First, the issue is that he's winning at a rate that is 10+ standard deviations above what the typical winning/profitable player is achieving. These results are accomplished across a significant sample of sessions (39 live streamed ones), and across almost a year.
If you consider some of the players considered the best "live readers" in the history of the game (Ivey, Negreanu, etc.), none have won at the rate that he has.
Secondly, he's playing $1/3 and $5/5 poker in a city (Sacramento) that is not exactly a gambling mecca. You would expect someone who is as good as he is to play higher stakes games. $1/3 and $5/5 are stakes offered at nearly any casino.
Third, he's performed well against some elite pros. Matt Berkey (who regularly plays the highest stakes in Vegas) was in a streamed game against Postle, and Postle performed extremely well in heads-up hands. Given that Berkey is playing for hundreds of thousands of dollars on a nightly basis in Vegas, and seems to be a profitable player in those games, are we supposed to believe that Postle somehow has identified body language tells that no one else has discovered?
This is not even considering other facts like:
* Postle used to consult for the production team behind the streaming for the casino
* Postle used to claim to run some kind of app development company, and has since deleted his LinkedIn
* The extreme winning sessions seem to only have taken place during streamed games
Sure, it's possible that there's a benign explanation here, but it's looking far and far more unlikely.
Not to mention the guy is earning close to a thousand dollars an hour playing low stakes poker. If he were that good on his own he would surely play higher stakes or play as much as he possibly could. Instead, he only plays at this one casino and only during the streamed matches that include RFIDed cards.
I remember reading somewhere that most good poker players are better at taking money from less skilled players than other good players. It's not ridiculous to think someone simply likes to play with less skilled players in general. It's easy money.
He is not playing just against less skilled players, he is playing with very good players as well. Regardless of the opponent he can always make the right decision and only time he loses is if he bluffs and someone makes a extremely tough call with a weak hand (something most people wouldn't do).
There is no situation when he bluffed against a better hand.
Not only this, but if he was as good against weaker players, he'd play all the time, not just when it is streamed and RFID is used.
I was trying to talk in laymen terms, not everyone knows poker lingo. Exactly, either Postle has superhuman mind reading skills or he gets info from outside. It's not certain whether he knows exact hands, maybe it is just "AHEAD/BEHIND" which can be really easy to pass along.
I find it astounding that personal accessories like hats and sunglasses are not only allowed but apparently not adequately inspected in a game where the subtlest body language and facial tics can affect who ends up winning thousands to millions of dollars.
(My poker experience amounts to two years' worth of high-school lunch hours, so admittedly, I'm commenting on something I don't know much about)
Did anyone else read to the end of this linked story expecting the "discovery" or answer at the end? Like... how he cheated?
Instead it just ends implying he must be cheating because statistics. Great, he probably is. But if he's actively cheating and people are onto him he'll be discovered eventually, just write a real article once that happens.
"It is by will alone I set my mind in motion. It is by the juice of Sapho that thoughts acquire speed, the lips acquire stains, stains become a warning. It is by will alone I set my mind in motion..."
First, the issue is that he's winning at a rate that is 10+ standard deviations above what the typical winning/profitable player is achieving. These results are accomplished across a significant sample of sessions (39 live streamed ones), and across almost a year.
If you consider some of the players considered the best "live readers" in the history of the game (Ivey, Negreanu, etc.), none have won at the rate that he has.
Secondly, he's playing $1/3 and $5/5 poker in a city (Sacramento) that is not exactly a gambling mecca. You would expect someone who is as good as he is to play higher stakes games. $1/3 and $5/5 are stakes offered at nearly any casino.
Third, he's performed well against some elite pros. Matt Berkey (who regularly plays the highest stakes in Vegas) was in a streamed game against Postle, and Postle performed extremely well in heads-up hands. Given that Berkey is playing for hundreds of thousands of dollars on a nightly basis in Vegas, and seems to be a profitable player in those games, are we supposed to believe that Postle somehow has identified body language tells that no one else has discovered?
This is not even considering other facts like:
* Postle used to consult for the production team behind the streaming for the casino
* Postle used to claim to run some kind of app development company, and has since deleted his LinkedIn
* The extreme winning sessions seem to only have taken place during streamed games
Sure, it's possible that there's a benign explanation here, but it's looking far and far more unlikely.