Edit/MH: Rossa85 has made good on all debt described in this thread. Cliffs at bottom. 11/21/11.

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With thanksb on 2+2, we staked rossa85 on pokerstars (rossa1985 on 2+2)

I met Rossa85 because he was a HU reg who was transitioning to six max. We would talk a decent amount at the tables because I start tables and so did he (that was when he was at his best). One day he asked me if I were interested in staking him as he had blown his roll at 5/10 6m (which he wasn’t very good at) and heads up PLO (which by the looks of it he was awful at)
It was a simple stake. We sent Rossa85 $25,000 to play 2/4-5/10 heads up NLHE on pokerstars. He absolutely crushed these games where his long term winrate was around 8 ptbb (with 300k in profit)http://www.pokertableratings.com/sta...search/rossa85. He was allowed to play 5/10 six max ONLY if there was at least one fish at the table, in other words frugal table selecting. I didn’t think this would be an issue because I am a reg in these games and a good percentage of the time they form around such a player. The other caveat that we put in place was a stop loss. We both agreed to a 10k stop loss in any given day. That means that if he lost 10k he would not be allowed to play any more that day unless he spoke with Marty and I to show us that he was all right to continue to play. I clearly explained that anything over $10,000 that he lost in one day would not be my responsibility.

The stake started off rocky. Rossa85 lost $10,000 his first day when he was 4 tabling a solid reg (pooruser) HU. I know both their games and although I don’t think Rossa85 was –EV, we talked about it and decided to hold off on playing GOOD regs HU until he boosted the roll a little bit. We were both on the same page. Taking this advice, Rossa85 was back in the black in no time. Unfortunately, soon after the problems involving violating our agreements would start. First, I found Rossa85 playing 3 handed with good regs at 5/10 6m on several tables. I immediately had him leave the tables and explained to him that this would NOT be allowed. I wanted him playing at 6m ONLY if there was a fish. I explained how this stake was not a means for him to get better. It was a means for him to rebuild his roll playing majorly +EV games. He agreed.

The following Monday I went to ptr to see how Rossa85 had done on the weekend. I saw a $-18,000 session and immediately PMed him and sent him an IM. He responded quickly. When I asked him if he had lost 18k on Sunday, he replied “No, it was more like 20k, ptr is wrong”. Rossa85 had legitimately forgotten about the stop loss agreement. I have had a lot of people lie to me in staking, but I could tell that Rossa85 had legitimately forgotten. He asked if we could forget about what happened and make an exception to this case. I thought about the situation and decided that he was essentially asking me to give him a free $10,000. I decided that because we clearly stated the situation and he was aware of the terms that he would owe us $10,000. I explained to him that those rules were there for a reason, there to protect us, and the fact that he forgot does not make him exempt unfortunately. At this point I started to worry, because I was just getting a bad feeling about the whole situation. The next week went on fine, Rossa85 was rebuilding and back to even on the stake overall (which meant that Marty and I were up $10,000). On that Friday, Rossa85 and I went over some hands and I felt a lot better about the situation. Unfortunately on Monday I would find something that made me sick to my stomach. Rossa85 had lost over $20,000 with the last -$12,000 being 200 hands of heads up PLO. My immediate reaction was “I will never hear from him again”

I emailed him about 3 times and PMed him 3 times. No response. At this point, I posted in the Mid stakes 6m thread and mid stakes FR thread to see if any Germans possibly knew him. I got SO MUCH help from the mid stakes community it was truly inspiring. One person helped me find his blog thread on a German site and set up an account (because I could not), and post things for me. Nothing really came of this.

Then on July 3rd, after no communication whatsoever for several weeks, Rossa85 emailed me this:

“Hi, I was so disappointed! I got on tilt the first time in my life and lost a lot of money. I cant explain what had happened...I dont know how this could happen. Then I didnt want to hear anything about poker or talk about poker the next week. Im a big douchbag.... I still dont understand how this could have happened. If you dont want to continue the stake deal what I expect after my behavior then I will send you back the money in parts. Like 2,5k/month. Even if I dont appear trust-worthy now I actually am and will pay it back. Tell me what you want... And SRY! “

I sent two responses, the first that night (I was at a wedding) and the second two days later:

“Hi, I'm at a wedding. We need to talk asap. I fly to vegas tomorrow so maybe we can talk the next day. Either way try to be available on AIM as much as possible the next few days so we can figure this out.”

“Here's the deal. We simply are not going to be to stake you again. What happened is just too much for us to overcome in terms of trust. We need to set up some sort of payback plan. 2.5k / month will take a while. Perhaps you could sign on AIM sometime and we could discuss it. I am in Vegas so I will be pretty busy but send me an email and we can try to set something up.

