Thursday, November 23: 1 WSOP buy-in down the drain

Bodog rakeback

I typically try to keep this blog free from affiliate/rakeback stuff, mostly because I'm weaning myself from the RB-business...ever since I moved up to higher-stakes games last year, I found that it just wan't worth my time to track and pay players...but I still get quite a few emails asking about it (I think in one of my earlier posts, I mentioned that I was an affiliate.) I've also got quite a few emails from Americans since the US legislation, asking about US-friendly sites that still offer rakeback.

So although I'm loathe to talk about it, I thought I'd mention a particularly cool little offer for Bodog, which is one of the sites that has taken a staunch pro-US stance and remained open to Americans. A good friend of mine is an affiliate there and offers 25% rakeback, but the cool thing is that even if you've already got an account there (on which you're not getting RB), he can switch you to his affiliate account, provided you're not currently tracked to an affiliate. That's a big "if". You may or may not have signed up under an affiliate when you originally opened your Bodog account...in fact, you may not even remember...but if you did not, it's cool that Bodog has allowed him to just transfer you into his affiliate account so you can start getting rakeback there. He just moved me over to his affiliate account last week (i wasn't currently tracked to an affiliate), and he's got a website with online tracking, and all that good stuff.

Email me at everywherejim at hotmail.com if you're interested. The info I would need from you is:
1. Real first and last names
2. Email address associated with your Bodog account
3. Bodog account # and screename.
I then have these sent to the Bodog affiliate manager who will say one of two things:
i) "Great, that player wasn't linked to an affiliate, so we switched him!", or
ii) "Sorry, that player was already linked to an affiliate, so you're out of luck."

Alright, enough with that, on to more interesting things.

Single biggest losing hand ever

I'm happy to say that I've gotten quite comfortable at the $2,000 and even the $5,000NL tables. I've been stacked a few times for the full $5,000, but this hand really obliterates that prevoius "best": after buliding my stack up to almost $14,000, I took a nice little $9,300 hit. I'd been running over the table this particular session, and I knew that a lot of my opponents were getting sick of my aggression; this session, I'd guess my stats were areound 35/22, which at a full table is pretty darn LAG. A few of them had started playing back at me...the SB in this hand was the only other somewhat aggressive player at the table, and he had come over the top of my raises a few times already. He made a quite strong play here, re-raising an UTG raiser from the SB, which typically screams strength. I almost folded, but his LAGgy image, combined with my having position on him, and both of our big stacks led me to call. I'm very happy with the way I played the rest of the hand. There was only 1 hand I had to be worried about, and several (AA, and all the AK combinations) that were likely going to pay me off here. Of course, that sense of self-satisfaction isn't going to bring me back the WSOP buy-in that I lost on this hand.

I have made a decision that these next couple months of posts will be this blog's swan song. It's been almost 2.5 years, and I always wanted to go out on a high note, so to speak; e.g. to end this blog before the quality of posts started deteriorating...and I don't think I've quite crossed that threshold just yet, which is a good thing. There were a few other times where I thought about ending this thing, but each time I was persuaded not to because of a few factors:

1. first off, I was still having fun...I still found posting here to be a therapeutic outlet for poker-related angst that just didn't lend itself easily to expression in the 'real world.'
2. Secondly, I was still getting a few emails each week from people telling me that they found my story inspiring and helpful vis-a-vis their own situation, which in turn inspired me to keep at it...to paraphrase a somewhat-corny old U.S. army recruitment slogan that I've always identified with: "if someone wrote a book about your life, would anyone want to read it?" And perhaps it just plays to my own feelings of insecurity, or the universal human need to feel that one's life is relevant or significant, but you know what: I do think my life, to this point, has been quite an interesting trip, and keeping this blog has played an integral part in reminding me of that fact, at least with respect to the last couple years.
3. Lastly, I could never quite bring myself to stop posting, because...well...I always felt like I still had more to write about. I nearly ended things at the end of 2005, and then thought about it again in May of this year, when I finished my second-to-last semester of law school and decided to do this whole Australian junket. But each time, something told me that I hadn't quite tackled all the things I wanted to talk about, and I knew that there was still value in those unexpressed thoughts. And I'm grateful that I've kept posting this year, because I think some of the more important concepts have crystallized for me during that time, such as my thoughts on what I called "Poker Opportunity Cost", which is something that continuously informs my life and the decisions that I make, and my entry here about how the psyche of a successful poker player might differ from that belonging to an individual who was born into wealth. It was never a struggle to come up with new material, because there was always some nagging issue that I wanted to find some expression for. But things have changed in the last couple months; I've found it harder and harder to come up with new topics; frankly, I've found that I've just plum run out of things to talk about. I've covered a hell of a lot of ground in my journey from a 2/4 grinder, to a $5,000 NL regular. I'm sure there are stories left to be written about where Fortuna will take me from here: I think I'll take a good run at playing in some WSOP events next year, since it's clearly a feather I want to have in my poker cap, irrespective of how I do. But after a few years of writing about my poker travails, I wonder just how relevant my future exploits will be to my present audience. It's been really strange to meet people who have read my blog and have them know more about my life, and more personal thoughts, goals,and insecurities than some of my best friends (since I share this blog with so few of them.) I've met some really interesting 2+2'ers, some cool, many not-so-much, and it's kind of jarring to launch into some poker theorum only to have them say "oh yeah, I remember reading that in your blog a little while back ." I'm not saying I mind :) but it's kind of funny when it happens.

As far as what's going to happen to this blog: well, it's staying online, that's for sure; I think it's too valuable a commodity to be taken offline merely because I won't be updating it as frequently anymore. I've thought about perhaps printing it out and getting it leather-bound for myself or something, as a bit of a momento to the work I've put into it. Heck, a few people have actually suggested to me that I look into getting it published. And yeah, at the risk of sounding a tad arrogant, I think the work product herein is extraordinarily valuable...perhaps in a different sense than some of the best strategy books out there, but I don't for a moment suggest that I'm addressing the same material as they do. As a resource to provide guidance to would-be pros or semi-pros, with respect to what to expect as far as the psychological challenges, demons, and insecurities you can look forward to if you decide to give this poker thing a real go, I'm not sure there's a better resource out there. I'd certainly pay $19.99 for something like this at Barnes & Noble. But I'm not sure that that's something I want to pursue at this time. But that's all a bit premature anyway, since I'm not calling it quits just yet...I've got another month or two in which I hope to get a few more thoughts down here, which will hopefully prove thought-provoking as I close the book on the "law school" chapter of my life, and start thinking more about what I really want to be when I "grow up."

Saturday, November 18: Jamie Gold 102

P.S. One final thing that I could mention about the Gold/Leyser situation: the previous post was long enough without me mentioning it, but one other way that a unilateral promise, even lacking consideration, can be converted into a binding contract is via a principle called "reliance." If one party reasonably relies on a promise (to his detriment), it becomes a binding contract to the extent that he was disadvantaged by his reliance. For example, if I promise a friend that I'm going to give him my BMW once I move overseas, and he relies on that promise and, figuring he'll no longer need the old Toyota he's been driving around, he gives it to the Salvation Army, then the promise I made to him (re: giving him my BMW) becomes a binding contract, because he reasonably relied on it to his detriment (he would, however, probably only be able to recover in the amount of the amount he "lost" -- in other words, the value of the Toyota.) This legal principle exists in order to allow people to rely on reasonably-given promises even before they're consummated, without being worried that they could get screwed if the other party backs out.

What this means for the Gold/CL case is that if CL had been shrewd (or had some shrewd lawyers at his disposal), he might have done an act in reliance on Gold's promise, thereby converting it into a contract. What could he have done? Hmmm...well, immediately after Gold's $12 Million win, he might have gone out and bought himself some expensive real estate (presuming he could have found someone satisfied with his level of credit), which might have established the reliance necessary to convert Gold's promise into a contract. That's a bit of a simplified example, but that's where good lawyers really make their bones: it's coming up with innovative solutions to sticky situations like this that sets the elite ones apart from the schmoes. There were plenty of ways that good lawyers could have approached the situation that would have put CL in position to ensure that he collected his half of Gold's winnings. Filing a preemptive injunction, however, was NOT one of them (unless, as some people have correctly pointed out, there is more to know about this situation, and CL did, in fact, have reliable evidence that Gold was looking to back out -- we'll know much more after the discovery phase of the lawsuit; prob early in 2007.)

