If you think you already know how to make proposition wagers, that’s fine…keep reading anyway.

The Cardinal Rule of Proposition Gambling was best expressed over 50 years ago in the film “Guys and Dolls”. The Sky Masterson character was based on the real-life Titanic Thompson, the greatest proposition bettor ever. In the film, Sky (played by Marlon Brando) says to the young Nathan Detroit (played by Frank Sinatra):

“One of these days in your travels, a guy is going to show you a brand-new deck of cards on which the seal is not yet broken. Then this guy is going to offer to bet you that he can make the jack of spades jump out of this brand-new deck of cards and squirt cider in your ear. But, son, do not accept this bet, because as sure as you stand there, you’re going to wind up with an ear full of cider.”

Prop betting works because the person offering the wager knows he can do what he’s proposing. On rare occasions, the proposer is talking out of his ass, and you can win his bet. Very rare. If a steak is this rare, it’s still mooing. Taking a prop bet is about the biggest sucker move you can make. They’re the worst bets on the board on a craps table, in a sports book, a pool hall, a bar…pretty much anywhere someone starts a sentence with, “Hey, I’ll bet you I can…”

I love prop bets because they’re an outlet for the creative mind that doesn’t exist very much anymore. In a society full of checks-and-balances, forms signed in triplicate, and approval upon license upon regulation, you don’t have too many opportunities to take an idea and get paid for it, immediately and directly. With prop bets, if you can think of it, and can sell it, you can profit. Titantic Thompson was smart enough to dig up a highway sign that said, “Joplin - 20 miles” in the middle of the night and move it 6 miles down the road. The next day, by the strangest coincidence, Thompson was riding in a car with some other gamblers on their way to Joplin, Missouri when they passed a highway sign…and Ti said, “Man, we can’t be more than 15 miles out of town by now….” Ingenuity like that deserves to be rewarded.

Now that I’ve said this, I’ll admit there’s times I’ll take a prop bet…but we’ll save those for another blog.

NP: “House of Love”, by The House of Love. One of my favorite UK bands from the late 80s and early 90s; just a good, honest, 4-piece rock band. Some spacey guitar parts and melancholy lyrics, some out-and-out rock. These guys also called their first three records “The House of Love”…the most famous of which had a single called “I Don’t Know Why I Love You” got that a bunch of airplay on college-radio and MTV’s “120 Minutes”. This is a different record, the one with “Christine” on it.

Dario Franchitti is an angle shooter, he twists the rules to his advantage he also won the Indianapolis 500, so he is a winner.  Dario and his crew chief are gamblers of the best sort for the biggest stakes.  Take a look at any sport and you will see that talent is a big part of the equation, in the NBA finals there will come a bunch of points where the talent is equal; it will be the people that take risks that will win.

Dario and his crew chief gambled that there would be a rain delay while all the other sheep took a pit stop.  To win as a gambler you have to be willing to be the opposite more than you go along with the trends.  Certainly there are many examples the other way but knowing when you have to take a risk is as important to having to take one (or not for that matter).

I know nothing about racing but hearing that story made me a little more interested.  A lot of people would think that’s not fair, but gamblers don’t think like that.

Hats off to Dario, not only did he win the race but he got to celebrate with Ashley Judd.

James Acquaintance and I were playing one-pocket at Speeds, because I wouldn’t play him at 9-ball and he wouldn’t play me at snooker or straight pool. I don’t know why we always went through such a negotiation before we played; there was never any money on the line. We didn’t want to miss out on other action because we had something going on (or at least, it’d look like we did).

As one game started, James broke and it was my turn to shoot I took a drag off my cigarette and headed to the table. As I passed James walking back, he grabbed my arm to stop me. He flicked a small piece of cigarette ash off my collar, looked me right in the eye, and said, “Keep it clean, dude.” At an opportune point later in the evening, I asked James what difference it made if I had a bit of ash on my shirt…after all, he’d smoke a pack or more over the course of an evening. He had to have his own ashes, right? “Look me over. Find one spot. I’ll lay you odds if you want.” Of course, he was right about his appearance, and the reason why.

