Positively Fifth Street: Confessions of a fish
 

Edit: I know this book is old but no review has been posted on it for 6 months. And it honestly made me angry.

This book should be entitled: confessions of a fish. James McManus plays one of the worst WSOPs in history and out of sheer blind luck manages to take 3rd place for 250k. BUT THAT’S NOT ALL FOLKS. Not only does he suck at poker but he a cocking condescending attitude that makes you want to reach into the book and punch him in the [censored] face. So just in case you haven’t heard it before James: You [censored] suck at poker. Here’s some hands that Jim brilliantly plays:

46 People left in the WSOP main event, 45 places pay. 45th place pays 15k, 46th place pays nothing

Jim is one of the smaller stacks with 36k.1. A player at his table named Applebee has 4.5k. Another player had 9k Blinds are around 1.5k/3k I’m guessing.

Folded to a pro in SB. Pro makes it 20k~ or so. Jim Calls in BB with 89s. He justifies it by calling it his favorite hand, and says he has never lost with it. He flops two pair. He wins. This has to be one of the worst plays anyone has ever made in WSOP history. It had to of been the biggest [censored] blunder ever made on the bubble of the WSOP main event. This [censored] call cost you at least $10,000 in EV Jim….

You [censored] moron. You would have been better off buying $10,000 in Lotto tickets. Hell, your EV would have been just about the same lighting the 10k on fire. Plus it would have been more fun. You could also write a [censored] bestseller about lighting the 10k on fire. It couldn’t be any worse then this [censored] book.

After lucksacking the bubble, Jim goes on a huge heater and comes into day 2 close to the chip lead. He plays scared weak tight poker just like his hero Tom McCoy recommends and loses 1/3rd of his stack. Every time he raises someone reraises because they know he is a scared bitch; he folds. Then the following hand comes up.

Blinds 3/6k or something. Jim opens for 25k with a (225k stack) with JJ on the button. Lag bid blind shoves for 185k total. Jim folds. fe [censored] folds.

You [censored] moron. You would have been better off sleeping in and blinding into the top 20. You sir, are what we call dead money. Luckily, the same huge ego that as blinded you from the fact that you have lived a middle of the road, mediocre and largely uninteresting life has blinded you from the fact you [censored] suck at poker. Thanks, for throwing 10k dead money into the prize pool. Further thanks for writing a [censored] book to inspiring more Joe Losers everywhere to do the same.

And if you just admitted you were a [censored] luckbox fish (or even showed some humility) I would have no problem reading your book. You are a decent writer. But your [censored] smug attitude flows off the pages. And I have no problem with cocky egomaniacs as long as they have talent(hell I am one), but you sir are completely lacking of it. You suck.

It is just so [censored] ironic that your luckbox wsop final table revived your mediocre writing career and landed you a professorship teaching “the science of poker”. You teaching a poker class? Give me a [censored] break. At least your [censored] little poker class with be stamping out hundreds of more fish just like you.

Really, I didn’t mean for this review to become an angry tirade, so I’ll try to salvage it. James McManus, thanks for giving me a look into the psyche of a fish. You have reassured me that poker games will continue to be profitable for years to come.

Re: Positively Fifth Street: Confessions of a fish
 

1) Wow. You really need to relax.

2) I enjoyed the book. I certainly wasn't reading it to get better at poker though.

Re: Positively Fifth Street: Confessions of a fish
 

Very funny post. You should find a way to send it directly to him, though. Or to call him at night just to read it with a Darth Vador voice.
Anyway, McManus is a good writer, and I guess not that bad a player, considering his results : his (admitedly) lucky 5th place in 2000 accounts for only a third of his total tournament winnings. And last WSOP he was in the money 4 times...
http://www.pokerpages.com/players/pr...im-mcmanus.htm

Still, good post.

Re: Positively Fifth Street: Confessions of a fish
 

true.

Re: Positively Fifth Street: Confessions of a fish
 

I liked the book. Yeah, definitely not a poker strategy book, but a good read. $0.02

Re: Positively Fifth Street: Confessions of a fish
 

I haven't had time to read this book, but from everything I've heard, it sounds like its probably the best non-strategy book ever written about poker.

Re: Positively Fifth Street: Confessions of a fish
 

not a huge fan of this book... liked the poker, but not the binions murder, history of poker/gambling and other or mention so much of his personal life.... didn't think his play was that fishy, from memory.

i liked big deal by holden better..... he struck me as pretty fishy though.

Re: Positively Fifth Street: Confessions of a fish
 

[ QUOTE ]
I haven't had time to read this book, but from everything I've heard, it sounds like its probably the best non-strategy book ever written about poker.

[/ QUOTE ]
You've got to be kidding. If you're interested in this stuff, have a look at the book "The Banker, the Professor and the Suicide King."

Re: Positively Fifth Street: Confessions of a fish
 

hahaha, that was an awesome review. Is it strange that I almost want to read the book now though?

Re: Positively Fifth Street: Confessions of a fish
 

I recently got the book as a present and was just skimming around to different pages.

I notice that in one of the tourney hands he had TT UTG and mucks.

I'm not exactly a good NL or tourney player but mucking TT UTG??

He mentions something like 'Bad Jim would have played that hand but disciplined Jim is smart enough to not mess with it.'


And he goes on to recite more stuff and advice from his heroos, McEvoy and Cloutier.