Speaking of good lawyers, another perplexing decision by CL was to select poker pro Mark Seif to represent him (at least in the initial negotiations he was having with Gold.) WHAT??!? What the hell prompted that decision?? Seif is an elite tournament player, and by all accounts a real smart guy, but on what basis did CL make that decision?? Seif may have passed the bar exam, but he hasn't practiced in God-only-knows how long! That's a situation where you call up an elite Manhattan or even Las Vegas firm and get one of their prominent contract attorneys to represent you (you'll have a ton of preeminent contract lawyers lining up for the chance to work, even on a contingency fee basis, on a $6 Million lawsuit.) Mark Seif is an outstanding poker player, but this is a contracts issue, not a poker one. That's like a 1st round NBA draft pick hiring Lebron James as his agent. I get it: the guy knows basketball; but negotiating a contract has nothing to do with hoops. When Terrell Owens had his contract dispute with the Eagles, the arbitrator was actually a professor at my law school, and the campus was swarming with ESPN camera crews, one of which asked the guy a question about the NFL, to which he responded "actually, I don't really know much about football." ESPN had some fun at his expense, but that's exactly what the arbitration process needed: a completely dispassionate individual who could take a clean view of the contract issues without letting football get in the way.

In fact, the preceding begs an interesting question about the ownership of sports franchises. Several owners and/or general managers love to tout their status as "fan first, owner/GM second." Sounds noble, and makes for good morning sports talkshow soundbites, but there's something to be said for the fiscally-responsible owner/GM who views his acquisition as an investment, and just goes out and makes sound business decisions. There's certainly a few notable and successful examples of the fan-first approach: like Mark Cuban (Dallas) or the Maloof Brothers (Sacrament0) in the NBA. But also plenty of examples of the business-first approach paying dividends like Billy Beane (Oakland, MLB) (although the majority of these types probably don't get as much publicity, because they pull the strings mostly from behind the scenes). Anyway, this really wasn't the direction this post was originally meant to take, and it's long enough for now, so for now I'll just post a pic of me bungee jumping for the first time ever, and leave the topics I meant to address for next time. Taken in Queenstown, New Zealand, birthplace of bungee jumping. Despite the predilection for risk that you need in poker, I'm actually a big pussy, and was doing my best to talk myself out of actually doing this. Luckily, my 2 travel companions would not have let me get out of the country alive had I weasled out of it, and I ended up with this awesome picture:

Friday, November 11th: Jamie Gold 101

Apologies for the break -- when law school exams call, I've got to bear down and give them #1 priority sequence.

Thought I'd offer the benefit of my legal education to those wanting to know just what's up with the lawsuit that was filed against Gold by a man named Crispin Leyser ("CL"), claiming that Gold owed him half of his $12 Million WSOP prize. I've more or less had enough of reading the completely ludicrous opinions of others, who have no understanding of the legal system. So I'm going to do my best to explain the story here, in as understandable a manner as possible -- this is actually kind of fun to follow: the equivalent of law-student porn, if you will.

The basic facts (on which both sides more or less agree)

Gold befriended CL a little while before the WSOP; they had both worked in television, and were fans of playing some poker. Bodog Poker had agreed to sponsor Gold to play in the WSOP Main Event (although it's not clear why; e.g. whether he won an online satellite, or whether they were paying for his $10,000 entry fee for some other reason.) At some point, Gold told CL that he thought if CL (who had some connections to the entertainment industry) could get some celebrities to wear Bodog apparel during the WSOP, that Bodog would sponsor CL to play in it too. CL had apparently suggested that he could get Matthew Perry and Matthew McConaughey. But it didn't pan out, and CL only got two D-list celebs: Dax Shepard (from the Punk'd TV show), and Matthew Lillard. Bodog did not end up paying for CL's entry fee.

