I want to preface that the contents of this post is for informational purposes. I do not condone or approve of any harassments or witch-hunting or the attacking of anybody.
 
Richard Lewis recently did a stream talking about the terrible state of CS esports and I thought it was an important stream anyone who cares about the CS community should listen to.
Vod Link here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/830415547
I realize it is 3 hours long so I took it upon myself to create a list of interesting points from the stream so you don't have to listen to the whole thing, although I still encourage you to do so if you can.
I know this post is still long but probably easier to digest, especially in parts.
Here is a link to my raw notes if you for some reason want to read through this which includes some omitted stuff. It's in chronological order of things said in the stream and has some time stamps. https://pastebin.com/6QWTLr8T

Intro

• "The last month has convinced me, that we are going to be heading into a dark place for Counter-Strike esports in 2021."
  • "I think I've seen the scene essentially kill itself."
• "For the past 5 to 6 years, we've basically been in a holding pattern of people coming into our game wanting to run it, wanting to run all of the esports and wanting to profiteer and its been sort of a concerted effort to drive them off and push them away."
  • "We're spread way too thin."
• "If Riot don't get involved and stop the scumbags that have moved over to Valorant from getting their feet under the table, Valorant is going to have real problems."
• RL thinks too much has happened all at once for us to do anything except watch it play out, like:
  • Recent CSPPA strike against BLAST
  • ESIC failures and them not being supported enough
  • Teams cheating i.e. coaches/bugs
  • Widespread match fixing
  • The Pandemic
    • "People who try to hold bubble events are so incompetent and fuck up and people get the 'rona and its their fault."
    • "People who say Flashpoint is a bubble is full of shit and is a lie and people are now suffering for that lie."
      • "To save money they let people go home and break the bubble for a week."
      • "Not just Flashpoint peoples decision, they have a partner that handles the production." (hinting FACEIT)
      • "People are trapped in hotels essentially under house arrest because of COVID restrictions and has fucked peoples lives up."
• "It's all too much, all of this incompetence, all of this greed, maybe we ride it out."
  • RL says he has talked to the Riot devs (the ones working on Valorant) and says, "They are so cognizant of all the fuck ups and all the problems we have in Counter-Strike."
    • He continues to say that this is factored into their business plan and that we never had a competitor, but just so happens to have one coincide, when we are at our worst.

CSPPA - Counter-Strike Professional Players' Association

"Who does this union really fucking serve?"

• RL believes that the CSPPA is a mockery.
  
  • He points out the hypocrisy that they wouldn't strike for the pros who were kicked out of ESL Pro League, or for Jamppi or dream3r.
    • He also says ESL paid CSPPA and are racketeering and many other TOs have to pay them to get their "seal of approval"
      • He says they would strong-arm TOs saying "well if you don't give us the money, these guys are so we'll just have to commit to playing their event."
    • Also points out that they will strike against a competitor they are not in agreement with (Flashpoint)
    • RL: "It's what it says about every other time you haven't done it and it's about every time you don't do it now moving forward." "The issues they've chosen to ignore this year alone are embarrassing."
    • Then he points out that there was no strike for Valve qualifiers even if we have no major but Jamppi and dream3r can't play in them.
      • "and Valve have said 'Oh yeah we know actually their stories are accurate, Jamppi didn't cheat, now in a legally binding document. Yep dream3r did have his account hacked in a LAN café', but they still can't play. Where is the fucking solidarity? Gone. Doesn't exist. It's not important [because] it doesn't affect you." "That's what the union does right now, it looks after all the tier 1 people."
• He says the CSPPA doesn't represent all players all the time and has driven a divide where you have the haves and have-nots
  
  • "We have a tier of players that operate with impunity and do not help their tier 2 or tier 3 players out at all." "If you are not a tier 1 player you do not matter, they don't event ask your opinion."
  • He tells chrisJ to admit and own the fact that the reason he didn't speak up during the ESL Pro League debacle is because it didn't affect him
  • "They are looking after some players at the expense of other players. How the fuck is that a union?"
• He says the BLAST situation is a reasonable dispute and supports the players but is not the right time for a strike and have not even identified the correct enemy
  
  • He thinks players are lashing out now due to previous incidents and are upset that BLAST are working with ESIC
    • He stated that CSPPA shouldn't beefing with ESIC and they should be working in harmony
  • He says what they need to do is talk with the teams/organizations that have sold that right to BLAST
    • RL: "Your employers, the people who pay you that massive exorbitant salaries, when you don't stream and you don't do interviews and you offer no value beyond your ability to click heads and you get 25k dollars a month." "Why don't you talk to them about it? Oh right. You're happy to take away BLAST's paper, but you don't want to risk your own."
  • "I am seeing such unbelievable cowardice from the players here with the battles you choose."
  • "Where was the strike action when in the qualifiers for the world championship, there were teams and players engaged in huge conflicts of interest?" "Where was the strike action when your image rights were taken and sold to every league you've ever been in every union type organization you've ever been associated with like, WESA, to your org every time you sign a contract, to the leagues you play in."
    • "Your image rights are essentially worthless now, there's about 10 fucking separate parties that have them, and how many of them are giving you anything for it? Not much pretty much your org by the way."
    • "That's a big issue. Your image is you, your image is your brand. What are you doing about that? Nothing."
• He is also angry at SirScoots who is "popping off" at people on Twitter who all want the same thing, which is 'A unified Counter-Strike scene for everybody, that works for everybody, that has a sustained ecosystem that nourishes everybody.' "We don't have that now."
  
• He also says their rankings are a joke
  
  • "Just so happened, oh look TACO, that very important prominent member of the board, we pushed his team artificially up when they weren't even in the fucking top 20, not by a long shot."
• He also says the ineptitude of the CSPPA cost Flashpoint a monitor sponsor
  
• "Is it really a player association or is it like a fucking agency at this point"
  

ESIC - Esports Integrity Commission

"They have been put in an impossible position."

• RL says that Ian Smith, the founder of ESIC and who was done work in mainstream sports, is a good and honorable man who has dedicated his life to integrity and sports. He takes on both sides, ensuring match fixers are punished, but also doing appeals and ensuring those punishments were fair.
• "ESIC is a tiny organization" and are in need of money, "They didn't run a grift like the CSPPA did."
  • "Saying 'you want our support and you want the players to turn up you better pay us.' They don't do that."
  • "Had startup seed money from MTG and since then they've been pecking shit with the hens."
    • Ian Smith made sure that the money given by MTG (Modern Times Group, parent company of ESL, ESEA, DreamHack) was nothing more than startup money and wouldn't be in debt to them
      • Ian Smith sat down with other TO's not part of MTG and wanted to partner with them. They declined and called ESIC "ESL spies and we will never align ourselves with you"
  • "They only were just able to afford, hiring a PR guy on a full time salary to deal with the press and send out those releases you've seen, this year."
    • "They have a tiny group of staff investigating these things and they have taken on the biggest problems in our scene: the cheating, the match fixing."
• ESIC have had "unprecedented levels of cheating to deal with, because there's something wrong with our scene ever since we went online. There's something wrong with it, everyone's lost their fucking pride and self-respect and they got no passion for it anymore, so they think fuck it, what's in it for me?"
  • He calls out coaches who are talking about players rights when they would rob and steal from them.
    • Also says more coaches being banned are coming
    • He also points out flaws in community's reaction to the punishments to coaches bans: "Half of the cunts still have jobs and some of the cunts got new jobs. We didn't even shun the cheating coaches."
• ESIC have "found I think another 2 or 3 exploits like that one and they are investigating them all right now, it's going on right now."
  
  • "I know that there are going to be more names getting banned, again."
  • "So they're doing that on a skeleton crew while, investigating 3 continents worth of match fixing in MDL and semi-pro level CS." "They're doing this with half a dozen people." "They don't have any money or any help. People barely even fucking cooperate with them, they are treated like pariahs. It's ridiculous."
    • "Why are the CSPPA popping off at ESIC on my Twitter timeline, when you should be working together." "because its all about what's in it in for me." "2020, the online era of CS: 'What is in it for me?' How can I cheat, how can I get my paper, how can I bleed this scene one last time before I fuck off and play shooty shooty bang bang Riot Games babys first fps."
• RL says that in the CIS region, teams have gone to tournaments and have been eliminated multiple times by the same team. We found out they were cheating and those players who lost, have been cut from their roster, careers ended because of cheaters.
  

