Paul Ryburn's Journal

She’s the only bartender at the Downtown Saucer who’s allowed to park her transportation inside.  See below:

Just found this out on Twitter.  Follow them at @cafeeclectic to keep up with the latest news on their opening.

In October-November I played a lot of No-Limit Hold’em on PokerStars at the 10 cent small blind/25 cent big blind level.  I frequently found myself at tables with a player named “yahai” from Hua Zhou, China who struck me as having some rather unusual playing habits.

First of all, there was the stack he brought to the table.  You can buy into most online no-limit hold’em tables for anywhere between 20 and 100 times the big blind.  I almost always buy in for the max, which would be $25 at a .10/.25 table, and most good players do.  The reason for that is, if you find yourself at the table with bad players, you want to set yourself up to take as much of their money as possible once you get them involved in a hand.  “yahai,” however, always bought in for the minimum – 20 times the big blind, or $5.

Secondly, good poker players in no-limit games usually size their bets in relation to the size of the big blind pre-flop, and in relation to the size of the pot post-flop.  This is done to give information (or disinformation at times, since poker is a game of deception) about how much you like your hand.  “yahai” didn’t do that, though.  He’d either fold (which he did about 98% of the time) or he’d go all-in with his $5 stack, forcing his opponents to make an expensive decision.  If he won and doubled his stack, he’d immediately leave the table.  If he folded and lost money due to being in the blinds, he’d rebuy to bring his stack back up to the $5 starting point.

It was annoying to play with him because he didn’t seem to have a clue how to play proper poker – just fold or all-in.  He was smart enough to only go all-in with premium hands.  In most positions on the table he’d go all-in with only AA, KK, QQ, JJ or AK, the best starting hands in hold’em.  On the dealer button or in the blinds, if no one had raised yet, he’d loosen up his requirements to about any two cards J or higher, and A-10 as well, and A-x where the cards were suited, and go all-in.

It seemed like he was wasting his time.  With his strategy, his all-ins only seemed to get action from other players about once an hour, and I figured the $5 he’d win in those situations would evaporate due to him getting hit by the 10 cent and 25 cent blinds that had gone around so many times.  “How is this guy making any money?”  I thought.

“And furthermore,” I wondered, “there are dozens of tables at the 10 cent/25 cent level on PokerStars.  How is it that ‘yahai’ and I end up at the same table so often?”  I went to the PokerStars lobby one day when he was online, and did a player search for him.  I figured he might be multi-tabling, playing more than one table at a time.

Was I ever right.  He was multi-tabling TWENTY-FOUR TABLES AT ONCE.

Now things were starting to make sense.  I decided to do an experiment.  I got on a .10/.25 table and played for an hour.  I played my normal strategy, but for the purposes of this experiment I was not mainly concerned with how much I won or lost, but how many VIP Player Points (VPPs) I got.  You earn VPPs for every hand you’re dealt into, based on how much PokerStars rakes out of each pot as their fee for hosting the game.  At the .10/.25 level, you don’t earn much.  I earned about 4 VPPs for that hour.

For “yahai,” though, those piddling points add up.  Let’s say that he multi-tables an average of 20 tables per time.  Research I did about him online (because there was a lot of discussion about this guy) indicated that he plays online about 10 hours per day.  That means he’s earning 40 VPPs per table per day, times 20 tables – that’s 800 VPPs per day.  Let’s further suppose that he works a normal “work week” grinding the poker tables, which would be about 22 days per month.  That means he earns approximately 17,600 VPPs per month.  I actually think that number is conservative, because I think he plays more than 10 hours/day and more than 22 days/month.

At 17,600 VPPs/month, he’d qualify for PokerStars’ PlatinumStar VIP level, which requires a minimum of 10,000 VPPs earned per month.  What does that get him?  Well, a lot, actually.  Higher-level VIPs can trade in their points for cash bonuses.  A PlatinumStar VIP, for example, can trade in 50,000 points for $650 cash.

But wait.  When you buy these bonuses, you’re not trading in VIP Player Points (VPPs), but rather Frequent Player Points (FPPs).  PlatinumStar VIPs earn 2.5 FPPs for each VPP.  So, the 17,600 VPPs “yahai” earns each month translate to 44,000 FPPs.  That means, about once a month, “yahai” is able to get a bonus of $650 cash from PokerStars.

