I remember 5 years ago when I logged into my PartyPoker account, only
to be welcomed with a message saying, "because of the 2006 Unlawful
Internet Gambling Act passed by President Bush, Party Poker will no
longer service U.S Citizens". At that moment, I thought it was over.
I remember 5 months ago, when the Government wanted to institute a
12-18 month "blackout period", and again, many people thought it was
over. Sadly, this past month, on Black Friday, we actually might have
actually witnessed the end of Full Tilt and Pokerstars for American
citizens, but I refuse to believe that we are done with online poker
altogether.

I've heard numbers as glaring as over 10 million Americans play online
poker. With a number that staggering, I can't imagine we won't find a
way to play poker online again in the near future. I would like to
think, that the U.S government has had a plan all along, and that when
they had previously considered regulating/taxing online poker, that
the 12-18 month blackout period, would be used to "even the playing
field" for the new American sites against FTP/Stars/UB, and what do ya
know, they have completely chopped a leg out from under each of those
sites, doing essentially, just that. Now that the three leading sites
are out of the way, it will leave a massive player pool of Americans
ready to play, with absolutely no site to play on. I hope that the
government will see this opportunity (especially in a time where we
are sporting a $15 trillion national debt and threatening to halt the
federal government over a few billion dollars in the budget) and seize
it by coming in, regulating/taxing and providing online poker to all
Americans. Sadly, I doubt we will be able to play against people from
other countries again (this is pure speculation), but I imagine the
new players flocking to the American sites will more than makeup for
this (picture ESPN with PartyPoker commercials running all day/night),
it'd be like the golden era of fish from PartyPoker of 5-7 years ago,
but even better perhaps. Not only will we likely not be able to play
against our international friends, but I also doubt we will ever be
able to play on Full Tilt/Pokerstars/UB(unless you move out of the
US). This is disappointing of course, but again the prospect of
perhaps Partypoker returning to the US, as well as a Harrah's or ESPN
based site maybe, operating in a justly, regulated US based market, we
could see online poker return for us USA players in a great way.

We also have to recognize that the status quo was just not
maintainable, as many players recognized 5 months ago at the rumored
blackout period. While the immediate time without being able to play
would have been difficult, we were not going to be able to operate another
5-10 years with middle men payment processors who weren't reliable, as
well as an ambiguous law saying playing is legal, but banks processing
our wires for gambling is illegal (?) It was all bound to end poorly
at some point, but I think that people will realize that US regulation
will be mutually beneficial for all, and a system with clear
rules/laws will be put into place, and we will finally be able to play
100% legally one day (hopefully!) It also would be a good time for
the federal government to analyze the nations' stance here, and in
particular assess the hypocrisy of how the state of Washington makes
playing online poker a felony, while Washington D.C allows online
gambling and provides the sites to people! It all adds to the
confusion on the subject in a nationwide legality aspect.

Maybe I am just being overly optimistic, but I think when several
million Americans all want something badly enough, they will find a
way (not to mention the $10 billion or so yearly tax revenue the
federal gov't could get if they taxed/regulated online poker!)
Hopefully an intelligent bill gets presented before Congress in the
next couple of years that can convince the conservative opposition
that playing online poker is a civil liberty that should not be
stripped of American citizens, and not only is it unjust to prevent us
from playing, they would be forfeiting obscene amounts of money that
they could be earning from regulation in a time when our country needs
it most. Give it a couple years (I don't see it being much sooner due
to the upcoming election year) but eventually this will be addressed
and hopefully the lawmakers will see that taxing/regulating online
poker in the US is a win-win situation for everyone.

In the meantime, I am gonna continue to play live as much as possible,
and focus on coaching my non-US based students in my free time (PM me
if you are interested in coaching). I just finished playing in the WPT
Hard Rock Hollywood event last week, which I will write about in my
next blog. Aside from that, I am looking forward to the WSOP next
month, and have a nice handful of events that I am going to be playing
(most excited for the 10k 6 max and the Main Event).

Obviously Black Friday was very rough for us all in different ways,
and sadly, many people won't be able to recover. I wish the best of
luck to everyone, especially those grinders who had particular hourly
expectations that are likely already forced into the new job hunt.
Have faith everyone, I really truly think we will find a way, and
online poker will return for us one day. Until then, good luck with
your other endeavors, stay sharp with your game, study the game
online, and test out those local cash games that we never dared enter
before :)

I remember seeing one quote the evening of Black Friday on Facebook
from Mement_Mori that I really liked and wanted to close with (Memo
shouldn't mind me using it since he has all the MTTs to himself now :)

"Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end.
But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."

- Sir Winston Churchill


Good luck everybody,

Grayson

Hey everyone, I am still out in Vegas, figured I'd do a quick update. I spent Thursday-Sunday at the strip, staying at THEhotel with a few of my friends from home, enjoying the Vegas attractions and betting the NCAA games. We had a pretty great time, some winners and some losers (I woulda done a whole lot better had Gonzaga beat BYU in my pick o the weekend! ), but the highlight of the trip might have been seeing David Spade's standup at the Venetian. I, like many others, grew up with Black Sheep/Tommy Boy, and couldn't miss seeing Joe Dirtay himself performing live, and he didn't disappoint.