Stream Sniping

"They're all at it in the online era, they're all at it, they're all cheating, they're all using exploits, probably that see through smoke bug got used a bunch of times"

• RL talks about how there is no integrity from dead (the player), always denying when caught doing something
  • On the topic of 'BLAST never said we couldn't stream snipe': "Lies, BLAST never said you could do that, they had to sort of retcon it." "because what happened after that they fucking started snitching and squealing"
    • "Suddenly you had like, 10 of the top 15 teams in the world, staring into the abyss of being banned for 6-12 months in line with ESIC recommendations."
      • He says that ESIC was put in a tough situation and couldn't enforce the bans because it would have resulted in killing CS. What resulted was, BLAST, ESIC, and teams came together and gave them a warning and told them, in RL's words "don't do this again or you're gonna get got."
        • He then says the top teams brushed this off and didn't give a fuck
        • The new MiBR team playing Flashpoint, that wasn't involved in the previous incidents are doing it again (stream sniping). He gave credit to Flashpoint for the quick resolution and punishment and respect for cogu's response to the situation.
        • "ESIC came out and said, once more, 'Guys, zero tolerance from now on.'" RL then got upset at community's reaction calling ESIC "pussies" for their non enforcement and said if we want competitive CS we cant ban the top 10 teams.
• He points out how players have no integrity and will do anything for an edge as long as they won't get detected or banned or it's within a grey area.
• "All of this shit was mad avoidable, even in the pandemic era."
  • He talks about why aren't we filming them. Why aren't there representatives for leagues and tournaments making sure players aren't cheating?

Match Fixing

"How many years have we let our scene be fucking pillaged by these greedy cunts?" "We just let it happen."

• RL says that gambling and skins betting which existed in moderation was "accelerated and blown up by the Call of Duty greedy fucks."
  • "Never forget TmarTn was on the board of EnVyUs." "His website, CSGOLotto, they had a bunch of off-the-books sponsorships." "NBK promoted them. People forget."
• "Those people who had access to the skins, go to the players" "Even people like s1mple, best player in the world, even he scammed knives and skins off fucking fans."
• Owners of skin casino sites would approach pros and lend them skins to use in tournaments and possibly keep them after reaching a deal
  • Players would tip off inside info about matches and teams in exchange for skins. Info such as: roster changes, how they played in scrims
    • They would use this info to bet and subvert the odds on their sites. "That happened religiously, I can't even tell you how many times it happened."
      • "I had access to the biggest database of information, from an inside betting circle in NA, and it would take information and screenshots from other pro players, who were feeding them info in exchange for money or skins."
        • "Some of these players are still playing." "Incredibly, there are players still in the CSPPA today, complaining about the BLAST recordings, that were embroiled in this murky shit back then."
• RL also says that there were tournaments where teams contrived with each other, who should throw, who should win.
• "There's a handful of people that are trying to fucking clean it up, and you think you get something over the line and you see something like the CSPPA and it's run by corrupt fucking chuckle heads, and now you've got another corrupt body you have to fight on a fucking daily basis, it's demoralizing."
  • "It's too far gone. Our entire semi-professional scene is compromised."
• "It's rife guys, I'm not going to lie any more. It's not just China, it's not just Russia, it's here, it's NA, it's Europe, it's Australia, so much more than you think, so much more than we can prove."
  • "I get sent chat logs all the time […] and they're morons, these players, short-sighted, amateur, morons and they're doing it on WhatsApp." People would get cut from the bets because they want to make more money, then they leak the logs. He says, from the chat logs, they spread "little" bets across every site they can (400 to 1k dollars) to prevent shifting odds
• He says the scumbags who've fucked off to Valorant will do the same there if Riot doesn't do something and says Valorant "is an esports scene heading for a very early fall based on the sheer volume of scumbags that are already there."
• "That's tier 2 CS in a nutshell these days. They know they're never going to play in a major, so what's the punishment?"
  • "All of these tier 2 fucks that are fixing games now they are like the fucking mafia compared to iBuyPower" "These guys are working with organized criminals to fix entire seasons worth of games. That's what's going on in your tier 2 CS."
• "I'm literally being told that there are players fixing games at all levels of Chinese esports and motherfuckers with guns are turning up to team houses and stuff."

North America

"Everyone in NA has left we've lost a continents worth of support during this pandemic and Valve haven't said a fucking word."

• RL says the Call of Duty "goblins" that destroyed CS for years are the same people who are now trying to leave CS. "The nerve to treat a game where the fans, and the community, and the TO's were nothing but good to you." "To just kick the players out now and go and leave and say 'It just doesn't make financial sense.' Oh you'll slither back when we have a major though for them stickers won't you."
• There's a cascading effect in NA where people don't bother with CS anymore and people like Chaos suffer.
• He says NA team owners are incompetent for always wanting it easy and always wanting a guarantee on their investment without skill or nuance.
  • RL says he would be able to market a team correctly and would have a good ROI and also points out how TSM wouldn't even be bothered to tweet that their team, which was one of the best in the world, was playing at the Major.
  • He also says not all NA owners are like that, compliments and respects Jason Lake who nearly lost everything to keep Complexity going.
• He then calls out the incompetence in Infinite Esports when they acquired OpTic Gaming and bought an Indian CS team.
  • He says HECZ is not to blame here and that they couldn't tell forsaken was cheating when it was so obvious.
    • They measured his reaction time to the likes of dev1ce and s1mple
    • When an enemy showed up on his screen he won that duel something like 44% of the time
    • "was like the number 1 player in the world statistically"
    • He brought a laptop to their bootcamp and refused to use the high end PCs that hey provided
• He respects Andy Miller (NRG CEO) and HECZ but says that the attitude of not being able to easily monetize their teams is "piss weak" and there needs to be a risk.
  • He says Chaos EC shouldn't be cutting their roster and should be competent enough to be able to figure out how to make money off their team.
• He says there are still opportunities in NA and people are panicking and pulling out, and says Valorant will be the same if not worse.
  • He also says "bums" who couldn't even get out of groups in NA competitions, are making crazy money in Valorant and says it will continue to inflate.
• He also said that he heard rumors that EG (Evil Geniuses) are done.
• He also thinks that the rumors of a Valve franchised league from before was sparked up from "these lazy fabled weak NA fucking team owners basically trying to see if Valve would bite at the hook if it was dangled and they didn't"
  • Slasher says NA team owners are really in favor of franchised leagues because they want to make more money. "Most of the powerful team owners right now are on board with ditching this third party organization structure, or they are trying to play this power politics with all the TOs, and that is contributing to a lot of the problems there"
• RL says that Riot has proved they can run a franchised league (LCS) and will be profitable in 2021 which is what a lot of team owners care about and says the competition will only serve to snatch people away from CS.
• RL continues to say, "I am so sick and tired of what we have done to this scene, I am just exhausted with it." "I think we have legitimately fucked it, I really think we have. I think we're staring into almost like a CGS (Championship Gaming Series) wasteland in NA." "Counter-Strike esports is a fucking joke."

Talent

"TO's have treated CS talent like absolute human garbage for years now."

• RL says that people like Sean Gares and ddk switching over to Valorant isn't for financial reasons because they are making less over there.
• He points out that TO's can't even give talent a 3 month in advance calendar.
• Because of the pandemic TO's won't hire certain people and some people are working more hours for the same money.
• He says we as a community don't respect journalists enough which is why we don't have good journalists.
  • He also says DeKay is leaving the scene soon and that Thorin is close to leaving also
• He says he had to talk a caster down from quitting and was struggling to find reasons.
• He says that DreamHack told Vince they would hire him but not if he wants to stick with dusT and says that this is the norm in esports. "Constant leveraging of people against each other." and says this is why we don't have a talent union.
• New gen casters are getting put into shit situations and the community's reaction to them is adding fuel to the fire
• He says the reason Moses left was because of the terrible conditions
• He says that Anders had to constantly leave his family and kid because someone fucked up or broke promises and had to constantly tell his kid to their face that "daddy can't be home this weekend."
• He says that esports has always been a lie to sell you this dream, "Meanwhile there's about 2% of the cunts getting all the checks."

