Dirty Poker - How much is true???

[BuckThunder]

So I just got done reading the book Dirty Poker and it was disturbing to say the least. I mean how prevelant is cheating, and at what levels does it begin to become a problem? Is this guy full of crap? He seem spretty legit and has a lot of credentials backing his claims.

Do I need to resort to cheating to make a living playing poker full time? I do have a dream of playing full time at modest levels (30-60, 20-40) and making a modest living, but do I need to have a collusion team to be a realistic winner?

And the stuff about the WSOP cheating syndicates is just mind boggling. He makes very strong points for these guys teaming up and chip dumping. Everyone agrees that there is a very slight diffeerence in skill levels among the top pros so why the same names and winners all the time? I mean if there are 150 top tourney pros, shouldn't the distribution of titles, cashes, final table appearences, etc be very wide? But it isn't. These guys really get together and chip dump to each other? Hell - Men the master got stone cold busted for it with his crew. What chance does an honest poker schmuck like me have against a team of pros chip dumping?

I know collusion happens online and in real life - I have witnessed it myself - I can tell you a casino in Seattle where the employees collude with regulars - ex employees have told me and I have been a victim to it. But how rampant is it? The author makes it sound like you don't have a chance in the long run playing honest poker and definitely no at the top levels.

Sorry for the rambling but this book really freaked me out and I don't want to be the naive idiot losing all his chips and just going "well I must not be very good". I know I am good - well good enough, but not against cheats. Do I have a chance to make a living as an honest player?

And please respond honestly to this post. If you have to start a new account to protect yourself because you cheat and want to chime in than by all means do it!

ED, David, Mason - have you guys witnessed a lot of cheating in your days - and whats your resposnse to playing the game straight and winning? How legit is this guy?

The Buck Stops Here