I'm going to start the blog up within a week or so.

If you are a poker player who doesn't hate money there's going to be some information on here you will probably want to see. Otherwise, if you just want to see how I've been doing, check it out.

-Hub

A lot of you may be wondering why my volume is down so much this year. You may see that I have less than 4,500 games on Stars & be wondering what I have been up to this year. Maybe you’re one of the many people I told that I was playing on Full Tilt this year. While I haven’t been playing nearly as much overall this year, the truth is that I haven’t been playing on full tilt, but have been playing about 60% of my games on another site lately. That site is Cake Poker.
I’m going to warn you now that this will be a long entry, but it’s definitely worth your time, especially if you’re someone who plays poker & doesn’t hate money, and would like to increase your profitability.
Sometime in late/middle January I was introduced to a site called Cake Poker. I had heard great things about the softness of the games, & they give 33% rakeback, so I decided to try it out. At the time their highest stakes 6 man SNG was $130, so I just mixed in some $130s & $78s on Cake w/ my normal lineup of Pokerstars 6 man SNGs. I was immediately amazed by the quality of play in these Cake games. Cake is a great name for the site, because that’s exactly what their games are. It literally reminded me of Party Poker pre gambling bill. The games were that easy. I decided it would be in my best interest to keep these games a secret, as the profitability of them was just too good. First, I shut down my blog. I didn’t want people asking me questions about my volume all the time, & having to try to cover it. I emailed Cake support about adding higher buy-in 6 man SNGs, & within a few weeks they added 6 man SNGs at the $194, $258, $382, $505, & $630 buy-in levels. I then found out that Cake allows you to change your screen name weekly. This was perfect for me. I began changing my name on Cake weekly, and blocked my sharkscope stats for a particular name anytime someone submitted me for a leaderboard. Cake soon became my main site & I was playing about 60% of my games on there. I was regularely berated for making what would be seen as standard plays at the high stakes SNGs on Stars. Nobody understands SNG strategy on Cake. I used table selection on Stars since I could choose between sites, but never once did I use table selection on Cake because I couldn’t find one player who I felt would hurt my ROI enough to bother. Here are my Cake stats so far this year:

Username, Games Played, Av. Profit, Av. Stake, Av. ROI,Total Profit, Site
Brad23 597, $8, $129, 8%, $4,886, Cake

CMoneymaker 121, -$14, $104, -7%, -$1,710, Cake

JerryYangFan 422, $17, $130, 10%, $7,227, Cake

jhub3000 44, -$25, $114, -20%, -$1,116, Cake

JohnsDad 260, $25, $124, 16%, $6,462, Cake

Misremember 233, $20, $105, 19%, $4,695, Cake

PamAnderson 341, $25, $123, 18%, $8,409, Cake

PascalC 416, $15, $119, 19%, $6,225, Cake

SexyLexie 445, $26, $117, 20%, $11,733, Cake

sweetiepie86 262, $20, $113, 15%, $5,121, Cake

TuaXiong 62, $73 $121, 49%, $4,506, Cake


The totals I got from that are as follows:

Games played, Av. Profit, Av. Stake, Av. ROI, Total Profit
3,202, $17.72, $120.82, 14.38%, $56,438

Now compare that to my stats on Pokerstars this year:
Username Games Played Av. Profit Av. Stake Av. ROI Total Profit Site
jhub3000, 4,413, $10, $179, 3%, $44,662 Pokerstars


It’s not hard to figure out that Cake is more profitable than Stars. Even a supernova elite would be better off playing all or the majority of their games on Cake. What’s happened on Stars is that too many people are overvaluing supernova elite & basically not even caring about ROI. This leads to a mass of good players multi tabling & not using any table selection, which leads to very tough games & many games that are even –EV for every single player playing. I’m sorry but if you have 3 top players in a 6 man SNG, NOBODY is making money in the long run. If there’s 4 good players out of 6, NOBODY is making money in the long run. If you really have to play these games just to get supernova elite, you would be better off going to another site w/ easier games, or at least mixing in another site, and maybe even dropping down a buy-in level or 2. Supernova elite isn’t everything guys. You have to do some math & figure out what the most profitable games are. I can tell you what isn’t the most profitable, playing most of your games at a 1-3% ROI just so you can get supernova elite. Sure you can make some good money doing this, but you’re going to endure some pretty stressful swings, and you would be better off playing easier games where you still have a good rakeback % and would have less swings. That’s where Cake Poker comes in. Supernova elite isn’t everything guys. I was the 4th player to get it last year, and I won’t even get it this year because I have found a better route that makes me more money while playing less, and is less stressful. Can you really beat that?