Valve

"Anything that Riot does, is better than Valve's inaction"

• Slasher says that the larger aspect of esports as a whole compared to other entertainment mediums and Valve's lack of inattention are the bigger problems. He continues saying that the fact that Valve let their game be ran as an esport, they need to take on the responsibilities of it.
  • Both Slasher and RL wants Valve to take control but not on the level of Riot Games, there needs to be a balance.
• In case it was ever a question: Gabe Newell has been to 0 CSGO Majors.
• RL calls Valve out saying they could have done something during the gambling era.
• He says Valve used to come to the majors, but doesn't think they do anymore.
• RL had met with Valve at the Cluj-Napoca Major and had tried to appeal iBP's indefinite punishment and had also gave Brax's life story:
  • A recent family member passed away, they had lost a lot of income, they had to live in trailer, iBuyPower did not pay any salaries, and was pressured by family to make money who didn't support his career.
  • RL said that Valve told him, "How dare you try and make us feel guilty." "We shouldn't feel bad about enforcing the only thing that matters that we need to make players afraid of: cheating and match fixing"
  • RL also tried to share other info about match fixing and nothing came of it
• RL points out that Source 2 or a new engine is not something you will want based on the experience of transitioning from CS 1.6 to CS:S. "Valve's track record with brand new engines being launched, not fucking great from what I remember."
• Slasher says "If there is anything the community should do, is pressure Valve to hire a community manager."
  • They say that we need a commissioner, a community manager (not the person who runs the Twitter who posts memes all day), then we need to have a circuit
• RL reiterates that Valve doesn't care about CS esports and says they need to change the culture at Valve to make them care about CS esports
  • Slasher says a systemic problem is making it so working on CSGO would be a bad decision for you as an employee for Valve
• He also hasn't talked to Valve in ages and have sent over bugs and cheats and doesn't get emails back anymore
• Slasher says we should be directing attention at the developer leads, pointing out Ido Magal, if he even is still the project lead
  • RL thinks that Ido and Brian are the only people that "vaguely even give a fuck about CS" and were the only people that RL recalled that actually read Reddit and paid attention from time to time
• "It is really fucking precarious. Somebody has got to step the fuck up and start giving a shit"
  • Slasher suggests org owners, with CSPPA, with ESIC, with TOs have a concerted effort against Valve
• "Riot Games are doing better things than Valve in the esports space" which is something RL didn't think he'd say.
• "People who used to be talent, working with unions, arguing with other talent, when the unions fucked them over, can't understand their perspective, TOs fucking over broadcast talent, broadcast talent wanting to leave and go and work for orgs, orgs having no money, Valve might take coaches away because all the coaches are cheating, ESIC has about 4 people in a fucking call doing the investigations, everyone thinks they're spies for ESL, ESL are just the evil fucking overlords wanting to rule the scene and will just somehow, like cockroaches outliving a nuclear bomb, and Valve are in a fucking holiday in Hawaii thinking about the next Dota character because they don't give a fuck about us."

Closing Statements

"We've peaked. If we want to sustain and exist, now is the time to figure it out. No esports lasts as long as this, we've already done 8 years. We've already broke the records. We have got to figure out a way to coexist and drive the negative forces out and we need to do it as a collective and we're not doing that."

• RL compared the Counter-Strike scene to the people on the Titanic who ran around with guns robbing people while the boat was sinking.
• "We have given up on being a respectable esports scene." "We are now a conduit to make money for those who want to just milk it, just have one last ride, one last roll of the dice. It's done." "What a fucking mess. What have we done to our fucking scene?"
• "There's just too much self-interest driving all of this." "I don't see a way we stop the dominoes." "When it's that bad, when there's that many dishonest people that ESIC have to come out and say that if we punish them all there's no one left. What does that tell you?"
• "How many opportunities have we had to clean house? How many times have we said, 'this must never happen again', and another scandal." "The entire skins betting operations was the biggest criminal conspiracy in esports ever executed and no one has been punished for it." "The people who could be driving that don't want to."
• "Right now people are fans of those organizations because the scene has value. It is worth being a fan of Astralis because they are excellent at Counter-Strike. It is worth being a fan of s1mple because he is the best player in Counter-Strike, maybe the exception of ZywOo. If the scene is devalued, if the scene loses its meaning, those things lose its meaning too, and people will leave, people will stop tuning into the games. I have seen it happen in multiple esports, this is not my first time at the rodeo. I am getting big Brood War vibes right now and I don't like it."
• "The role you play in all of this as fans, as viewers, as listeners, as consumers of esports content, it's absolutely imperative that you know who the good guys are. It's absolutely imperative that you use your voice. It's absolutely imperative that when things are bad, you know who, at least, is trying to make them good, and you have to apply your criticism to the right targets."
  • He continues saying it's no good in continuing to attack ESIC and saying how they are bad, ESIC have it hard
• He says CSPPA are on the right side of the argument on BLAST but have been on the wrong side of many arguments many times.
  • "If you are not willing to stand along side the weakest member of the union, with the least amount of influence, and the least amount of power, then it is not a union at all and you shouldn't pose as one." "You wanna serve a bunch of special interest do it, everyone else in esports fucking does, but do not pose as something you are not." "We love the players. I've been fighting for players rights for as long as I've been able to, but the CSPPA is not what we needed."
    • "They are not applying the pressure to the right people, they are not fighting the right battles, they are not helping their weaker members."
• He says what orgs have done by keeping or hiring coaches is bad. "When you give up on holding an appreciable standard, you've lost the scene" "Competition matters, rules matter, punishments matter, achievements matter, excellence matters" "If you start stripping that away, you have nothing" "You guys need to take that knowledge and apply it sensibly."
• "Valve has sold you all down the river, they sold everyone in the esports scene down the river, tournament organizers are selling their talent down the river. Don't hate on them for sounding tired after a 16 hour day. Don't hate on them because the hype for a matchup they've seen for the 20th time in the past 3 months, they can't be as excited or it sounds contrived. Support your guys, they're there for you, these are your people."
• "This community has got to start acting like one for the first fucking time. Just put the petty shit away, let's try and fix this fucking scene while we still have one to save."
• "You can't rely on Valve, you can't rely on ESL, you can't rely on the CSPPA, you can't rely on anyone." "Once again, it's gonna be the likes of us, the amateurs, the people who give a fuck, rolling up our sleeves and grafting." "I'm old and tired and I don't want to have to do it again. People need to pick up the torch and do it."
  • "Like Michal did, like Dudenhoeffer did. You see something wrong, fix it. You see somebody doing something wrong, call it out. If you think something could be better, let people know."
• "Vote with your wallets if you're not happy with the direction Valve goes in. If when we do get to the Major, they serve up another subpar, same old bullshit stickers and signatures package again, do not buy it."
  • "You're a powerful block and if you use it correctly we can fucking avert this disaster."
• "I'm not doing another year in this broken, bust-up fucking scene, where everyone is miserable, everyone is broke, everyone is tired, and everyone is trying to fucking rob everyone else, blind, while the fucking people who are meant to be protecting you, are just fucking enhancing it and lining their own pockets."
  • "I'm not doing it anymore and you shouldn't want to do it either."
• "I stand by every fucking thing I said. I mean it, because this game fucking matters to me, this scene fucking matters to me. I put my life into this, my adult life, and to see it in this state is fucking sad."

