Come on, you can't post something like this without giving us a name.

i read about the first 150 posts in the thread and stopped before the last 40 ish.


i think you guys underestimate how big downswings can be online. i think a 200k downswing now playing a normal schedule of high buyin mtts with the scoops/ftops/wcoops and maybe a few random live tourneys mixed in like monte carlo, wsop main, pca is not a 7sigma below expectation run bad anymore. this is not even talking about playing the live circuit where buyins are much higher.

if someone had 200k to his name and wanted to get an apartment, car, etc and doesnt play cash games or sngs and has no way to achieve a steady income if tourneys start going bad how can you blame them for getting backed for online? 400k? same ****. i mean obviously at a certain point giving up the profits you will make for lack of variance/freedom with your money becomes meaningless because having a 500k downswing in just online mtts is pretty much the worst run of all time and if you had 1m to your name getting backed online is stupid.

i dont even want to think about what kind of downswings are possible live. i have a few horses who have gotten close to 300k makeup but nobody has exceeded it yet. the wsop is very scary/threatening but also a very exciting time as a backer. big downswings can occur, but also some big wins as we have had the past few years.

i have made mistakes with my money, aka listening to my mother. she really has no clue about stuff involving poker even though she plays a part in my taxes (as a former accountant), finances, every day life, and knows a bit about poker, but her having me put away 800k+ for long term savings was a massive mistake when you account how much i have paid in taxes etc.

i have put so much money away for long term that i constantly feel short when it comes to backing/playing myself so i often play lower stakes than i can beat because of fear of going on a 100k or even a 50k downswing myself and not being able to back my horses for good tourneys. i feel like i have had horses run awful for a few months then we lucksack something huge every 3 or 4 months to keep us afloat and doing well.

of course i could go cash out 500k from my long term investments but i have a lot of family pressure preventing that, and its not like i want to destroy my relationship with my parents over feeling short on money. i think getting backed myself if i couldnt beat midstakes cash games would be 100% an option i would pursue if i was enticed to play more tourneys.

just my rambling 2 cents on the matter.

brags go in bbv

think someone might of already talked about this but it sucks bad to be in mu for awhile and be real life busto, or in my case stretched pretty thin. This is making me have to play lots of cash and my volume has gone down quite a bit....kinda sucks for both parties

Think about some of the donks that are in backing deals that they can't play cash games on their own!

This is pretty true. I remember when I first started playing HSMTT's in 2006, the average Sunday did not have: Brawl, 2 FTP 150's, 150r, 100c, Mulligan, 100r turbo, Stars 500, 100 quad, 50r, or 200r. The FTOPS had just run for the 1st time and wasn't nearly as expensive as it is now. There were also no weekly 1k's (there are 3 now). You can do the math on how much this adds to your weekly buyins. 20k used to be a bad downer in online mtt's over a decent sized sample; now it's like 1 bad week.

It should also be noted how most of the tournies weren't nearly as big as they are now: Warmup and 2nd Chance were un-guaranteed & getting 1/2 as much as they do now; 100r got 400 ppl on Sunday; the FTP Sunday major was a 350k guarantee.

With smaller fields, smaller buyins, and ppl not playing "unexploitably"/bat**** insane variance styles yet, it's pretty easy to see why so many more players go on humongous downers in short time spans now than they used to.

something else to consider is the lifestyle some of these ppl grow accustomed too. i remember one HSMTT'r who said their monthly nut is like 10k after rent, food, other bs.

mcd's moms basement food stamps busto

nice

Wow.. and this whole time I thought that backers just absorbed their horses' losses regardless (like they only make a % per tourney regardless of how much they've put up in the past).

I love how 2+2 makes me feel like a noob on almost a daily basis.

Oh and... mental note: never get backed

Pretty sure that was FatalError

i knew who it was just didnt wanna put him on blast =P

This thread makes me happy that I'm still not playing the highest online yet and also that I'm going to finish college before I decide to completely do this for a living yet.

backing is a pretty bad business because almost everyone is terrible at poker, some however are very persuasive

Therefore backing becomes a pretty good business because you only have to suck a little bit less than the next guy to be profitable. DUCY?

wow great post by Daut.

It was a weird and rare situation. If you had a form of instant messenger you'd probably know already.

bad beat, I'm just in the friends circle of ppl who get hacked and not the ones that talked about 7 figure makeup

LOL not an ounce of profit in four years play, live or online. Yet has a backing deal (which not only pays his buy ins, but rent as well and living and travel expenses) This is the one reason many backers lose money, they back friends instead of people who can play a lick of poker. As for the 200k hits, guess its a true even a blind squirell will find a nut if he searches long enough. Much love bro, just messing with you.

and hes probably 1000x the player that you are

I dont mean to derail at all....but seeing as I consider myself to be in the realm of the players Seabeast it talking about. How much +life ev is there to be being backed into poker tournaments with huge first prizes at a young age. I was thinking about this during SCOOP. Ignoring the question of whether or not i have an edge in the tournament, I still had like a 1 in whatever shot at a million dollars at age 19. Makeup or not, thats pretty absurd. I may not have properly articulated what I mean because I'm super tired after driving 9 hours home from college but w/e

.

I agree with everything you said except the word 100%. People should take some responsibility themselves too. I don't know exactly how backers and horses decide what tournaments the horse plays, but say you have a backer who isn't that great of a manager and he wants to put you in the SCOOP main event. You should be able to say "No thanks, I'd like to make it on my own sometime this year, and I'm not too confident in my edge in this tournament. Another 10K in makeup isn't what I need right now."

As for Daut and mkind's points that Sundays cost a lot more than they used to, you don't have to play everything. Again why not take responsibility instead of letting Stars and FTP manage your bankroll for you. If you would be fine on your own spending 4K per Sunday, but now that you spend 8K per Sunday, you get backed and give away half your profits, that doesn't make a whole lot of sense (edit: especially since your ROI on the first 4K is a lot higher than your ROI on the last 4K which includes the 150R, 200R, 500, etc.)

Isn't this just another version of the old argument that it's life +EV to play the lottery because losing a buck doesn't change your life in any way but winning a million changes it completely? Which is basically BS because any economics course will tell you that money has decreasing marginal utility.

And you're so good at poker that you'll probably have a million in a few years anyway without having to play way out of your roll.

The answer has been said in this post like 20x now and yet you refuse to acknowledge it. Many players -- such as myself -- get backed strictly because it allows them to feel less stressed. I'm glad you're able to deal with the swings of 10s of thousands of dollars every month...the fact is you're a minority b/c most people can't. That's a lot to deal with. And if putting their risk of ruin at 0 allows them to function better not just while playing but in their everyday life, getting backed makes more sense than u can seem to fathom. Some may argue that if someone's life ev is higher, it will allow their results to be a whole lot better, even if they're giving away a % of their winnings.

And just as an fyi, despite being backed, I still don't play 100r's, 1k's, or even most 500's (and that was my decision, not my backer's).

Edit: Regarding your edit, that's def a big part of the reason why. I also hate the idea of playing a bunch of tournies and having 1 buyin thats significantly bigger than the others b/c when u bust it, everything else ur in seems less important.