Gambling, and especially proposition wagering like a game of pool or other endeavor, is mostly about inviting action. You want people to want to be around you. As much as people may want to take your money, only a really serious person is willing to go through some unpleasantness to get it. Those are the people you don’t want coming after you, obviously. You want to the mark, Joe Chump who is out on a Friday night to have some beers and some fun, and will gamble with you for a little bit of a thrill. He isn’t thrilled if you’re dirty or smelly.

This is true in most walks of life, including the poker table. If the worst player at the table gets up because your jeans are torn or your shirt stained or you haven’t showered, you’ve cost yourself money. If you’re verbally abusive to anyone, dealer or other players alike, you’re creating the same negative atmosphere. Negativity rarely translates to positive results.

NP: “Live at the El Macombo”, Elvis Costello and the Attractions. This disc is included in the “2 1/2 Years” box set that also includes Costello’s first three records. When you see him now in car commercials and singing with Burt Bacharach in Austin Powers movies, it’s easy to forget how edgy, aggressive, and flat-out brilliant his early work was.

I hear this often “I just don’t have the opportunities other people do”, and for every one person that says that there are a hundred that don’t say it. I am calling BS on all of you and also on myself. Fortunately for all of you I have provided a link to a site with all of the secrets of the universe.

www.google.com

Sure, books can help but if you show me a 200 page book I will show you 175 pages of filler. Want an MIT or Harvard education, let me guess “you can’t afford it?”. Did you know that most of the curriculum to Ivy league schools is either freely available or is coming soon. Think you have what it takes to graduate from MIT, find out now.

Want to start a business and you think all of the case studies from Harvard might be helpful. Here you go.

If your endeavors are sometimes less than scholarly check out this video on breakdancing.

As you (and I) have always known there really is no “Secret”, but if you need something to get you going I think one word will do that for you.

Preparation

Now go cure cancer.

The Houston Rockets recently fired head coach Jeff Van Gundy after another very good regular season and a 1st-round playoff exit. These kind of seasons are the cornerstone of Van Gundy’s entire career. He works hard and prepares well, his teams work hard and compete…but he’s never taken a team to the NBA title. He’s also a boring-looking fellow with a boring name and little apparent personality other than his “coaching fire”. The owner of the Houston Rockets decided that he and his fans deserve more and fired Van Gundy with one year left a guaranteed contract.

So who do they replace Van Gundy with? Rick Adelman. Throughout his previous coaching stops in Portland, Golden State and Sacramento, Adelman has led teams to very good regular seasons and playoff runs that stopped short of the championship. He works hard, his teams are well-prepared, and are almost always competitive. He’s also a boring-looking guy with a boring name and little apparent personality other than his “coaching fire”.

Kissin’ cousins?

Jeff Van Gundy

Rick Adelman

The definition of insanity is doing the identical thing as before, and expecting different results. By that definition, Rockets’ owner Leslie Alexander is insane…as are many of us. Let’s say you know that your poker game is too tight to consistently win tournaments. You know you want to change. Do you get a coach who plays the exact same way that you do? Hell, no. You get someone who is successful in the exact opposite style you have, from whom you can learn a new thought process and approach to the game. The old and the new will blend into a hybrid that hopefully brings success.

Why is it that sports owners…successful, billionaire businessmen, one and all, can’t figure this out?

Lately my computer has been running slowly and it has been very upsetting to me. I have thought to call Comcast and give them a piece of my mind. Or maybe the firewall people I paid almost $1000 to protect me. Could it possibly be that my computer is outdating itself as we speak (I got it about a year ago), that would be nice, another splendid excuse to spend 2k on something that completely wastes a good majority of my time. So I was talking to a friend about my problem and he came up with a perfect solution (actually 2 people did). Here it is:

1. Turn the damn thing off.
2. Answer emails twice a day at specific times.

You aren’t going to believe this but that is indeed possible (“and don’t sneak emails on your blackberry”, my friend knows me too well) and it works. My computer has never run better and instead of nervously waiting for a response from people I do whatever the hell I want it’s not like almost everything can’t wait.