Cake Poker is good for everyone. Here’s some examples:

1. Supernova elites: Even if you’re one of the best players and are supernova elite, you would still make more money at least mixing Stars & Cake together & using some table selection. Even then, you may be better off just playing mainly on Cake & not worrying about supernova elite. I know I am widely considered a top SNG player & that’s what I’m doing. If you aren’t a top player and are supernova elite, it’s not even close. Cake is best for you. You shouldn’t even worry about going for supernova elite this year. 33% rakeback + a much higher ROI is better than a low ROI w/ more rakeback.
2. Supernovas: I believe supernovas make about 26% rakeback. On Cake, you make 33% rakeback & it’s straight cash to your account, not FPPs. Factor in that the games are much, much easier on Cake & I shouldn’t need to go on.
3. Platinumstar, Goldstar, etc… You get much higher rakeback w/ Cake at 33% & the games are much, much easier.
4. NL Hold Em cash game players: I have heard from several people that the NL cash games are just as easy as the SNGs. I’ve also seen this posted on forums, w/ people raving about how soft Cake is.
5. Pot Limit Omaha cash game players: From what I’ve heard, the PLO on Cake is even softer than the NL cash. I recommend giving it a try.
6. MTT players: The Sunday MTTs are the softest around.
7. HU SNG players: look up BigGameJames & glazenuts & compare their ROIs to other Stars players. When talking to BigGameJames on AIM, he has told me there’s less than a handful of HU players on Cake he respects.
8. SNG players: Well, I should have pretty much covered this one already. If you need more assurance, check out these players on Cake:

Username Games Played Av. Profit Av. Stake Av. ROI Total Profit Site
ASballer23, 2,599, $16, $165, 11%, $40,478, Cake
Don Cabalero, 1,813, $6, $124, 10%, $11,363, Cake
T$GetBucketz, 1,764, $24, $103, 27%, $41,650, Cake
tcoll17, 1,098, $16, $144, 8%, $17,475, Cake

These are some of the better players in the Cake SNGs. At the same stakes on Pokerstars, I think at least half of them would be losing players. They would be break-even at best. The others would have an ROI no higher than1-3% if they’re lucky. Not one of them understands optimal SNG strategy. Now I don't mean to bash the level of play of these players, but I needed an example & 3 of these 4 players are assholes in the chat anyway.

9. Other players: Well, if you don’t play one of the games I listed I wouldn’t worry. If every game I know about is soft on Cake, I would imagine that all games are soft. It’s certainly worth a shot.

Even if they don’t have enough games running of your particular game, you would be much better off mixing in what you can on Cake & then filling the rest of your tables from another site.

Cake also has a 100% deposit bonus, up to $500.

Why am I telling you all of this? Well, I have been in discussions w/ one of the higher up employees at Cake. I told him how I was keeping it secret that I was playing on Cake & told him how I thought it would be beneficial for the site if I made everything public. Obviously, I wanted something in return. We negotiated a deal that would work out for both parties. I’m not going to disclose the details of the deal for now, but I’m sure some of you will figure it out or at least get a good idea. That said, everything you read is true. I didn’t alter any details in any way.

Part of my deal is that I must play under my normal screen name of jhub3000 from here on out (on Cake) & cannot change it. I have contacted sharkscope & they’re supposed to be merging all of my Cake stats to one screen name (jhub3000) in the near future. At that time my Cake account will be #1 on the 5-6 seated leaderboard & my Pokerstars account will be #3 on the same leaderboard. I will be ahead of any other SNG player on the any game leaderboard. It’s been a good year. I should also note that between my Cake stats & Pokerstars stats, sharkscope is missing about $10-11K of my profit.

If you want to try Cake out, you can just click on the link at the bottom of the page. Juat MAKE SURE THAT WHEN YOU SIGNUP YOU USE THE SIGNUP CODE jhub. THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT BECAUSE YOU NEED TO TYPE IN THIS CODE TO GET 33% RAKEBACK. I’m helping you out by telling you all of this, so please help me out & signup through me. I can assure you that I don’t get any portion of your rakeback, or any $ benefit for each individual person I refer. Cake has been working on their site a lot lately & I’m pretty confident that within a year they will be one of the top 3 sites in terms of the volume of players. They have excellent support, and they’re constantly working to improve their software & other features of the site. If you have any ideas or games you would like to see them implement just send them an email at support@cakepoker.com. Or send me an email.

If anyone wants to send me stars money for Cake money to get their Cake bankroll going just send me an email at jhub3000@hotmail.com letting me know what you want to swap. I have a lot of money on there so I should be able to help a few people out.

I’m sure of you already knew about Cake Poker. Some of you have probably already heard stories of the profitability on Cake. Others of you may have never heard of it. Hopefully I am able to help those who had never heard of it.

For those looking for more 10 handed SNGs, Cake is adding higher buy-ins in the near future.

It should be noted that this post isn’t meant to bash Pokerstars in any way. They have an excellent staff and do a very good job of putting out a good site for their players. I’ve even met some of their staff & they’re excellent people. It’s not their fault they have the toughest games on the net.

I’ll leave it at that for the 1st entry. In the next entry maybe I’ll review a little bit of the year. Here are my stats so far for 08:

484.38 hours
Profit: $112,835.49
Bonuses & Rakeback: $35,501.04
Total Profit: $148,336.53
Hourly Rate: $306.24

Signup for Cake Poker:


MAKE SURE TO USE THE SIGNUP CODE jhub FOR 33% RAKEBACK.

ALSO BE SURE TO CLEAR COOKIES & INTERNET HISTORY BEFORE DOWNLOADING. THIS CAN BE FOUND UNDER TOOLS>INTERNET OPTIONS.