This is long, if you’re uninterested skip to the ten tips list or TLDR
A while ago I started mixing unusual options activity into my gamblinginvesting. At first I lost a shitload of money chasing dumbass whales with zero plan, but now I actually have a pretty good feel for it. I still fuck up alot, but more often I do not fuck up. This is to help those of you who want to start chasing whales, or are at a basic level and want to do it better.
I'm using some plays from this week as examples because they are fresh in my mind and I have a couple screenshots.
Tools I use barchart in tandem with Unusual Whales. For barchart, you can honestly get by using their free version, you just can't sort as well. They have a free month trial too. I also pay the 20 bucks for Unusual Whales to confirm what I scan, and they have a good stocks volume standard deviation tool. I have zero affiliation to either, just saying what I use.
There are way more technical ways to do this, but I like to use my eyes to scan sporadically throughout the day like a boomer.
Basic Concept Long story short, you're ideally chasing the options purchases of what are, presumably, deep-pocketed individuals or institutions. UOA identifies certain options contract orders that are higher than the average daily contract order. For example, if the average daily option volume on an GME weekly is 4,000, and an option order enters for 4,000 or higher, it's flagged as unusual activity since it's a multiple of that daily average volume--sometimes it shows as multiple orders if "they" push through a few smaller purchases that produce heavy volume.
MM are sneks who like to move in silence, which they can do with with stock positions via dark pools and the like. However, they can't get away with that with options activity--it all shows. That fact, young autist, is your slingshot against the institutional goliath.
Hunting the Whale So I've got my unusual options activity page open on barchart or wherever for the current day. I adjust the expiration date option so that the options I'm looking at don't expire past a couple weeks out (more on why later), then I'm ready to eye scan.
I typically start by looking for one of two things: 1) large clusters of orders that belong to one ticker or 2) sporadic orders for a ticker that consistently show up over a couple hours, but belong to non-hot, non-meme stonks that do NOT have earnings imminent. To make sure I'm looking at something potentially weird, I choose to exclude options that expire more than a couple weeks out.
1) Clusters of orders—ABNB example The way I scope it is kind of a tiered process. First, I'm looking to see if there are any clusters of orders that catch my eye on a quick scan. Second, I'm looking to see if those clusters of orders contain both calls AND puts, with some OTM activity and spreads preferred. Third, I look to see if the number of seperate call orders outweighs the number of put orders (or vice versa), and additionally I look to see if the volume of the calls drastically outweighs the volume of the puts (or vice versa).
Why? Because it helps you determine if the options order is just a hedge, or if it’s hedging against itself as it’s own position. This is super important so try to follow along-- most UOA is just institutions hedging; Mr. MM has a nice, busy life and fancy yacht and can't just exit his positions back and forth all day like a WSBer. He also has like a billion shares of his stonks, so if he dumps it when he's got paper hands it will siginficantly tank the value and cause a ripple effect. So, instead of hedging by dumping his shit, he hedges by adding OTM options against his position--next level fucking diamond hands. That would be the type of whale order from Mr. MM we don't want to follow. But, if Mr. MM buys 4,000 FB call options in a few blocks, and you see like 1,000 in FB puts go through right alongside it, the odds are that someone is betting big on FB and using the puts as a hedge, since the puts represent a smaller volume in the call/put ratio. Instead of the options being a hedge for a bigger stock position they hold, these types of option clusters indicate that the option order itself is the big, independent play, and it's hedging itself with lower volume order vs the higher volume (4,000 calls to 1,000 puts).
Then I do an easy confirmation. I check the tickers general trend the past week or so in a chart, do a news search on twitter of their ticker for news catalysts and sentiment, and google and YouTube to see if the crayola kids think it's a good nerd play.
Example: Here's the screenshot on some ABNB UOA I noticed and played this week. It went to 200% and change within a couple hours, but I had unfortunate diamond hands and sold for about half that.
ABNB UOA
So, this a softball. First, you can see that ABNB all of a sudden explodes with all these options showing up at 12:52–that's our cluster. Second, the clusters have both calls and puts in that minute timespan, with some put orders showing at the bottom of the cluster. Some of the calls are deep OTM, as far as 200c. Third, the call orders far outweigh the put orders in both amount and volume. Awwwww shit, looks like we got more than a hedge—we’re onto something.
Confirmation time: ABNB had been on a general uptrend, and I typically don't like to chase, but I combed twitter and saw their were rumors of the CEO speaking the following day, and that news had just broken of their DC booking cancellations. I looked back into the morning, and saw a few more unusual blocks, and a few more rolled in just after the cluster pictured above.
Passed the smell test. Options bought, tendies gained.
Sparse Orders: SNAP example
The same principles can apply to orders on tickers that pop up individual orders, not large clusters, which a) haven’t had much attention b) have been on a steep downtrend—this makes the order unusual, and/or c) seem to keep popping up in single orders over a few hours to a day.The same principles as above apply, but if you see these types of orders with very little time left until expiration, you can assume assume it's probably not a hedge. SNAP isn't the best example of the week because there wasn't a put order in this block. But, there was positive TA sentiment when I searched, SNAP had been on an oversold downtrend, and I don't have screenshots left of the better ones I saw and went after. Plus, importantly, IT WAS TOWARDS THE END OF THE DAY (this is huge, EOD is prime time for AH news whales)
SNAP UOA
A better example from this week though is SPCE, which had only a few orders sprinkled throughout the day, and one toward the end of the day which was DEEP, DEEP OTM expiring 1/15. *That’s a flag for us—sporadic listing throughout the day, OTM toward the end of the day. * BAM! EOD SPCE OTM calls sprinkle in, ARK invests to kick off AH, SPCE moons.
Sparse Orders Patterns: Connecting the dots on tech rebound with FB and SNAP
Seeing the SNAP orders above sharpened my eyes that day to looking for a pattern with tech on the whole, since big tech had been so royally gaped the past week. I kept seeing FB options like this pop up
https://i.imgur.com/muVGtq2.jpg
Sometimes you can put together sporadic listings and create a working theory based on a sector. Because this and similar FB orders were deep OTM and one day out, I knew there was a risk they could a hedge, but also knew that the tech sector was due for a rebound and saw SNAP posting sporadic OTM as well. So, I bought my options for each of those two another week out and closer to ATM (important, more below), to give the whale some breathing room in case was it was a hedge, even though the technicals agreed with the bounce. The whales were right, and it was an easy little overnight profit.
How I’ve Fucked Up 1: Don’t get tricked by trends
Although we like to believe institutions are ahead of the curve, often they are just trend-riding lemmings who follow what's already way, way up. They buy the top, just like WSB tardies such as yourself specialize in. So, when you see shit like this below, take a minute to think before you get excited:
NIO UOA LIKE THIS WAS NONSTOP
It was the same for all the memes: PLUG, FCEL, MARA, and RIOT all week, dominating the orders. If something is already too popular, just stay away from it. You can ride something up, but when you see massive orders on shit that's already like 400% IV, just...don't.
How I’ve Fucked Up 2: DO give the MM’s some breathing room
Even if you’re confident in a move you see that is a few days out, extend your play a week or two further out minimum, and strike it closer to ATM. If you can't do either of those things because you can't afford the premium just skip that play and check back for something new later; I promise a better opportunity will arise. You can recover from bagholding, but you cannot recover from blowing your account on an incorrect 0DTE.
Breathing room is also important because often whales will have the news but not the exact timing. Two months ago I followed a DDOG whale on a Thursday 1DTE that expired worthless the next day. The following Monday (1 trade day later) DDOG made the announcement that rocketed them like 20%--if I'd given them a week's breathing room, it would've been a 15 bagger. Fucking F.
So, to review: look for order clusters or sporadic ticker orders that a) have a mix of calls and puts with one dominating the other b) unpopular tickers that have deep OTM or close expirations c) always check chatter afterward and fundamentals and d) try to put together a narrative of things that are related that catch your eye (this Monday's EV run or this Friday's tech bounce could be next week's airline dominance or cruiseline craze--connect the dots). Initially look for options expiring soon, as they indicate the most riskiness--and therefore confidence--if the MM is not hedging. Shop with a short term eye, buy with a long term choice.
10 Things That Will Help You Not GUH:
1) Monday and Friday morning/afternoon are the most accurate whale times, according to data from Unusual Whales
2) If you don't have PDT always save some spending power for EOD shopping
3) If you don't have PDT never, ever follow a whale with a weekly. Sometimes the news the whale bets on is a 'sell the news' event, and you won’t recover from a drop especially if there is IV crush involved.
4) Always give the whale breathing room by purchasing an expiration at least a week further out
4b) Always give the whale breathing room by going closer to ATM strikes than theirs
5) Sign up for barchart monthly trial (then continue it) and unusual whales--they're each like 20 bucks and thats way less than you spend on an FD.
6) You don't need to learn TA, but you need to check technicals on the tickers you want to chase--almost every major ticker has youtubers or fintwits giving their daily or weekly TA. This way you know if it's a proper breakout happening if the whale hits, and you're not just guessing at when to take profits. Remember, whales can buy wayyyyyyy OTM and sell for massive profit at any point--they aren’t bagholding a call until it's in the money like you are. You may be 10% up waiting for the next 80% GME day while your whale has sold at their target 5% profits on the play and is chillin.
7) Leave at least 10% of your account spending power free each day. I promise, the one time you go full boat you will see the most obvious whale play at the end of the day. Then you won't be able to do shit about it and you'll hate yourself when it's a 10 bagger overnight. Trust me.
8) Make sure the ticker you're chasing isn't just ER anticipation/bets. Always check earnings dates before buying.
9) Remember whales are people, so they can be stupid, too. Don't baghold a position that is clearly fucked for some news that looks unlikely to come. They are gambling addicts just like you, except they have more money.
10) Always take profits if you ask yourself if it's time to. If it's good enough to screenshot, it's good enough to close the position.
Positions: Dumped a ton of stuff and loading up Tuesday because long weekends scare me, but saw some ineresting 2/5s I held including
WKHSc PLTRc SPYc (1/19, 1/22) LMNDp
And a couple tickers that I couldn’t post lol. also have AAPL and JD leaps
TLDR Use a service to follow whales so you can get ahead of announcements. Look for clusters of options activity that hedge themselves via call/put ratio, and do a legitimate check for TA and catalysts to confirm their moves. Never follow a whale into a weekly, but use weeklies are your best screener.
I might do a pretty consistent DD post (a couple times a week) on what I’m seeing at the end of each day if there is interest, and if it’s not a day I don’t have a ton of real work. If something quick catches my eye I usually throw it up on my twitter @yourboymilt (there’s no notification thing on here mods, just trying to be helpful— not selling anything) I’ll also probably throw some more potential Monday positions on here over the weekend once I decide to do some more research. Later.