Failure to achieve

Last night I went out for drinks with a few friends that are younger and one recurring theme kept popping up. I let it slide for most of the night until the end of the night and then I snapped. The comments were all a similar theme:

1. I am just not as ambitious as you.

2. I don’t recognize opportunities the way you do.

3. You have more ability than I have.

These were the things that weren’t being said so I will just say them:

1. You have more money than I do.

2. You know how to take advantage of opportunity.

3. You have had advantages that I couldn’t hope for.

I am not going to justify who I am or how I became that person but I will say this, if you don’t think you can do something that is the first step to failure. It’s also the last step too. Even a lottery winner believes they can win for at least that split second that they hand over the money to the cashier. By the way, the next time you walk into a casino start thinking about all the cool shit you are going to buy with your windfall, then figure out how much you are willing to lose and then try and beat the house for a Ferrari. It can be done and people have done it. Just last week I had a buddy take $200 and turn it into $50k, in like a week. It can be done. I am not saying belief is the only element but that first step off of the cliff is a doozy.

Discussions about various religions

The discussion came up about various religions last night so here are some links:

Hinduism

Buddhism

Islam

Christianity

Now Playing: The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferris, at first I was a bit disappointed (I can’t stand the term New Rich), much of the stuff I knew but towards the end of the book there are a ton of resources. I will talk about this in my next blog.

Also Maxwell’s This Womans Work was just on my Zune, love that song.

by Brian “WillisNYC” Willis

Check out Brian at http://www.thepokercampcom/instructors/   

Recently the bad beat jackpot at Caesar’s Atlantic City was nearly $300k. I found this out while enquiring why the turnout at the casino that I was playing in was so low. In turn, this reminded me of one of the most startling things that I have ever seen in a poker room.

I was sitting at a cash game in Caesar’s and witnessed a scene so brutal that I would never believe it except that my own two peepers actually saw the events unfold. I was startled by an uproar at the table next to me. This table was directly in front of the entrance to the poker room. Back then Caesar’s had a short velvet rope held up by a pair of bronze stanchions that separated the front desk area from the rest of the poker room.

I turned my head to see what had caused the uproar and witnessed a tall, skinny black man, hereafter dubbed ‘Skinny’, holding one of the stanchions near the end of the table. A short white man, whom we’ll call ‘Shorty’, was seated at the table near him and it was evident that he had just been ‘clocked’ by the fellow holding the stanchion. He was slumped over the table holding his head in his hands and moaning. As I turned, Skinny dropped the stanchion and ran from the room posthaste.

A Good Samaritan who had seen what transpired tackled Skinny between the slot machines before he could take 10 steps out of the poker room. I turned my attention back to Shorty who had been clocked in the head. Well he must not have been hit too hard because the moment he saw his assailant sprawled out on the floor, he shot out of his chair and darted toward the exit of the poker room.

Now those of you familiar with Caesar’s in Atlantic City know that you can see the entire slots area from the poker room. So I all I had to do was stand up in order to witness a further escalation of the brutality which I had just witnessed. Skinny was lying on the floor, held down by the Good Samaritan when ‘Shorty’ came running up. Shorty’s run became a flying leap which culminated in a two footed landing that came down directly on Skinny’s head and face! I groaned collectively with the rest of the poker room patrons who watched in amazement.

The stunned Samaritan let go of Skinny, I am sure he was as shocked as the rest of us were. To my amazement, a seemingly unfazed Skinny stands up and starts exchanging punches with Shorty. How either of them still had their skulls intact amazes me to this day, let alone how they still had their wits intact enough to start pounding on each other after the initial pair of skull shattering blows was delivered.