That’s not all.  By June of this year, “yahai” will have earned enough VPPs to reach the next level – Supernova, for which you have to earn a minimum of 100,000 points in a year.  Then he’ll earn 3.5 FPPs for each VPP earned.  So his 17,600 VPPs per month will equate to 61,600 FPPs.  Furthermore, he’ll get a better deal on a bonus – $1500 for 100,000 VPPs.  At the rate he plays, he’ll be able to cash in his points for that $1500 bonus about every 7 or 8 weeks.

So, “yahai” can be a completely break-even poker player on the tables, and still earn $650 a month or more.  In the US, that’s really not that much, but in China, $650-1500 a month should place him squarely in the middle class.  “yahai” isn’t some ignorant donkey who doesn’t know how to play poker and doesn’t care to learn – he’s a businessman, taking advantage of a favorable economic situation.

Recently I’ve seen a lot more players like him, with names like “yazhou,” “chinlee,” and “zhaobao,” all from China, all at the .10/.25 levels, all employing the same $5 stack shove-or-fold strategy.  Why are Chinese players flooding the low-stakes no-limit hold’em market all of the sudden?  I had no idea until I came across this article, which provided some insight.  There were many, many Chinese players making a living at World of Warcraft until recently.  They’d play the game for hours and even days at a time, earning “gold,” the currency of the realm in WoW.  They’d then sell their “gold” on eBay for real money, thus making a profit at the massive multiplayer online game.  The Chinese government, however, banned this practice last year, causing the players to find a new venue to make money – poker.  As I understand it, it’s not just PokerStars that has been invaded, but all the major poker sites.

What to do if you get tired of finding these shove-or-fold short stackers at your poker table?  My advice would be to take a break from no-limit and play fixed limit for a while.  My experience is that you can play about 8 levels higher in fixed limit – so if you’re playing 10 cent/25 cent blinds in no-limit, you can play $1/$2 fixed limit pretty comfortably.  In fixed limit, you can’t use bet sizing to give information/disinformation about your hand, so you have to play proper poker.  Plus, you tend to earn more VPPs in fixed limit games, getting you to the next VIP level faster – and getting you access to some of the bonuses that “yahai” and his friends enjoy.

Another option would be to play no-limit hold’em Sit’n’Go tournaments.  If you’re playing .10/.25 cash games, you should be comfortable at the $6.50-$13 buy-in range for SnGs.  There are players like “yahai” in these tournaments but they almost never finish in the money.  They either get blinded off, or they get too aggressive and more experienced players take advantage of them.

I hope that sheds some light into why all these Chinese players have invaded the low-limit poker games.  For months I was privately cussing “yahai” and his buddies, but now that I see what they’re doing, I kind of respect them.  They’ve found a relatively low-risk way to avoid being prisoners of the corporate world.

This blog entry is sure to get a lot of traffic from search engines, as people frequently search for “yahai” trying to figure out who he is.  If it’s your first time to read this blog, welcome, and if you found this post helpful, I have a tip jar at Buy-Paul-a-Beer.net where you’re welcome to leave a little somethin’ to help build my bankroll. 

I just got home, and it’s 1:54 AM Saturday night.  Or actually, Sunday morning.  Which means it’s the start of a new week.  Which means I can post a new “Brick” quote.

Interesting fact about Brick before we proceed:  If she drinks a Red Bull when she first gets to work, she doesn’t complain about how tired she is for the rest of her shift, but it makes her pee for like five times an hour.

She doubted her nickname tonight, by the way.  “Sometimes I think you call me Brick because I’m dumb as a brick,” Brick told me.

“No, that’s not true,” I replied.  “My friend Clay nicknamed you Brick because you’re built like a brick house.”

She seemed like she wanted proof.  “I’ve been staring at your ass all night,” I told her.  “You have black underwear on.”  That convinced her I was telling the truth, and everything was fine after that.

And now, on with the quote.

Tuesday night we were at the Saucer playing trivia and two of the stars of this blog, Brick and the Nuh-Uh Girl, found themselves in the same place.