Build your opponent a golden bridge to retreat across.
Sun Tzu, Art of War
Everything was for tomorrow, but tomorrow never came. The present was only a bridge and on this bridge they are still groaning, as the world groans, and not one idiot ever thinks of blowing up the bridge.
Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn
I was wrong! Blow the bridge! Blow the fucking bridge!
Tugg Speedman, Tropic Thunder
Hello again GME Gang! It’s been a while since I last ranted at you, but I know we’ve been in some very good hands here at WSB with all the great DD folks have posted over the past few weeks. So no need for CPT Hubbard to go for 11 again on the Thumbscroll Dial (until today, that is). I’ve enjoyed a lot of these posts very much, so thank you on behalf of myself and the attention-deficient Rocket Children for continuing to deliver that 100% Chaff-Free GME-grade Wheat at such a feverish clip.
Now, I am going to get to Hong Kong’s Lamest Outlaw and his disconcertingly vacant eyes here shortly. But first I want to take you on a journey back to Christmas Eve, in the year of our lord 2020—a heady time in all our lives. We were all so young and innocent then, weren’t we? Fresh off the run up to 22. Blissfully oblivious that we were living in the last moments where the question What is The War of 1812? was the only acceptable Jeopardy question for the answer: The Last Time the Goddamn U.S. Capitol Was Stormed. This was also before we all became irresponsibly overleveraged in Cathie Wood’s Ornamental Gourds ETF. It was a wondrous, confusing time.
But before we get too off topic, let’s all hop in my 1985 DeLorean (purchased with proceeds from my Jan 15 calls – thanks RC!), fire up the ol’ Flux Capacitor, and get that shit to 88 because something happened that evening that is Worth Pondering—particularly in light of recent events. And just as a friendly reminder: even though you’re going back in time in a DeLorean, no one here has to deviate funds away from GME shares to Save the Clock Tower and you are under no obligation to fulfill a scenario where you wind up making out with your Mom (unless your Mom is Cathie Wood like mine—in which case maybe just some quick over-the-clothes stuff).
On the Subject of How It Once ‘Twas The Night Before Christmas
So what in the holy fuck happened on the night before Christmas, Captain? Well, while all you Gentiles were sleeping soundly after lying to your children about benign home intruders and before gorging yourself on the teat of late-stage capitalism, me and the rest of the Chosen People were up late eating Chinese food and thinking about tendies (self-hating Jew Joke! Ba-zing!). But then: when out on the electric twitter machine there arose such a clatter, I sprang to my phone to see what was the matter. And what to my wondering eyes did appear, a mysterious tweet from a Rich-Ass Viking who had a lot of fucking interesting things to say about this whole GME situation that’s what.
This tweet, buried as a reply to a tweet sent by Mr. Rod Alzmann (@RodAlzmann or u/Uberkikz11), simply said: “Merry Christmas. Shhh.” But it included this screen shot:
[**Image Deleted Due to the Mods - check the link below where someone transcribed it - I'll try to add later**]
Now, this tweet to Rod, sent late at night and likely after a strong Mead or three, was very promptly deleted. But your intrepid cub reporter saw this here tweet that night with his own two eyes—seeing as I am a degenerate GME addict and devoted follower of Mr. Rod Alzmann (Hi Rod!). And I took screenshots, of course, like any responsible records custodian might. And so did the dude who wrote a somewhat-overlooked WSB post on this, which included the most pertinent text of the message if you are having trouble reading it here:
https://www.reddit.com/wallstreetbets/comments/kk0omp/christmas_miracle_gamergate_2020_gme_shorts/
Now, what are we to make of this? At the time, I thought it was very interesting. But I did not give it too much attention seeing as how the internet is overcrowded with anonymous weirdos claiming to know more than they do about all sorts of subjects (and now I feel your judging eyes…). Also, there was some very good commentary in that WSB post from some sharp folks about the screenshot author’s questionable use of the shorthand PE/IB—given that private equity and investment banks wouldn’t apparently be involved in a behind-the-scenes transaction with the short funds like what was being discussed there (don’t ask me, I just string together silly words here). But maybe you poke around his Twitter a bit and see for yourself.
Still, plausibility assessments based on preferred nomenclature aside, it seemed to me that some version of that conversation had to be taking place behind the scenes in a situation like this—given the batshit insane short interest, the funds supposedly involved, and the rapid rise in SP coinciding with RC’s share accumulation, December 21st amended 13D filing, and new status as a GME Insider and Board member (just love saying all that in a row, don’t you?).
So the Viking’s screenshot tweet, and the very likely possibility that shorts are in so deep that they’re attempting to negotiate peace with large shareholders behind the scenes, stuck in my tiny little baby brain as a pretty plausible set of scenarios. And from the look of it, it seems like some funds were at least willing to discuss offering these shorts a Golden Bridge away from Certain Fucking Destruction on the open market. And if the words on the screenshot are at all aligned with reality, these short funds have no good options.
Yet it seems like they are still playing hardball to negotiate the carat on this generous bridge offer they’re getting. Why? Maybe they’ve been getting high on their own supply for so long and they don’t know how to see this situation for what it is. Who knows? Maybe there is no Ryan Cohen and we’re all living in a simulation. But if the recent low-rent anti-GME articles and market manipulation efforts we’re seeing are any indication, these overleveraged short fuckers seem to think they’re going to be able to spin out of this hold and drive the SP back down to even smaller peanuts than it’s at now by sheer force of will (and some deployment of well-honed tricks of the trade amirite?) to emerge unscathed. Or even victorious? I dunno—it’s their delusional fantasy sequence.
But do you know what this scenario reminds me of? And this is just coming to me so please bear with me as I’m not showing this to my editor before we print (I haven’t seen this movie in ages – don’t know what made me think of this!). Fuck it, I’m just gonna start riffing here. The shorts trying to thread this needle, against all odds and logic and common sense, reminds me of that hilarious scene in Dumb and Dumber where haplessly delusional Jim Carrey thinks he has a chance with Mary Samsonite Swanson. But the scene is funny because he really doesn’t. Have any chance. At all.
Now, I know this is a 1990s movie originally released on VHS that we haven’t seen it or even seen it referenced in ages. But now that you’re thinking of it again after all this time, doesn’t it remind you of this too? I know, I get it: You’d have to have fucking peanuts for brains for it not to.
(https://twitter.com/ryancohen/status/1350877969816956934?s=20)
On the Subject of the Continued Internet Bumbling of Mr. Justin Dopierala
Now that screenshot came to mind this past week when something kind of weird happened while we were all enjoying our quick rocket ship ride. And yes, we are briefly going to talk again about Seeking Alpha’s second finest pro-GME author (always been more of a Dmitriy man myself) and recurring CPT Hubbard character, Justin Dopierala (and no, Angela, I do not want to have like 10,000 of his babies).
Last Thursday, after we were all virtually high-fiving one another and counting our future Lambos, Mr. Justin Dopierala, head of Domo Capital and longstanding uber-bull GME shareholder and author at Seeking Alpha (last seen arguing pithily with our own Rod Alzmann about the conservative nature of Rod’s holiday earnings projections. Hi again Rod!), made it known that he sold all of Domo Capital’s 500,000 shares for around $42.50—at the very top of the run up last Thursday morning.
Now, Domo Capital’s business decisions are none of my goddamn business. And there are plenty of market opportunities right now. Shit, I hear there is even a new Cathie Wood Gourd ETF coming online soon that people are really excited about and that I’m sure Justin’s clients would find intriguing. But Domo’s decision to sell seemed curious given a few things: (1) on Wednesday, when the rocket is mid-flight, he got a twitter follow from Gabe Plotkin, head of Melvin Capital, which he promptly tweeted about with a “get a load of this fuckin’ guy” vibe (oh the sweet, intoxicating arrogance of tendie victory, I too love it so); (2) he had also tweeted that day comparing GME’s rise to Apron’s short squeeze that lasted 4 days—where he also stressed to his followers that Apron had a much lower SI than GME; and (3) he then promptly deleted all of these tweets and almost everything else GME-related on Thursday after apparently introducing 500,000 shares of liquidity into the height of a stressed market up and through the Thursday reversal and down into his own personal tendie town.
Now, after seeing all this, I mouthed off a bit to Justin on the electric twitter machine because that’s kind of my thing. And if you are familiar with my prior ramblings, you know that he and I go way back. In response, Justin talked a bit of shit about your intrepid cub reporter here in a comment on Dimitry Kozin’s October 21, 2020 article about a possible sony revenue share deal or something, the comment section of which has become the preferred SA water cooler over there. (And I can’t link that because Thems The Rulez). And Justin hurt my little feelings a bit with his very sharp denial. And by all means have at it over there to check out his comment about why he sold if you give a shit. That is if Justin hasn’t deleted it yet. Free country and all.