Security finally showed up and secured the two men. I couldn’t hear the conversation, but it was obvious that they were trying to ascertain how this fracas got began. During the conversation Skinny stands out in my mind for being at least 12 if not 18 inches taller than Shorty who couldn’t have been taller than 5 feet, nor could he have weighed 125 pounds soaking wet. This was illustrated at one point as the security guards released Shorty for an instant. Shockingly Shorty, still quite incensed, launches a roundhouse that connects directly to the chin of Skinny. Security restrained Shorty once again without further incident until the police showed up and took both of them away.

As I was recounting this story at the table in the Borgata, another player asked what started this whole ‘mess’. I replied that I didn’t ever find out. To my surprise, the Borgata dealer spoke up at this point and vouched for my entire story. He said he was dealing at Caesars at the time and that Shorty had bad beat Skinny in a hand earlier that evening. Damn if it isn’t a small world!

A large percentage of what I know about gambling and hustling, I learned hanging out at Speeds‘ pool hall on Garland Road in Dallas (I think it’s closed now, but there’s others in the Metroplex). My professor at Speeds U. was a guy named James, who owned a landscaping business and always wore matching track suits that looked like they might have been tailored to fit. I always got a kick out of the track suits, because if you challenged him to a lap around the track, he would have stopped halfway through to light a new cigarette. I remember just about everything he ever told me…except, of course, his last name. I probably never knew that tidbit in the first place. So I’ll be calling him James Acquaintance.

James was very big on image, and how you use it to get the action you want. He never believed in goofy gimmicks or drawing attention to yourself, because it’s an impression you can’t control. The “hick with money” gimmick was played out by Amarillo Slim; the shooter with big thick (fake) glasses had been done to death before I was out of diapers. When you exaggerate a look to generate an impression of weakness, maybe it works and you’re a 200-watt bulb to the moths in the room. Or maybe the mark sees right through you because nobody ACTUALLY looks like that. Or maybe you don’t get any action because the mark decides he doesn’t want to be around someone who looks or acts like you’re looking or acting. Two out of three of these outcomes is bad.

The approach to take is to dress to not impress. This doesn’t mean you show up dirty, wearing rags. Just don’t do anything different than the average person ever would. You’re shooting for the middle-of-the-road, the 50th percentile of fashion and appearance. That way, YOU control every impression and can steer what direction your game goes.

There will certainly be more from the Gospel of Prof. James Acquaintance as this blog progresses….

NP: “Hot Fuss”, The Killers

by Paul “Beanie” Nobles

Shannon Elizabeth was being interviewed after she knocked out Barry Greenstein from the NBC Heads up Championship. In that interview she explained that she was a big believer in the power of attraction and that she has envisioned herself receiving good cards.

Which of course sounded like a bunch of bull.

If Shannon does indeed believe in the power of attraction she might want to consider trying to attract a job as an actor. I could go further but I will stop there.

It seems Shannon needs poker about as much as poker needs her, here is her career on paper, notice that the last decent gig she had was in 1999. Her bombshell years are close to over so she better keep flopping full houses.

I am not of the opinion that poker she be made into a sideshow and Shannon’s presence excluded players that were more deserving.

By Ryan Carter

When I tell someone about my professional poker career they are always jealous of the lifestyle I live. To someone working a 9-5 the amount of freedom a pro gambler has sounds like paradise compared to their boring ass job. The truth is, if poker somehow became a 9-5 and I was forced to choose between the complete freedom or the game I love, I would choose the game in a heart beat.

I gamble because it gets my blood pumping. I still get the same adrenaline rush every time I launch a huge bluff, and it’s hard to keep a smile from my face when I trap some sucker into giving me his stack with a garbage hand. The challenge of out thinking my opponents while constantly controlling my emotions keeps the daily grind fresh and exciting. While the freedom is great I wouldn’t trade the mental stimulation I get from poker for anything.

My personal philosophy has always been; if I’m not doing something every day that truly excites me I need to fix that ASAP. There are a million ways to make money in this world, so there is no reason you can’t be doing something that pays the bills as well as gets you pumped to wake up each morning. Look up and you will see this site’s slogan: “Always Bluff: For People Who Take Risks”. To live the Always Bluff lifestyle you don’t have to be a professional gambler. You just need to be willing to “take a shot” at something you truly desire even if there is a little risk and uncertainty involved.