The two of them got to talking, and Brick learned that the Nuh-Uh Girl is Jewish.  So they got to talking about Hanukkah, and Brick asked, “That goes on for twelve days, right?”

Twelve Bricks a-thinking… eleven bums a-bumming… ten Brittneys texting… nine pigeons crapping… eight Scratchys scratching… oh hell I’m too drunk to come up with another seven days.  I’m going to heat up a Jimmy Dean sausage biscuit that I bought at Walgreens today, then crash.  If I feel like breakfast food in the morning I may change things up and try the Silly Goose $7 brunch buffet.

‘Tis the week of Hanukkah, good cheer we are bringing… this holiday we celebrate by dancing and singing… gather ’round together, the Brick-a we’ll do… then join in a song that our forefathers knew…

Too rdunk to walk the 30 feet to bed… the living room floor is looking like a seriously good option right now.  More posts in the morning if not ridiculously hung over.

Here’s a pic of the Nuh-Uh Girl eating.  Bicycle Bobby and I were at the bar when she came in.  “I wonder how long before she orders food,” we asked each other.  Not long later, a salmon plate came out.

Since I’m a pro wrestling fan, I figured I’d post a link to YouTube video of a classic match I’d heard about when I was a kid, but never got to see until 27 years later.

February 1983, St. Louis, MO:  NWA World Champion “Nature Boy” Ric Flair defends the title against Bruiser Brody in a best-two-of-three-falls, one hour time limit.  Considered one of the classic world title defenses of the 1980s.  Because of YouTube’s 10-minute limit on uploaded video, it’s broken into six parts.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6

The fine folks at Calhoun’s Sports Bar, in the South Main district at GE Patterson and Mulberry, e-mailed to say that they will have the Tigers vs. Southern Miss game on their TVs tonight.  It’s at 7 PM, broadcast on CSS.  They will also have all the NFL playoff games on their 10 TVs.

Still at home playing poker… played a couple of hours of Omaha Hi/Lo, now back to fixed limit Hold’em.  Down a little today, thanks to an expensive hand where I flopped a straight, but the board paired on the river to turn my opponent’s set of 10s into a full house.  At least I’m earning lots of frequent player points.  Will probably be out later tonight, although with the low predicted to be around 10, I doubt I will venture too far from home.

The SMA recently upgraded their website, so that it has details of all the things they have going on currently, whereas before it had details of the upcoming May 2009 meeting.  They also have sections about dining, Trolley Tour, and shopping, and there’s a photo gallery.  Looks great!  Don’t forget that there’s an SMA meeting Tuesday night at the Center for Southern Folklore.

If you want to network with the SMA, you can follow them on Twitter at @SMAMemphis.  You can also find them on Facebook under “South Main Association.”  When I searched for them, the South Mumbai Association came up in the results as well.  I’m sure they’re an interesting group too.

Last night:  Couple of hours at the Saucer, couple of hours at Bardog, over to my friends Shawn and Joe’s place to shoot pool.  While at Bardog, my friend Christina who is organizing the Jersey Shore Pub Crawl told me that she wants to dress me up for it – she wants to give me a fake spray-on tan and the blowout hairdo that Jerz guido douchebags have.  Can a blowout really be done on hair as long as mine?  Seems like it would take an entire tube of maximum-strength gel.  And who knows how many times I’d have to wash my hair the next morning to get all that junk out.

My friend Joe cut Saucer bartender Brittney’s hair earlier in the week, and while I agree that something needs to be done about her hair, he should have had her brush it forward so it completely covers her face.  Now that he’s cut her hair, she has his cell number, and now she’s texting him all the time.  If I had Old Lazy Ass texting me all the time I think I’d flush my iPhone down the toilet.

No plans at all for the day… guess I’ll get on PokerStars and play some more Omaha Hi/Lo.

We’ve got a Friday night coming up, but I can’t see much incentive to get out in temperatures that may drop into the single digits… hmmm… just took a look at the DowntownMemphis.com calendar for today. If you’re going to get out in this weather, my recommendation would be the opening of Local, the new gastropub in the old Sauces location. The Nuh-Uh Girl has been asking people all week, in person and on Twitter, if anyone is going, because she’s not one to pass up an opportunity for food.