But to summarize, on the subject of treacherous coordination with Melvin Capital, Justin said he would not could not in a boat and he would not could not with a goat. And I for one believe him. And do you know why? Because even though Justin seems like a very smart guy in some ways, he’s also a well-known internet bumbler who blurts out things to his internet friends that a person with better self-control would keep to themselves. And so I do not think he is capable of pulling that off or keeping a secret like that. Also: he said he didn’t so I am more than willing to give someone the benefit of any doubt in that area and you should too. I think we keep Hanlon’s razor firmly in mind here about never attributing to malice that which is explained by stupidity. That is unless, of course, you’re Andrew Left and you’re actually trying to convince people that you didn’t realize there was a US presidential inauguration planned for the same time you announced your Super Important TeeVee Yammerfest ‘21 about GME not being a good candidate for an imminent short squeeze no way no how not if my name isn’t Andrew Left short seller expert extraordinaire and Hong Kong’s Most Misunderstood Ethically-Minded Businessman. You can ascribe the fuck out of malice to that one.
No, even though I really have no idea, I think the most likely thing that happened there was that Gabe Plotkin, Master of the Universe, Head of Melvin Capital, and Acolyte of Perennial Most Ethical Business Man MVP candidate, Steven Cohen—got into Justin’s head when Plotkin followed him on twitter during the 57% (at one point 94%) day last Wednesday and then Justin got a bit chippy about it.
And this is the real reason I’m bringing this up.
Because I honestly care very little about the Nervous Investing Habits of the Wisconsin hedge fund voted most likely to prompt a Mr. Roboto reference. No: I think that Gabe Plotkin sent a message with that follow. Without even ever having to say it directly. And I think that after GME’s huge run and getting a little overexcited while working the twitter machine, Justin maybe had a chance to relax with a warm glass of milk that night and reflect on that message. Which I believe was: I’m watching you, motherfucker. And the only reason I’m paying any attention to some shitstain Wisconsin pseudo-fund on a day like today when I am getting my ass fucking torched is because I want you to know that if this GME shit blows up on me, I’m going to fuck your ass up. I will remember the name Domo Capital forevermore. And when you least expect me, I’ll be there. Now: your move, motherfucker.
And once I realized what might have happened there, that made me feel kinda bad for Justin if he felt that way. Definitely a puss move because fuck you Plotkin I drink your fucking milkshake, right? But bad because that’s a mean message for a business colleague to send, Gabriel. Shame on you if that's how you roll like a big New York bully and scaring our poor Justin like that. And if you just wanted to follow him to shoot the shit or swap listicles and Star Wars Prequel memes with a respected contemporary—even in the very midst of getting fucking annihilated while short GME—well Justin has a totally different account for that and he’s not allowed to access it during work hours.
On The Likelihood That The Most Heavily Shorted Stock in History Is Not Being Subject to Continued Market Manipulation When A Steve Cohen Acolyte Is Losing His Fucking Shirt
Have you heard about Steve Fucking Cohen? The guy who looks like he’s tip top of the list of the premier Hollywood casting agency’s rolodex for Saddest Dipshit Still At the Strip Club After Everyone Else Has Already Gone Home? I’m sorry, that’s mean and my mother told me to always be kind to the truly hideous looking because they’re probably still beautiful on the inside (spoiler alert: he’s not!).
Get a load of this guy:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-01-02/why-sac-capitals-steven-cohen-isnt-in-jail
https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/business/story/2020-09-02/controversial-hedge-fund-billionaire-steven-cohen-takes-on-hollywood
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/steven-a-cohen-among-the-million-dollar-donors-to-trump-inauguration-2017-04-19
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/11/steve-cohen-trump
https://nypost.com/2015/06/17/billionaire-steve-cohen-bros-out-with-guy-fieri/
Are you back? I’ve missed you. That was scary, wasn’t it? But allow me to TL/DR all that for you who decided to avoid all that unpleasantness: the dude just has all this bad luck and keeps finding himself into these really awkward situations where someone could potentially question his commitment to ethical business and life practices as well as adherence to the laws of the United States and it’s just not fair and nothing’s fair and Nice Guy Steve Cohen Is The Victim Here So Just Stop Right There Mister I See What You’re Doing. He's also bros with Guy Fieri. Cool.
But why am I talking about a guy who would so clearly pass Billy Madison’s Final Question about Business Ethics without even breaking a sweat?
Because Steve Cohen once had a young Ace Protegee that he loved very much. With the name of an Archangel, so tender and pure. And one day this young man decided he wanted to Prove Himself and Leave Steve’s Nest. And thus was born Melvin Capital, seeded financially by Steve Cohen but named after famed Crooner Melvin H. Tormé, which Gabe’s esteemed mentor Steve would play in his office, over and over, all those years ago.
Now let’s fast forward a bit because I’m boring myself with all that fucking Cohen reading (the bad Cohen—don’t you dare get anyone confused here). As I was saying: Gabe Plotkin, head of Melvin Capital, has by all accounts gotten himself into a bit of a pickle here being so deeply short GME. Lots of people have analyzed and overanalyzed it, and I’m not going to do it again here; that dead horse is well and truly beaten. But to bottom line it: we’re all just staring down what is essentially an unprecedented math problem that will, at some point, resolve itself. And if it revolves itself in favor of the Good Guys, then the Bad Guys will lose a Fuck-ton of Money. That’s your money block quote, WSJ, so fuck off and stop calling me.
Now: picture yourself as a Steve Cohen acolyte that just bought a $44M Miami Compound and who cannot stop talking about how co-owning the Charlotte Hornets is worth it just for the courtsides alone bro once basketball is a thing again and so what if Michael Jordan keeps calling him Gary it’s close enough. Are you feeling the most financially secure that you have ever felt in your young rich life right about now? Or might you be a wee bit worried that you’ve pursued an investment thesis so reckless, so irrationally and intentionally destructive of equity, that even Melvin H. Tormé himself must be rolling in his fucking grave that you would ever dare put at risk your ability to continue being Michael Jordan’s Gary?
And so here is when I again link my good buddy Jim Cramer’s Great Unveiling of the Tactics Deployed by Short Sellers hoping to change the narrative and construct a “new truth” to suppress the SP in the face of, oh, let’s just say: a very promising turnaround story in a high-growth industry by an e-Commerce Canadian Genius who does not fuck around and who knows what he’s fucking doing and aims to sell more and better video games experiences to crackhead video gamers and there’s a million things he wants to do but just you wait, just you wait.
Is this plot that hard to follow?
And I’ll also say this: I know fuck-all about monitoring order flows or how funds continue to create synthetic shares to short shit into oblivion. But I’m just stepping back and thinking of the broader narrative and tactics on this. Spit-balling here again—bear with me. Now, if you were massively short a security while paying out your ass in borrowing fees for the privilege of entering the most crowded short trade in the market and you’re now opposite a massive business turnaround story, Ryan Cohen, numerous institutions, funds, retail whales, Norwegian HNW Freemason Consortiums, and the energy behind the Finest Rocket Children Ever to Grace Planet Fucking Earth—and you’re taking it in the ass week after week here—Do you then play this straight? Do you set aside all of these illegal and deceptive short tactics Jim Cramer candidly outlines in that video even though they’re impossible to enforce and are in fact not enforced? That Jim basically says you’d be professionally negligent if you were short and didn’t do this shit because fuck it whosgonnastopyou? And now you fucked up and that steamroller is barreling down upon you and there are all these things you could theoretically do try to get yourself out of this jam if you were That Kind of Person? Do you set this all aside and, at least in Jim’s view, tie one hand behind your precious ethical back? On the most heavily shorted stock off all time where you are bleeding Real Life Big-Boy Money? Just buying and selling you know, just a job, honest living, nothing much to it, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, can't get too carried away with it.
Or is it something a little bit fucking different than that?
I don’t know. I’m not in the industry myself. And I would never accuse anyone of doing anything so clearly contrary to the values upon which their professional career as Master of the Universe was built. So Gabe: chill. Don’t follow me or something on twitter man, since for all I know that’s Plotkinese for I Hope You Don’t Mind Sleeping With This Severed Horse Head in Your Bed Motherfucker. It’s just money, dude. You seem pretty well taken care of. But man would I be sweating if I were short right now staring down the barrel of your new neighbor Ryan Cohen’s whims and patience and polite Canadian manners and ambiguous emojis that we all lose our shit for. I mean, fuck man: are you ok? Don’t forget to exercise and eat well during all this. Maybe switch to green tea or something. And remember: you’ll always—always—be Michael Jordan’s Gary.