Many people thought I was crazy for dropping everything to play poker for a living. If I hadn’t I would be stuck in some lame job, not getting any work done because I was day dreaming about the life I have now. I would have spent my whole life thinking about what could have been, and that would have been a great human tragedy. If you’re life isn’t everything you want it to be I suggest you do something about that immediately. Trust me; the rewards are well worth the gamble.

by Paul “Beanie” Nobles

If you are a regular or professional poker player High Stakes Poker on GSN is your show. It’s everything you would want in a poker game and it’s the exact opposite of the “all in” coverage on the WPT and WSOP. In the second taping a friend of mine asked me if I would take a piece of him on the show, he isn’t normally a big cash game player and I wasn’t that fluid at the time so I said “no”. I always regretted that, here was one of my best friends in poker and I didn’t have his back. What kind of friend was I?

Now the taping started again for I believe either the 5^th or 6^th season. I was offered the same deal by another friend and took it immediately. One thing you need to understand about poker is the need for “taking a shot” is important. Sometimes you would do it because the game is just so good (I will get into this in Part 2), in this case my friend isn’t necessarily taking a shot, he plays this big fairly regularly, but the format is changing and HSP has a bigger game coming with a 500k buy in and 300-600-1200 blinds. Apparently Jamie Gold and Sammy Farha get involved in a pot that is a must see.

So why back someone playing against the best players in the world? That is simple, because he asked. When you come up in poker the people that have your back are few and far between. Who is to say that my friend isn’t the next Ivey, Lederer or Hellmuth? There is only one way to find out and that is by supporting people looking to take a shot.

By Paul “Beanie” Nobles

I watch this show with my kids every Friday, its called Meerkat Manor. The lead character (or Meerkat) is named Flower. Flower does not play.

Every other show there is an incident where a rival Meerkat faction is trying to invade Flowers turf. Flower has none of that and the battles get vicious. Meerkat’s die in these interactions, it’s a sad part of the process but a necessary part all at the same time.

Your turf is your turf. You have built it and anyone violating your area needs to be treated in a harsh manner. It’s necessary for people to know that you are willing to fight for what is yours because it is all that you have in life. Many millions of people have died fighting for turf. Their losses aren’t always in vain because people know that you aren’t willing to lay down.

Attila the Hun used to come into a village and negotiate with the leaders of that village and explain that they had 2 options. They would fight to the death or they would become slaves. Almost always they chose the first option. Not so ironically, the village leaders would often change their minds and ask Attila for the second option when it was obvious they would lose, at which point Attila would explain to them that they had made their choice.

Certainly you could make some comparisons to Iraq but that isn’t what got me to write this article. Both of these situations pertain to both poker and business. If you play 10-20 NL and someone is coming in and eating your fish it might be time for a little battle. Sometimes just the presence of conflict will have them looking for softer ground. Business is the same way, you have to stand for something, you have to be something, if you don’t you can easily be taken. Getting to the top of any mountain is a difficult climb but don’t forget that on your way up you need to battle for the turf you have claimed.

One last thing. You have to be willing to lose battling to the death.

To say that Amsterdam has beautiful women is a kin to saying Kermit the Frog likes the big girls. Its just obvious. What is not completely obvious is that they ride around on bikes all day (so does everyone else in Holland but its hard to notice them when a supermodel rides by every 2 seconds). These three or four pictures will not give you a true appreciation of what I am saying. This was the last day of the CAC conference, there are no pictures of anyone because we were all tired as shit and just went to the casino.

This is in the square outside of the conference, there must be strict laws about using a cell phone while riding a bike.

We were there over their memorial day, this was the day the queen was to speak. We watched the proceedings from one of my colleagues rooms until it was clear that there were snipers ready to shoot anyone for any suspicious looking behavior.

I am going to be very careful with this picture since this young woman might not be of age. She was part of a group of about five waving flags in celebration. As you may have guessed the other four were all guys.

