https://www.facebook.com/VSelbst/posts/1539524546084021
I’m writing to say that I’m officially parting ways with PokerStars and moving on from my career as a professional poker player. Poker has given me so much over the last 12 years. It has been intellectually challenging, exhilarating, fun, and extremely rewarding. It has given me the opportunity to travel to places I might never have experienced, and forge friendships with people from all over the world. Speaking of those people, those whom I’ve met through the poker world (players and industry people alike) are some of the most dynamic, creative, out-of-the-box thinkers and all around passionate people that I know.
Many people will ask why I’m leaving – there’s no one specific reason, but just a number of factors, big and small, that contributed to a general feeling I’ve had for a while that it was the right time. The most obvious reason is that Black Friday has meant that in order to do this job professionally, you either had to move out of the country or travel 90% of the time. That was really fun for a period of time in my life, but as my late 20s turned into my early 30s and my priorities changed toward building a stable home and community and starting a family, the constant travel is no longer tenable. Secondly, I don’t feel good about promoting poker as an ambassador anymore (I can’t tell amateurs they should come play online and it’s beatable for them when I don’t feel like it’s true). Lastly, whether because poker got more competitive or because we got older (or likely some combination of the two), poker recently turned into a real job, requiring hard work and discipline to succeed. I had never treated the game that way–I always kept a very light poker schedule–I showed up and played for fun and did other projects back home as my “real work.” The shift in the nature of poker and what it requires put me at a crossroads and asked the question of me whether I would rather change my relationship to the game or move on. To me, the opportunity to work hard and learn something totally new and get to keep poker in my arsenal of fun go-to hobbies feels like the right approach.
My next career I’m giving a shot is at a hedge fund. I’m doing trading research and strategy. I’ve actually already been there for almost four months now, and the environment feels a lot like poker did back in the day – a bunch of nerdy kids collaborating to try to beat our opponents at a game. It’s also really freaking difficult… there’s so much to learn and figure out in a world that’s completely new to me and every day I think I’m getting the hang of it, the next day I fail at the next challenge. It’s exhausting, exciting, and completely humbling every single day. Plus, I’m following in my mother’s footsteps (she was an options trader turned lawyer and recreational poker player), which would have upset the hell out of me ten years ago, but makes me really happy now.
I don’t know if the hedge fund thing will work out. For the year before I started my current job, I was working part time at a police misconduct plaintiffs’ law firm, and I started out liking it but in the end it didn’t really suit me (no pun intended). It’s pretty difficult to find the next thing when your first career was so much damned fun! Anyway, whatever happens with my next career, I know that I’ll never truly stop playing poker (just ask Fedor Holz what happens when you retire)! Seriously though, I will always love the game and the people in it and I’m so thankful for everyone I’ve met and everything I’ve experienced. So with that, so long, and thanks for all the fish!
If you click the Facebook link at the top, you can see about 20 photos she selected from her poker career over the years.
As always, though, there's more to the story than meets the eye.
While it would seem plausible that an intelligent woman such as Vanessa might be interested in moving on to other pursuits -- especially ones which don't require extensive travel like tournament poker does -- you always need to look beneath the pretty statement for the truth.
Vanessa Selbst had a very prolific and successful tournament career. She's 41st all-time in total value of cashes (not winnings, mind you, but cashes). She's 25th all-time in the US. She's #1 all time of females. In total, she cashed $11.8 million.
However, she was entering a LOT of big buyin events, and spent many millions in tournament entry fees. Did she spent $11.8 million? Probably not, but it's very possible she spent close to that.
Vanessa was only a tournament player, for the most part. Aside from some televised appearances, she didn't really play cash, to my knowledge. That's part of her stated reason for quitting -- she's tired of the travel.
But let's take a look at her recent results.
In 2016, she cashed just $115k.
In 2017, she cashed a shockingly low $8k.
Prior to that, she cashed $839k to $2.86 million for 6 consecutive years, from 2010-2015.
It's safe to say she lost money over the past two years, especially 2017.
Pokerstars was likely putting her in to some of the events she played, and I wouldn't be surprised if she also had backers.
However, Vanessa seems to have been mostly airballing it for the past 2 years, and I'm guessing that she decided poker is too damn hard nowadays, and she's done. Keep in mind she hasn't finished better than 9th since 2015, aside from one 5th place finish ($1372) in a small-field, $200 entry tournament to memorialize Chad Brown.
If you read between the lines in her message, where she discusses how much more difficult poker has become, you can see that she's really quitting because she has decided she can no longer beat the game -- or at least she's having enough doubts to where she wants to try her hand at something else.
Now, none of this is anything to be ashamed of. It's far more admirable to walk away when you see things starting to go south, rather than to stay around and go busto like so many other once-successful tourney pros.
However, I can't praise Vanessa because I don't like her as a human being.
Here was my own take on it on Twitter:
A number of people responded with agreement to this, with only one (Andrew Barber) raising issue with it.
Vanessa was one of those SJW liberals who always had a strong (and often obnoxiously-stated) political/social opinion, but she wouldn't allow any sort of debate.
If you dared disagree with her -- even politely -- she blocked you.
That happened to me, and it happened to lots of others I know.
I find it extremely hypocritical to be a Twitter provocateur, and then acting hypersensitive to any slightly critical responses to such provocations.
I also felt that Vanessa exploited the "angry butch lesbian" stereotype, and felt it gave her a license to often outwardly display aggressive, brusque behavior toward others in poker -- both in person and on social media.
For example, in 2008, while playing heads up at a PCA tournament with Dustin "neverwin" Woolf, she got nasty with him when he correctly called a bluff she made. When a minor war of words subsequently ensued, Vanessa threatened to beat him up at one point (lol) because he "insulted her in front of her girlfriend". Here's a 2+2 post I made about it in 2008, when Vanessa was going to appear on their Pokercast:
https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/s...3&postcount=11
Vanessa even appeared on that animated "Micros" series in a cameo, poking fun a her own bad temper.
I initially respected Vanessa because she was one of the voices against shady poker sites -- even after she blew up and became poker famous. However, as I learned more about her, and watched her poor/hypocritical behavior on social media, I thought much less of her.
As I said in my tweet, good riddance.
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Originally Posted by sonatine