Now things get interesting: at some point Gold agreed verbally to give CL 50% of any money he won at the WSOP. Just why he agreed to do that is a matter the parties debate, but I'll get back to that soon. There is no doubt that Gold had promised to give CL half. The night before the final table (at which point Gold was already guaranteed to get at least $1 Million in prize money), he called CL's answering machine and left the following message (I have put the important parts in bold):

Hey, it’s Jamie, thank you for your message. I slept pretty well so we should be fine. I have a real good plan on what to do for today. Thank you for all your help. I wanted to let you know about the money. You’re obviously very well protected, everything will be fine but nothing’s going to happen today, that’s for sure. I have the best tax attorneys and the best minds in the business working for me from New York and LA and what we’re probably going to do is set up a Nevada Corporation and it’s going to … I have to pay you out of the corporation. I can’t just pay personally because I could get nailed. So it might take a few days, so please be patient. I promise you — you can keep this recording on my word — there’s no possible way you’re not going to your hal … after taxes. So please just be with me. I can’t imagine you’re going to have a problem with it. I just don’t want any stress about any money or any of that [censored] going on today, or even after the end of the day. I’m sure you’re going to be fine; you’re going to be very well taken care of, absolutely fairly. We’re just trying to handle this properly and after now I don’t even want to talk about it or think about it. But please just trust me. You’ve trusted me the whole way, you can trust me a little bit more. I promise you that there’s no way anybody will go anywhere with your money. It’s your money. Alright, I send you love, thank you for your support …

The preceding voicemail has set the poker world abuzz, with many people (who have no clue what they're talking about) claiming that it's the 'smoking gun' that will ensure Gold loses in court. This is poppy-cock, which I'll explain in a moment.

Aaaaaanyway, after Gold won $12 Million, he immediately got in touch with accountants and tax professionals to start working through the most advantageous way to take ahold of his winnings (there's all sorts of perfectly-legal measures you can take; such as incorporating yourself, or the like that can result in slightly-lower tax liability...and when you're dealing with $12 Million, even a small reduction in taxes can amount to like a quarter-million more in your pocket.)

While this was still going on, CL (apparently worried that Gold was going to back out of paying him the half that he'd promised) filed a lawsuit, seeking an injunction to prevent Harrah's from paying out half of Gold's winnings, on the theory that it actually belonged to him. A judge granted that injunction, so Gold was paid $6 Million, and the other half is still with Harrah's, awaiting resolution of this matter. P.S. an "injunction" is sort of like a temporary restraining order -- it doesn't mean that CL actually WON the case or anything (we're still months away from that). All it means is that the judge agreed that there was a viable enough question about who the money belonged to tell Harrah's to hang on to it. The law allows for these "injunctions" to be granted to prevent people from taking hold of assets and then disposing of them before a claim can be made by an opposing party...for example, theoretically Gold could have taken his $12 Million, and immediately bet it all on one spin of the roulette wheel and lost it, leaving no money for CL to recover should he then file a lawsuit. (But in this case, filing for the injunction was one of the all-time greatest bonehead moves, as I'll explain below.) Apparently miffed by CL immediately pulling the trigger on a lawsuit, Gold seems to have reneged on his promise, and decided that he isn't going to give CL a dime.

And that's where we stand; still with me?

The Legal Stuff

Alright, this is where things take a turn for the sexy.

Yes, there's no doubt that there was (at one time) a promise by Gold to pay CL half his WSOP winnings. Neither side disputes that. And as I wrote before, that's the 'smoking gun' that a lot of people are clamoring proves Gold's "guilt." The problem is that most of the general public watches a tad too much Judge Judy, and thinks that our legal system works something like that: i.e. that each side gets 15 minutes to tell the court what happened, win as many trailer-trash points as they can, and then a judge exercises common sense to determine what decision would be most "fair." Sorry to burst your bubble, but you're living in a dream world.