All of my friends flew home early Sunday just in time for me to catch the 2nd half of the UNC/Washington game in the Mandalay Sportsbook before heading to Gboro's house for the Sunday grind with him and the rest of his roomies. Luckily for me, UNC edged out Washington in a nail biter, and my favorite team (have been a Tarheel forever despite being a Univ florida grad) advanced to the Sweet 16 :) I was hoping this was a sign for good things to come on the Sunday trails, but I ended up having a heartbreaking close call last night in the FTP 640$ Million tournament.

I was one of the chip leaders from around 30 people down, and everything was going quite smoothly, but after losing a pot with 77 vs. kingsofcards AA with 16 left, I fell down to around 30 blinds and wasn't able to get above that threshold again. I worked a 20 blind stack around the final table bubble, and ended up making the final as 8/9 with around 15 blinds (400k at 14,000/28,000) After an orbit or two of folding, I picked up 77 and shoved pre-flop with around 12 blinds, getting a call from the only amateur at the table (who had been playing insanely tight during the home stretch of the tournament) with 10s (after about a 30 second nit roll from him :/ ) Ty "puffinmypurp" reiman was standing next to me as the cards flipped, and calmly said "seven from heaven" and without missing a beat a 7 comes out on the flop, but just as quickly, it was followed by the dreaded 10 ball on the turn, for me to make my dramatic/disappointing exit : ( I was out 9th for 16k, left to think about the 221k up top to first that coulda been. This was the 2nd biggest final table I have ever been at (behind my WCOOP 200$ final 2 years ago), so pretty bummed to go out 9th, but I am going to assume that this close call will lead me to something bigger during the SCOOP.

So it is currently Monday morning in Vegas, I am sitting here with Jamie "thecronic420" rosen, Ben "bonafidedonkey" Palmer, and Eric "blizair" Blair, as they all prepare to go play the 5k Wynn event. I won't be playing, flight home to Orlando tomorrow, so I am gonna go enjoy the strip and mess around while keepin an eye on the fellas as they go deep in this event. Despite the closest call of my poker career, I'm not gonna worry about it, wait until the next big final and hopefully I can avenge the close call. Definitely enjoyed the sunday grind yesterday with the aforementioned guys, who all had some close calls, and lil shout out to Steve for his 2nd place in the Mulligan yesterday, was a pleasure to watch him dominate deep in that tournament as he always does.

Looking forward to getting back home to see the girlfriend and pup, relax, and get back to coaching and prepare for the upcoming SCOOP/MET fiasco on FTP next month. Will post again soon, thanks for reading everyone.

-Grayson

How's it going guys, this is my first of many blogs to follow here on P5s. I will basically just be telling you about my poker(hand discussions/deep runs etc), my students and their progress, as well as anything else interesting going on outside of poker. I just recently started up coaching, and have a great group of young talented guys who I expect to see big things out of in the next year. As many of you may have also noticed, Pocketfives Training is starting up, and I was lucky enough to be chosen as one of the lead instructors for the site. I am very much looking forward to working with other great players like Apestyles, 1sickdisease, Gags, NeverscaredB, among others, as well as focusing most of my attention in the next upcoming months on coaching/teaching members of the community who are looking to make the jump to the next level.

Poker has been going pretty well for me as of late, I had a decent little run on Sunday/Monday, getting a couple good scores including winning the 500$ Monday Omaha tournament on Pokerstars for just under 18k. I'm looking to ride the momentum into the 1k MET/Mini FTOPS MET tonight, as well as the hugeeee Mini FTOPS MET Main Event on Sunday (the same tourney I was fortunate enough to luck box a few months ago :) , but MET this time).

I will actually be playing that Mini FTOPS Sunday session out in Vegas at Gboro's house, where I will be visiting for a few days with him and his roomates (Cronic420,Bonafidedonkey,Blizair), to hang out and get in a good grind session. I actually leave this Thursday to head to Vegas (from my home in Florida), for my friends and my yearly annual March Madness Vegas trip...we try and see a show or two, have some good meals and bet the NCAA games big time : ) Hopefully I get lucky, along with having a great time, then get to ship something big at Gboro's house to cap the weekend off in style.

Outside of poker playing/coaching, the most interesting thing I've done in the past couple weeks was when I took my girlfriend last Thursday to see the broadway musical "Wicked". Even for those of you out there who aren't "musical" or "theatre" people, I assure you, you would really enjoy this play, it's quite amazing. Otherwise I have my Vegas trip to look forward to, and then a somewhat low-key relaxing month of April, until the SCOOP starts up in May.

I will post again after my Vegas trip, hopefully it is eventful : )

Take care guys,

Grayson