Jim”

It has been almost three weeks now and Rossa85 has not responded. It is fairly obvious that his intentions with contacting me was to get more money to degen with. Obviously we had no interest in this. This whole situation has made me sick. I talked a lot with Rossa85, we had a good amount of trust between us and he basically **** all over that. Now Marty and I are out $22,000 (10k for the stop loss breach and 12k for dumping money at a game not staked for). This does not even include the money he lost legitimately playing games we staked him for. During our stake, Rossa85 MADE a large amount of money table selecting HU games, somewhere in the region of $30,000. Yet all we are asking for is to get our $22,000 back. If anyone knows Rossa85, please show him this thread and tell him to do the right thing. Thanks for your time,

Jim


Cliffs:
- We send 25k to Rossa85 on pokerstars, a well known heads up reg to play mid stakes HU and table select 6m.
- He loses 20k in a day, violating the 10k daily stop loss and is deemed to owe us an additional 10k when the stake is over.
- He does not table select 6m, loses money there, and ban 6m games.
- Rossa85 degenerately loses $12,000 at heads up PLO in 200 hands, then disappears for several weeks.
- I spread the word of what he did, he contacts me, then disappears for weeks again.
- Rossa85 contacts me after several months and sends me 1k, then sends me 1-2k three more times until mid November 2011 when he sends the final 17k and makes good on debt.

This is why staking people you have never met is so lulzy. Youre out 25k and theres really nothing u can do about it. Sucks man.

More money than sense.

good luck though, I hope he comes through.

gl getting it back OP

fyl. gl on getting it back. hope the guy *****.

That truely sucks. Good luck in getting it back. Is he on 2p2 or something? Rossa85 rings a bell.

You shipped him the whole stake at once? Not too smart.

yes, rossa1985 on 2+2

So shady by him, trying to think of something you could do at this point.

He multitabled 5/10 HU. Without 20 buyins minimum he wouldn't have enough to survive the variance associated with a single day in that game. This is totally standard and I had no problem sending him this.

That sucks and all, but man I really have a hard time feeling bad for people who get ripped off like this. I mean you know going in that this is a very real possibility, so it should be built into your staking deals extra margin to cover stuff like this. Kind of like how if you have ****ty credit your get a bigger interest rate on your loan. I mean I guess when it happens you should do everything to recover your losses, and making a thread is required for that, but like the emotions in the op of these things are always the same "I feel sick" "this is so awful". When it shouldnt be like that, it should just be "well I got ripped off, which is inevitable in this line of business".

Hope you get the money back tho, good luck.

well if the most he could lose in a day was $10k then maybe you should have only shipped him $10k at a time?

you have his adress since you said you're not posting it ?
Go to his house and kick his ass

Yeah, why arent you posting his info? Do you just not care about the 25k that much?

Theres a process to these things, you dont go blow your load all at once. This is the foreplay section of the dance

Stake Sam Grizzle instead.

This is more of a closure post. I just want to get the word out that he cannot be trusted and stop thinking about it. We of course are prepared for the eneviatable scumbag to come through and straight rip us off. This one just kind of came out of nowhere. I mean I have tens of thousands of hands with this guy, and countless conversations. I think you're missing the point of me saying "it makes me sick". I don't really care about 12k, or the fact that it was essentially stolen from me as much. It's more about the fact that Timo is a person I had talked to a lot, a great talent, and his skill is for naught and he basically spit in my face.

I deal with business and poker literally 20 hours a day, I know what to expect in given situations and am basically numb to most everything in terms of variance and poor outcomes. This particular incident however I find particularly upsetting just because of how big a waste of talent he is.

Anyways, like I said the purpose is to get the word out in case anyone can help / knows him. Definitely NOT looking for sympathy in any way so no need to make posts about. Thanks,

Jim

what a dickwad

I read in the negative feedback marketplace thread that I shouldn't post his address. If this is standard then I'd be more than happy to. He lives in Germany, like I said.

gross. gl getting it back op

Im stupid and confused.

You only sent him 25k correct?

But your saying he owes you 12k for losses incurred playing a game not rolled for and an additional 10k for breaking the agreement on the stop loss? So thats where you got the 22k from.

Wouldn't the amount you're trying to get back (or claimed owed to you) be 25k or 35k??

What am I missing here

Dude, if i was you id be posting his info all over the web as thats the only recourse you have short of taking a flight to germany and kicking some ass.

yeah, I think its 2p2 rules that you cant. Id have to check though

Your response to my earlier post makes sense, sorry if I attached emotions that werent there

sic

Sorry, I keep saying 12k because I'm talking about me personally. I am saying he owes my partner and I 22k, which would be 11k to just me. Sorry for the confustion but yes, the 22k comes from the ~10k he lost over the stop loss that day and the 12k from PLO. I think this is the most accurate figure that I can say he DEFINITELY owes us so that's all we're asking for, nothing more.

As for flying to Germany to kick his ass, that's not really what I'm trying to accomplish here. Thanks for the suggestion though.

Can't you contact local authorities or hire a local attorney?