(By the way, if any of you are wondering just how Judge Judy or any of those other judge shows work: well Judy is indeed a former judge. But what you see on TV isn't actually connected to the country's judicial system in any way. It's just one big TV production. But what about the disclaimer you see that "the cases are real...the plaintiff and defendants are real..."?, you might ask. Well, they are. What happens is that the show's producers scour the docket of the small claims courts, looking for cases that look...well...ridiculous; i.e. where both parties look pretty juvenile, and the facts of the case look like they'd make for some good "wow, those-people-make-my-own-life-seem-so-satisfying-and-relevant" TV. Then they approach the parties and ask them if they'd like to be part of the TV show...if they agree, both parties sign a contract agreeing to appear on the show and be bound by the decision of the "judge", and drop the proceedings from the docket of the "real court." But the fact that Judge Judy actually did used to be a judge really has no value...it could be Kato Cailin in a Big Bird suit up on the bench, and the parties would still be bound by his decision...because they agreed by contract to be bound by it...not because the "judge" has any actual disciplinary discretion.)

Anyhow, back to the matter at hand: Here's the thing (and pay attention here): one of the most fundamental principles of contract law is that promises are not legally binding. Yep, any first-year law student can tell you that. In other words, that voicemail means nothing. Zilch. Zero. Nada. Gold could have stood up on the final table in front of an audience of thousands, dropped his pants, and announced through a bullhorn: "I, Jamie Gold, promise to give CL half of my winnings today", and it wouldn't mean a damn thing. The voicemail may be evidence that Gold is a scumbag for going back on his word, but as far as forming the basis for CL's legal claim to that money, no dice.

So that's what the law ISN'T. Here's what it is. The "full" law about promises is this: promises, without consideration, are not legally binding. "Consideration": that's the operative word here. Roughly speaking, it means that each side must give something up to make the agreement binding. Otherwise, it's just a "promise", or a "gift", and that means bupkiss. In fact, that's exactly what Gold's argument is: that his 'agreement' with CL was just a promise to make him a gift of 50% of his winnings, and not any sort of binding contract. For example, if I say to you: "I promise to give you the deed to my house, if you let me borrow your car next weekend, then there IS consideration: it's you letting me borrow your car -- and hence the promise is binding because the other party is giving up something in return. BUT, if you just say "I promise to give you the deed to my house", it's not binding, because there's no "consideration". Now, there's no requirement that what each side gives up needs to be of equal, or even fair value. For example, in the case above, the deed to a house is probably worth way more than the ability to borrow a car for the weekend, but courts don't really concern themselves with that -- they just need to see something given up in return to make the promise binding.

Hope you followed the above -- so how does that fit into the Jamie Gold case?? Well, Gold is arguing, as I mentioned above, that there was no consideration, and hence the 'agreement' was only a promise to make a gift to CL of 50% of his winnings, which isn't binding. BUT, CL tells a different story: he says that the agreement he had with Gold was to get celebrities to endorse Bodog during the WSOP, in return for 50% of Gold's winnings. And he did just that. They may not have been the A-list celeb's he originally thought he could get, but his argument is that the agreement he had with Gold was a binding contract, conditional on him acquiring the celebs, which he did, and that's what constituted the "consideration" necessary to make the promise a binding contract. Got it? Here's where things get murky, because it's really unclear from the facts that have come out so far just what was the nature of the agreement Gold and CL had. Gold claims that once he saw that the D-list celebs that CL had acquired for Bodog weren't good enough to get Bodog to sponsor him, he simply "felt bad", and decided to promise to make a gift to CL of half his winnings. CL, on the other hand, claims that Gold told him prior to him getting the celebs that he would gift to him 50% of his winnings if CL were able to get them to wear Bodog clothing...and he argues that the fact that the celebs weren't the A-listers he originally thought he could get is irrelevant. Oh, one more thing: in case you were wondering, "past" consideration usually doesn't suffice to make a promise binding; in other words, if Gold had said to CL: "Great job on getting those celebs for Bodog -- sorry they didn't think it was good enough to sponsor you, but you know what: I know how hard you worked to get them, and in return I'm going to give you half of my winnings." That wouldn't be good enough to make it binding. You might think that CL's work in getting the celebs might constitute his "consideration", but notice how it occurred before Gold agreed to give him 50%? That's called 'past consideration', and usually isn't accepted by courts...it has to be consideration that's bargained for at the time of making the agreement. The outcome of this case will depend largely on the terms of 2 agreements: i) the one between Gold and CL, and ii) the one between CL/Gold and Bodog (e.g. just what was the deal with the celebs?? Did Bodog ever agree to sponsoer CL in return for getting them?)