Otherwise, you can look at the calendar and figure it out for yourself… if you like MMA, there’s an event tonight at the New Daisy. Grizzlies host the Utah Jazz at the FedExForum at 7.

Unless something compelling comes up, I may just stay home with the netbook and play poker… thanks to Air Traffic Mike’s recommendation, I’m starting to get into Omaha Hi/Lo. Seems like a good game, with less need for bluffing than Hold’em, and more bad players at the tables because there’s less literature out there on Omaha.

If you haven’t been for Bardog for breakfast (they open at 8 on weekdays now), check out this post on the I Love Memphis blog. It’s round 7 of the Breakfast brackets, and Bardog handily defeated CK’s. The bacon and the scrambled eggs got especially high marks, and the breakfast was also rated a good value for the money. Of course, the service at Bardog is always outstanding.

There’s a 5K taking place tomorrow between 4 and 6:30 PM, so allow for extra driving time if you’re traveling in or out of Downtown during those hours.

Hmmm I was just about to type congratulations to Alabama for their win last night, and in comes an e-mail from regular blog reader Moody asking why I haven’t bothered to say anything about the Tide, considering I blog about other SEC teams like Arkansas.  Fine then, Roll Tide.  Happy now?

Eating an antipasto salad from Blimpie as I type this… my health guru would be proud.

It’s Thursday evening and surprisingly, I’m not out at the Saucer.  With the BCS championship game on TV, I have no doubt it will be smoky, loud, and crowded full of dudes.  No thanks, I’ll pass.  Staying home tonight, playing poker online and about to watch TNA Impact.  I’ll switch over to the football game on commercials.  Roll Tide I guess, but I really don’t care.

I saw on Facebook that Earnestine & Hazel’s now has a website.  You can see it here.  I wonder why they don’t have a “menu” section of their site?

Speaking of menus… I see that South of Beale now has their winter menu on their site.  Mmmm venison… braised beef short rib peasant pie sounds good too.

Here’s a link to an interview that Judy Peiser of the Center for Southern Folklore did about Elvis Presley’s comfort food.

Mesquite Chop House is doing a Dogfish Head brewery dinner on Wednesday, January 27.  Menu to be released by Monday… I’ll try to link to it once it’s up.  I went to one of these a few years ago at the Saucer and it was really good – the brewery brought some beers rarely seen in this part of the country.  Plus, with Michael Patrick in the kitchen cooking, you know the food will be delicious.

The hottest team in the NBA, the Memphis Grizzlies, host the Dr. Martin Luther King Game and Celebration at the FedExForum on January 18, which is MLK Day.  NBA legends Oscar Robertson and Alonzo Mourning will be honored for their contribution to civil and human rights.  There will be a High School Classic, Melrose vs. Germantown, tipping off at 1 PM with doors open at 12:30.  Next will be an MLK Day Sports Legacy and Symposium with Robertson and Mourning sharing their experiences.  The game will tip off at 4:30, televised on TNT, with the awards ceremony prior to the game, recording artist Brian McKnight singing the national anthem, and a halftime ceremony honoring Dr. King, recognizing Robertson and Mourning and featuring a performance by McKnight.  I’ve been told you can get special ticket pricing if you call account executive Carlos directly at 901-205-1491.

I had a good time drinking my favorite beer Dos Equis Lager on Fire Sale last night at the Saucer, and got a bonus when the elusive and mysterious Kimmy Kim showed up.  Hung out and talked with her for several hours, and the fountain of knowledge known as Brick also came over several times.  Brick told us that she recently cooked a turkey.  “The part I hate most is cleaning the guts out of the inside of the turkey,” she said.  “That’s just nasty.  You know, some people put them back in and stuff the turkey with them.  I tried it once.  It was gross, trying to put all those chicken guts back in the turkey.”  I guess turkey guts magically turn into chicken guts somehow once they’ve been removed.

“Now all you’d need is a duck, and you’d have a turducken,” I told her.  Brick didn’t know what a “turducken” was.

All right, time for me to hit Publish and get serious about my poker game.  Time to make some money!