Playing 4.5 SNGs For a living

Emmanuelmjr said:

I'm a live cash game player, I don't play professionally but I make a descent side income playing deep 1/3 (£500 sit down).


I also punt off a lot in the micros online in attempts of looking for the lowest variance game I can find to potentially play professionally along with live cash game.

My current job pays £8.97ph (or £67.25 for 7.5hrs), just a little more than minimum wage. I would have to average a profit of $88.13 per day in order to make the same as my current job. Anything above that would increase my $hr. I believe this is more than doable.


I have not played enough volume to determine the long term profitability of the games but I have played enough of them to figure out that they have the lowest variance in comparison to other games I have played. Certainly couldn't do MTTs at the same level professionally.


The games are infested with regs but the majority of them are soft and don't seen to know how to play the format (Neither do I but studying). Maybe 10 -15 really good ones. I have only played around 3000 hands in them.

Could someone with a descent enough volume in these games help me with a little more insight please.
Thank you

P.S. Sorry for my grammar, english is not my first language. (this is not an excuse for bad grammar).

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MemphisGrind said:

Do you plan on working your regular job until you prove to yourself that you can sustain a win rate even to your current job? Also when you say 4.5 SNGs are you referring to the 180 man MTTSNG that cost $4.50? if not, what are you referring too? How many players? what are the pay outs? What are the details of the tournament you are playing, what site?

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Emmanuelmjr said:

I take it you don't have a large enough sample to answer my question then?

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MemphisGrind said:

Look I don't play as much as most people online, but I make a living wage playing 1/3 and 2/5 live.

You won't tell me what tournament you are referring too... so how can I know??? If it's $4.50 sng's on the WPN or buy ins in that range that have 6-9 players. I have 60,000+ hands on those. If it's $4.50 180 mans on pokerstars (only other 4.5 sng I can find online) then I have 0 hands because I live in the US and we can't play on pokerstars, but that wouldn't make sense anyways, because you even acknowledged yourself you can't do that playing MTT's which is true and that would be considered an MTT.

Regardless of what tournament it is, you can get insight on what you are wanting to know from people that don't have hand histories on that specific tournament. Because, it honestly seems like the knowledge you are searching for has nothing to do with that particular tournament, but more along the lines of what it takes to earn the same salary you make now.

You already have 3K hands on whatever tournament you are referring too so you should now if you're beating the game. Once you get to 50k-100k hands you will have a better idea of what your effective win rate is and I get that your not there yet and want to hear from people who are there, but there are MANY other factors that go into making a living wage when trying to decide if you can make, even to or more per hour than your current position. and I have MORE than enough qualification to speak on that.

All this being said. I'm just trying to help. If you don't want it. that's perfectly fine. I'm sorry I even tried.

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Emmanuelmjr said:

Sorry, I did not mean to sound defensive.

I appreciate your help.

I meant the 4.5 SNGs, I have played about ~160 of them. About 20k hands in total but 3k hands are the most recent. Over the 20k hands all together, I have a 16% itm with 23.24 roi.
A large proportion of that I had no idea how to play the format and I was playing about 12 tables at a time. I only play 6 tables max now and I have been intensely studying the format. As well as my mental game and believe I am ready.

Everything look perfect theoretically. I actually project I make 2k more than my current wage in the first year but that's theory hence the volume request.

Over that 20k hands I had 0 edge over regs so I just played them like normal mtts.

Yes the plan is to leave my current job to specialize in them.

The focus while I adjust will be on live 1/3 deep cash. (500 sit down) I have 20+ buy ins for that but will also play 1/2 deep and normal 1/3.

So if you have tips in the 1/3 Live arena. They are welcome or play pro in general I'd really appreciate that

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MemphisGrind said:

Yes, I know for sure I can help with the 1/3 and PLO that's what I specialize in. Feel free to private message me if you'd like. I'm part of a few hangouts outside of CC where people that play at my stakes and at my local casino we all work together on strategy and video analysis. So my time isn't super open, but I'd enjoy further discussing this. and feel I can add value. Thanks for the follow up message.

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