After Black Friday, an online poker pro on what comes next:

While I am still pretty shocked and depressed, I have to rely on the same sort of objective analysis I learned as a poker player to make the best decision about my future. Similar to a difficult poker hand, I am forced to choose between the best of a few undesirable options. I have to make adjustments to my career path and lifestyle that will affect the course of my entire life, and I have to do it soon. The short-term solution will probably not be all that desirable, and the challenge is figuring out which of my options will create the highest level of long-term prosperity.

Before online poker’s Black Friday:

Within 18 months, Cates went from routinely losing at local $5 games to winning at the highest stakes of online poker for anywhere between $10,000 and $500,000 per night. In 2010, his reported $5.5 million in online earnings was more than $1 million higher than the nearest competitor. Unlike other young poker millionaires who make the bulk of their money by winning televised tournaments — a proposition that, because of the high number of players and the unpredictability of their actions, involves roughly the same amount of luck as winning a small lottery — Cates earned his stake by grinding, the term used to describe the process of pressing a skill advantage over an extended period of time.

Pee-wee players take the field in the morning, as parents and young siblings are scattered through the stands. But as day turns to night, and the boys on the field get bigger and older, the crowd grows and the atmosphere begins to shift.

Groups of men in their 20s and 30s fill the stands and sidelines, to the point where passers-by must jostle for space as they walk along fences separating the bleachers from the field. And then something else becomes obvious: Wads of bills start switching hands; cheers and fist pumps are followed by exchanges of money; and men debate how much to put down next time. Marijuana smoke is often in the air, and adults walk around with cups of alcohol seemingly without concern.

Haralabos Voulgaris makes his living outsmarting oddsmakers. And his is a very comfortable living, indeed. One of a small handful of people who turns a large yearly profit betting solely on the NBA, Voulgaris is known to move the lines with his action, which can sometimes be as high as $80,000 a game.