But here is where we return to our good friend Andrew Left from Citron Research.
Do you remember the excitement you felt this past weekend? I’ve never seen WSB so jacked. People were coming out hot on Tuesday—an uptick day! The new phone book’s here! The new phone book's here! What luck to be free of Gary’s tomfoolery for one fine day. And then GME spiked right away—reaching a high of over $45 that morning.
But then something happened. We all know what it was. But here is where any SEC lookie-loos need to close those Pornhub links and pay closer attention. Because in the moments before the Citron tweet that morning about Andy’s upcoming BuzzFeed Listicle call on Why GME is Scary Investment GRRRR, total short shares available dropped from 1.2M to 0. And a $300K put bet was placed on a weekly with a strike price well over 10% out of the money at the very moment that GME’s price was accelerating rapidly. (H/t u/FatAspirations). That’s some WSB-level shit right there.
And yet they pull it off! GME immediately shoots down nearly 30% intraday, and eventually climbing abck up above 10%, making us all feel a little weird and like ungrateful millennial brats for feeling so shitty about a 10% day. But we all know what fucking happened, now don’t we?
So what can we say about ol’ Andy? Now, many of you know Andy as the dumbshit who shorted TSLA until he was ground into little bits of dumb dumb dust and made to look ever so foolish over and over again until he finally cried drunk uncle and flipped to being long TSLA and now he’s cool to you or whatever. Or you might know him as the guy who puts out really shoddy research that often, by pure happenstance, drives a new narrative to control the orderflow and SP on a WSB-beloved security like PLTR? You know the guy I’m talking about. Once in hot pursuit by Hong Kong fuzz, an International Man of Obviousness with a face that says: why yes, I will have another vodka tonic thankyouverymuch. That’s him.
Well, just like future call-back candidate for the role of Frightened Inmate #2, Mr. Steve Cohen, Andy is also but a Caveman—frightened and confused by your modern concepts of “ethics” and “rules.” No! No!—He’s a straight shooter! Devoted to rooting out obvious frauds, like Lukin Coffee and TSLA (Do not fuck with Elon or my Hot Mom’s ETF, Andy). And like the aspirations of Antoine Bugle Boy when he entered the blue jeans market, Andy saw an overcrowded short trade here based on an overly simplistic and obsolete short thesis about GME and said: “Me Too!” And as this thing is ripping to the stratosphere, Andy starts ringing his dumb dumb twitter bell and saying hear ye, hear ye—Inauguration Day and time it shall be for all my Big Brain thoughts about GME!
Nothing weird about that. No sir.
So Andy Citron or whatever the fuck his name is will be putting out some dumbshit video or something today in what seems to be a pretty clear attempt to scare my poor Rocket Children and get those pesky computers to high frequency this shit to drive the SP down to more acceptable loss levels (cause let’s be honest: they’re still taking a fucking bath here) for Mel Tormé’s namesake hedgefund and all the other cretins that are dug into short position here. And they’re gonna try to scare ya’ with the color red! And they know that no one here likes the color red.
But do see what’s going on here and who we’re dealing with. This really ain’t rocket science, Rocket Children. The dude actually tried to claim he forgot about the Inauguration. In 2021. He has not been in a coma, to the best of my knowledge. But you do look a little bleary eyed, Andy. Must have been all that staying up super late working on those last few bullet points to fill out the powerpoint on that GME listicle of yours, eh sport?
Conclusion: On the Subject of Patience and The Arc of The Universe Bending Toward Ryan Fucking Cohen
In my youth there was a period of time where I went out on boats that would drop crates into the waters of the Arctic. Bundled inside them were raw pieces of meat. In the coming days the boats would head back out to the frigid seas, hook the floats bobbing upon the waters, and pull the crates up. Packed inside would be many crabs. They were so delicious & made a good price at market. The difference between the crate that was empty and the create full of bounty was a mystery even the great physicist Erwin Schrödinger pondered at much length.
But the hearty fishermen of my youth already knew the answer long ago. Why did the trap fill up? Time. In time, all traps fill. In time, all things pondered shall be revealed.
--The Fucking Viking, That’s Who
Now look, you all know I have a soft spot for Ryan Cohen. Hell, we all do. He’s a good dude. And the man has played this flawlessly so far. He really has. The fact that we are all sitting here with Ryan Cohen having successfully negotiated three seats on the Board—a bloodless coup as my man Rod Alzmann says—here in January? It’s amazing. His vision for GME is dialed-the-fuck in and extremely exciting. This misunderstood business is on the threshold of an exciting turnaround with Ryan Cohen at the helm. And though I was very much looking forward to the potential repercussions of a vote being called at the annual meeting and what that might mean for the short-term share price, this result is infinitely better. Whatever their motivations, that Board and George Sherman saw the writing on the wall here and accepted the Golden Bridge that Ryan offered them. And Ryan Cohen has done everything he’s set out to do here. And he’s clearly been having fun while doing it. Read up on the guy at some point if you haven’t–there’s lots of good DD out there on him, obviously. And while you’re reading and thinking about Ryan Cohen, think also about guys like Steve Cohen (no fucking relation) and Gabe Plotkin and Andy Left and how lucky we are that we get to roll with RC against that motley crew of fuckwads.
And do you know what? I’m guessing that RC, and maybe even the funds being discussed in that screenshot, have been very patient with Mr. Plotkin et al in recent weeks. You don’t go around bankrupting hedge funds willy nilly, you know--bad form and all that old chap. People tend to remember that. And guys like Steve Cohen and Gabe Plotkin seem like they play for keeps. So now you try to build them a Golden Bridge to cross—maybe not their preferred route of travel, but could be worse and all that, right guys? But for whatever reason it seems like the natural instinct here on the short side is fight over flight. And these short FUD tactics are getting increasingly ridiculous to help slow down the inevitable march toward the detonator right next to that bridge. So relax everyone! And let’s not fool ourselves: All those Masters of the Universes are well aware of the math problem they’re all facing here and they must have a vague grasp of the odds that this goes off in one direction over the other. And what that could mean for the size of their money pits and how many sports teams they can buy this year. Shit, I assume Steve Cohen is counseling his young acolyte about how many sads he himself felt deep down in his man heart on that fateful day in 2008 when he lost $250M on a short when Volkswagon squeezed to infinity—a sadness that he will continue to draw on when his agent finally finds him a role that calls for it.
But my point is: the longs here can afford to be patient and let this play out. When this thing moves, the Viking’s Schrödinger crabs will only be in one pot. And I’m guessing that pot is the one being held by the guy who is actually in total control here: Ryan Goddamn Cohen.
So enjoy the show today. If you’re anything like me, you’re feeling relaxed after gorging yourself on lucky space peanuts all week.(https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/news/10022/lucky-peanuts/)
And though these silly wabbits with their cumbersome FUD efforts can get a bit tiresome, I’m still very much enjoying this GME show at this point and almost do not want it to end—what with all these Sorkin-esque twists and turns and my Cohen Tweet Decorder Ring getting all this sweet action.
But just remember who Ryan Cohen is, what he cares about, and what, so far, he has told us he intends to do here. And then you might realize, as I have, that Ryan Cohen has had the Gray’s Sports Almanac here all along. This story has already been written. He’s already won. And Melvin Capital’s Schrödinger-ass crabs are dead as fuck. The only question now is: what causes that Golden Bridge to blow? I, for one, am content to wait on RC while counting my good fortune that I can continue to accumulate until whatever happens here happens. So pass the rocket peanuts.
It’s just money after all. Right Gabe?
TL/DR: Psst: a Mysterious Viking once told me about behind-the-scenes Golden Bridge negotiations that are likely taking place that give shorts no chance but the shorts seem to think they’re saying there’s a chance but there really is no chance; Gabe Plotkin, Steve Cohen and Andy Left are misunderstood Straight Shooters who probably answer typical interview questions about their own perceived weaknesses by saying “Sometimes I just care too much about doing the right thing”; and Ryan Cohen is the Goddamn Man so we can all relax and not worry so much about all this dumb short FUD bullshit, ok? OK. 🚀🚀🚀
**If you construe any of the above as investment advice without doing your own DD or at least Googling Ryan Cohen then you are a fucking idiot and may God have mercy on your soul. You too, Andy.