We just don't know the answer to those Q's yet -- all that's been filed with the court are each side's briefs...meaning their "side" of the argument. Early next year, we'll probably get to the "discovery" phase, at which point both parties are required by law to exchange all the documentation they have about the case...once we see that info, we'll have a better idea of whether the promise should be considered a binding contract, not.

Now here's my general commentary on why both sides completely butchered this situation:

#1: Why Gold is an idiot
He reneged on a promise, plain and simple. Doesn't necessarily make you a criminal, but does make you a grade-A jerk, and for a person who's supposed to be an ambassador for a game where honesty and integrity go a long way, it just doesn't reflect well on the way he was raised, or how he'll represent the interests of the nation's poker players . Gold's argument in this case boils down to "yeah, sure I had made a commitment at one time to pay him half my winning, but on account of how much he pestered me during the event, and then his cheekiness in filing the injunction lawsuit, I've decided to change my mind." CL seems like something of a lowlife too, but Gold is essentially saying "yeah, I admit that I went back on my promise, but Leyser did it to himself by being such a jerk." That's an argument that would barely hold water during 6th grade recess, let alone among professional adults.

#2: Why Leyser is an idiot
There are many thigns I could write about here (starting with his failure to get somethig in writing from Gold or Bodog,) but I'll restrict my discussion here to one point: CL -- and possibly his lawyers -- are complete idiots for filing for the injunction vs. Gold so damn early. Why? Because it appears from all indications that Gold did actually intend to pay CL his promised half (see voice message above -- you don't really leave a msg like that if you're intending on ducking out on the guy), but just wanted to take some time to work out the most advantageous way to structure the arrangement for tax purposes: a reasonable request, and one that would seem to be in CL's best interests, in addition to Gold's. Why on Earth would you file a lawsuit and risk pissing off a guy who has agreed to give you millions of dollars and apparently intends to follow through (but does not have a conclusive obligation to do so). CL did not file this lawsuit on his own -- he had lawyers help him draft it; if those lawyers were worth a dime, they should have taken a look at the facts of the case presented to them by their client, evaluated just how strong his claim to the money was, and (once realizing that it might not be a binding contractbecause of the absence of consideration) immediately counseled CL to reconsider for fear of immediately poisoning the guy's perception of you (when he has no legal obligation to pay you the money.) This situation is akin to walking into your boss' office and cursing him out the day before he decides what your annual discretionary bonus will be. There's positively nothing to gain, and everything to lose. Remember, CL's lawsuit was NOT a direct claim to half the money; it was only a suit for an injunction, preventing Harrah's from paying out the other half to Gold until the matter was sorted out. The only way this action makes sense is if CL had a legitimate concern that Gold would dispose of the money and leave nothing for CL to collect. But there's just no way in hell that's realistic. Gold's has a lot of money and modest celebrity -- he simply doesn't fit the profile of someone who's going to flee the country, or somehow put that money beyond CL's reach. It would be another story entirely if Gold had already backed out of his agreement to pay CL half...then a lawsuit laying claim to half the money by CL would be perfectly reasonable...but a suit for an injunction is completely ludicrous, when there's no real risk of flight, and every risk that the guy might simply change his mind regarding a non-binding promise. No upside; huge downside. Lawyers really dropped the ball on this one.

Sunday, November 5th: Bear with me...

I hate falling into a < 1 entry / week frequency, but I've got Tuesday circled on my calendar as the point when I will officially have this law school exam-period misery behind me, and will have some (hopefully interesting) things to say at that time.