already crushed Bovada. You're young. Compound interested and low bills are your allies. Figure out how to get a great job. If that's programming classes at the local junior college, do that. You're more of a people person? Marketing or MBA classes. If you have the brains and self-dedication to succeed at poker, you'll crush those activities. Poker is no longer any way to make an easy living. It rarely was in the past. 12 years ago for a short window.