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So there is now a poker coaching scandal involving former Stoxpoker.com instructor Jason Ho. Ho is supposedly one of a long line of internet kids that has claimed to have made over a Million online in 2008 and has been hiring himself out as a coach. Now it looks like that most of what he has been doing is a total scam and that there isn’t even any proof that he has won that kind of money online. Stoxpoker has since removed him from the site as a instructor and many people have been coming out of the woodwork to backup the negative claims against him.

He looks trustworthy...right?

This begs the question from me of why didn’t these guys do their homework on this guy in the first place, especially Stoxpoker. Just because a guy claims to have made a killing doesn’t mean it is so. I personally never claim to have done a thing online because I don’t play that much. When I point to the things that I have done in poker, which admittedly isn’t much, I point to the major sites where they can see documentation that I have X number of cashes etc.

When I first got started in live poker, I met a pro early on that started giving me advice. I didn’t know the guy and later in the day, I looked him up to see if there was any validity to what he was telling me. The fact that he had nearly won $1 Million in tournaments over his career clued me in that maybe I should listen to him. When he introduced me to the guy that is for all intents and purposes my poker mentor, I still looked him up.

The big difference is that the guys that have given me advice never charged me a dime for their time or their knowledge. I developed friendships with them and they took me under their wing so to speak. I am not saying that paid poker coaching isn’t a viable tool, but you need to be very careful with someone that is wanting you to pay them to teach you how to play the game. There is an old saying of “Those that can, do. Those that can’t teach.” Obviously there are exceptions to that rule, but if you are considering this path, do your homework and don’t take a person at their word.