You see this in Europe a lot more than you do in the states but I think there is little question that it is effective. In case you don’t know its a urinal and you try and hit the ball while you make water.

If Dr. Dre were in Amsterdam this would be a place he could go to both get his drink and his smoke on. It was also the place we met on the last day of the conference (before we went to the casino or the red light district).

Um, coffee is not exactly what the coffee shops in Amsterdam are known for, the red light district smells like weed. If you have ever been to the French Quarter in New Orleans you know that is a much better alternative to what it could smell like.

See that cinema sign, you surely want to check the offering before you partake. Just a word to the wise.

After Katrina there was a big deal about how Holland manages their waterways, which are immense, apparently the system moves the water every 24 hours, unless the guide on the canal tour I was on is a liar.

I am not considering moving any time soon but if I ever move to play poker professionally, Amsterdam would seem lucrative. And by the way, to the woman in the 2 seat in my Limit Holdem game that shit was not a string raise in any country but I didn’t want to be an ugly American (especially while you nice people were paying for my trip).

This was a party held at the Mansion (right across the street from the Holland Casino). I would love to give a shout out a la Petey Pablo “this one goes out to Seagrams Gin, because I drink it and they paying me for it”. But they didn’t so I won’t.

Peace, next stop is the French Quarter in New Orleans for the WSOP Circuit event.

By Paul “Beanie” Nobles

I have anxiously awaited Entourage every Sunday for a number of years. I totally get the need for product placement in shows like The Sopranos and Entourage but Entourage jumped the shark 2 weeks in a row. Last week they basically whored for the UFC in a very obvious way, OK, once I can stand. This week the boys headed to the racetrack, at first it wasn’t apparent and then JohnnyDrama yelled “Go Baby Go”. In case you don’t know “Go Baby Go” is the slogan for National Thoroughbred Racing Association. It could not have been more put on.

I am cool with a little bit of product placement. Tony had a Coke last night, while it was obvious it wasn’t as contrived and certainly they didn’t sell half of the show to Coke.

Entourage went from being one of the best shows to selling out real quick and that is too bad.

Not much really, both charge affiliates but the CAC is infinitely less satisfying. I am still a little steamed about being made to pay to get into the conference. Its similar to going to Best Buy so they can sell you a TV and charging you for the privilege. Oh well, I will likely choose CAP’s Barcelona event over the CAC’s Montreal event based on this. Sure I could have groveled at the feet of one of the presenters but that just isn’t my style, well O’kay, no one answered my emails by the time I left and it was pretty apparent that I wasn’t getting past the gigantic doormen to find someone.

Here are some pictures:

This is a unisex bathroom at the party thrown by 3D poker or something or other. Someone really needs to explain to these people the idea of VIP because between the group of 5 I was in I can’t imagine too many people drive more traffic than we do.

The defacto leader of our small group based on his respective genius at his young age. It will surprise exactly no one when Nick becomes London’s equivalent to Bill Gates.

Midd’s with some surfer dude (or Swede, who knows). If you have ever attended a Bodog shindig Shannon Middleton planned it. She is a take charge kind of gal and one of my favorite people to hang out with.

Kyle (who looks like an Axe murderer in this pic), Andrew and Nick.

Matthias and Richard.

Kyle, some hot chick, Nick and Andreas.

Just in case you needed proof that Greg Powell is a great salesman check out his beautiful wife.

Funny looking bathroom.

A picture of the VIP Balcony that we were not able to visit.

Hot chicks getting their shake on.

Pete, a woman that is about a 9.5 and her boyfriend who I have no idea what his name is so I will just call him “Lucky”.

Sex is going on behind this curtain, I would have taken more pics of the Red Light District but I would have gotten pimp slapped literally. Pimps don’t like you taking pictures of their whores apparently. Who knew?

Jeremy with a gal from 888.com.

A picture of the lady taking pictures all night. My futile attempt on being ironic.

A picture of me at the Beverly Hills Hotel. I couldn’t find any good pics from today and I really like this picture.