Humans are Weird – Sparks

Original Post: http://www.authorbettyadams.com/bettys-blog/humans-are-weird-sparks
“Human Friend Mercy?” Rotates With Decision asked as she lifted her leading end out of the temporary tank the human in question had provided for her.
“What is it Rotates?” Human Friend Mercy replied without turning her face away from the reflective surface that was mounted on one wall.
“Wouldn’t your meditative devotion be more effective if you had another mirror angled from your … well it isn’t your lagging end exactly. I think you call it your supine surface? Or perhaps a pair, or a trine of mirrors would be more effective. But perhaps humans cannot interoperate an image scattered that far. Rolls a little your binocular vision should help with that…”
Human Friend Mercy’s hands had slowed in their soothing repetitive motions and the light show dimmed allowing the perhifreial sparks to dance more clearly. Her head slowly turned her face towards the Undulate in the tank revealing that she had sacrificed the bilateral symmetry of her face to get a proper visual sounding of the scene. It was, Rotates With Decision had been led to believe, a gesture of lack of understanding and mental effort to understand.
“Say way lil’ gal?” Human Friend Mercy drawled out.
“I will ask again once you have completed what you are doing,” Rotates With Decision said. “Do you mind if I deliberately observe with all of my appendages?
“Watch as much as you want,” the human replied with a graceful, almost Undulate dip of her shoulders.
A shrug, Rotates With Decision believed it was called, one of the more normal movements the massive bipeds produced from their numerous joints. Rotates With Decision gave a hum of gratitude and spread her appendages to observe the brilliant light show. She wondered idly why none of her companions with more human experience had ever mentioned this marvel.
The brush, a mass printed device that resembled the algae agitators she used back home in the growth pools, was gripped firmly in the humans dominant hand while she used her non-dominant hand to direct the fall of the thread thin fibers that grew out of her caudal end. The human had begun the meditative devotion by freeing the thousands of strands from the cloth band that restrained them and now the band clung snugly one of the larger joints on her arm. Then she had started using the teeth of the brush at the lagging end of the fibers to tease out the tangles exactly as one had to loosen the more fibrous algae back home.
The moment the printed material of the brush had touched the fibers a shower of brilliant sparks had erupted from the contact. As Human Friend Mercy had worked the brush up the length of her fibers the showers of sparks had grown in number and density until the flowing mass of fibers was a veritable cascade of dancing light. When all of the tangles were worked out of the fibers the human had worked up a steady rhythm that filled the room with the sparking light.
The beauty, the light, the rhythm, the softly chanted tune that Rotates With Decision couldn’t quite make out, everything about the wondrous scene before her spoke of a religious devotion. Even if Rotates With Decision hadn’t had the chance to see the ancient human religious art on display she would have recognized the holiness of the moment. As it was the tradition of putting a circle representing light around the head of humans in religious devotion suddenly made so much more sense.
Rotates With Decision suddenly realized that that chanting was actually the decamarked counting form the humans used. Human Friend Mercy was counting up by ones and was somewhere in the mid sixties. Rotates With Decision wondered which human prayers had that many beats. She had been somewhat under the impression that nightly prayers were usually shorter. She wondered suddenly if it had been rude to interrupt the prayer. Humans were oddly solitary creatures sometimes. True, Human Friend Mercy hadn’t appeared to be offended, but the human was probably too agreeable to express such a thing even if it was inconvenient to her.
The pace of the prayer was picking up in anticipation of the end count and Human Friend Mercy was briskly dragging the brush through the full length of the strands, catching the mass in her non-dominant hand and guiding the mass through the tines of the brush. The resulting light show almost obscured the dancing fibers in its glow. Human Friend Mercy reached a count of one-hundred and finished with a powerful stroke that made the room glow. Rather than bask in the accumulated light she parted the sparkling strands down the center of her caudal end and began quickly braiding the two halves into the side braids she had explained were the most comfortable for sleep. Showers of sparks fell from her fingers and lit on her shoulders before extinguishing in the ambient vapor. The human finished the task and dropped the brush on the shelf before giving a little hop and landing on her bunk.
“What was that question you asked Rotates?” Human Friend Mercy asked as she shifted in the usual human search for a comfortable position.
“Primarily I wanted to know why you have not arranged for a view of your, dorsal I believe, surface during the prayer time,” Rotates With Decision said.
Human Friend Mercy stopped shifting with her pillow clutched in her hands and stared at Rotates With Decision with the fluctuating gaze that indicated deep thought.
“What prayer now?” Human Friend Mercy asked with confusion clear in her tones.
“The counting prayer you just preformed at the mirror,” Rotates With Decision said, gesturing towards the reflective surface.
“That wasn’t a religious thing,” Human Friend Mercy said slowly. “It was a hygiene thing. It distributes the oils properly though my hair so the oils produced at the base of the strands can reach all the way to the tips. It also prevents insects from nesting in the braids and dislodges any dirt. I count to make sure I give sufficient time to the task.”
Rotates With Decision positively wriggled in surprise.
“Such astounding beauty produced from a merely hygienic process!” she exclaimed. “How delightful, but surely even so you would want to view the full effect of the light flow?”
“The what now?” Human Friend Mercy said, but was interrupted by a yawn.
“I can ask you about it in the morning,” Rotates With Decision said as she slipped back into the tank.
“Good idea,” Human Friend Mercy said and she shifted position to begin sleep.
However after a moment her arm lifted from her side and dropped across her caudal end in a pose that usually indicated thoughtfulness rather than restfulness.
“Yo’ Rotates,” Human Friend Mercy called out with another yawn. “Think I got it. My and my sister would sometimes brush our hair in the dark to see the sparks it made. I bet you can see ‘em even without it being pitch black.”
The human voice had wandered off into sleep and her arm dropped to her side so Rotates With Decision did not bother perusing the matter. There was always tomorrow. She stared at the lingering glow in the braids that fell over the human’s shoulders in fascination. Was it possible a species could produce such beauty without realizing it?

THE SECOND EDITION OF THE PAPERBACK AND THE KINDLE VERSION ARE NOW UP ON AMAZON!

QUICK NOTE: RE: everyone who asked. The book is avaliable in Amazon regions US-UK-DE-FR-ES-IT-NL-JP-BR-CA-MX-AU-IN. HOWEVER The above link only takes you to the US Amazon site. The one indicated by the .com ending. If it says "not avaliable in your country" that just means that you need to click over to your Amazon region.
Of course if you want a signed first edition you can email me at the email on my website and I can ship you a signed Author copy of the first edition for the same price as the crowdfunding campaign $35 domestic and $50 overseas. I'll do that until I run out of extra books.

My VXX 101 was shared here so I figured I’d be helpful and post my other 101 and 102s from WSB*
some image links and stuff didn’t convert. I’ll clean it up later
Original link: https://www.reddit.com/wallstreetbets/comments/ky9m34/unusual_options_activity_101_whale_watching_tips/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
——————-
This is long, if you’re uninterested skip to the ten tips list or TLDR A while ago I started mixing unusual options activity into my gamblinginvesting. At first I lost a shitload of money chasing dumbass whales with zero plan, but now I actually have a pretty good feel for it. I still fuck up alot, but more often I do not fuck up. This is to help those of you who want to start chasing whales, or are at a basic level and want to do it better.
I'm using some plays from this week as examples because they are fresh in my mind and I have a couple screenshots.
Tools I use barchart in tandem with Unusual Whales. For barchart, you can honestly get by using their free version, you just can't sort as well. They have a free month trial too. I also pay the 20 bucks for Unusual Whales to confirm what I scan, and they have a good stocks volume standard deviation tool. I have zero affiliation to either, just saying what I use.
There are way more technical ways to do this, but I like to use my eyes to scan sporadically throughout the day like a boomer.
*Basic Concept *
Long story short, you're ideally chasing the options purchases of what are, presumably, deep-pocketed individuals or institutions. UOA identifies certain options contract orders that are higher than the average daily contract order. For example, if the average daily option volume on an GME weekly is 4,000, and an option order enters for 4,000 or higher, it's flagged as unusual activity since it's a multiple of that daily average volume--sometimes it shows as multiple orders if "they" push through a few smaller purchases that produce heavy volume. MM are sneks who like to move in silence, which they can do with with stock positions via dark pools and the like. However, they can't get away with that with options activity--it all shows. That fact, young autist, is your slingshot against the institutional goliath.
*Hunting the Whale * So I've got my unusual options activity page open on barchart or wherever for the current day. I adjust the expiration date option so that the options I'm looking at don't expire past a couple weeks out (more on why later), then I'm ready to eye scan.
I typically start by looking for one of two things: 1) large clusters of orders that belong to one ticker or 2) sporadic orders for a ticker that consistently show up over a couple hours, but belong to non-hot, non-meme stonks that do NOT have earnings imminent. To make sure I'm looking at something potentially weird, I choose to exclude options that expire more than a couple weeks out.
*1) Clusters of orders—ABNB example *
The way I scope it is kind of a tiered process. First, I'm looking to see if there are any clusters of orders that catch my eye on a quick scan. Second, I'm looking to see if those clusters of orders contain both calls AND puts, with some OTM activity and spreads preferred. Third, I look to see if the number of seperate call orders outweighs the number of put orders (or vice versa), and additionally I look to see if the volume of the calls drastically outweighs the volume of the puts (or vice versa).
Why? Because it helps you determine if the options order is just a hedge, or if it’s hedging against itself as it’s own position. This is super important so try to follow along-- most UOA is just institutions hedging; Mr. MM has a nice, busy life and fancy yacht and can't just exit his positions back and forth all day like a WSBer. He also has like a billion shares of his stonks, so if he dumps it when he's got paper hands it will siginficantly tank the value and cause a ripple effect. So, instead of hedging by dumping his shit, he hedges by adding OTM options against his position--next level fucking diamond hands. That would be the type of whale order from Mr. MM we don't want to follow. But, if Mr. MM buys 4,000 FB call options in a few blocks, and you see like 1,000 in FB puts go through right alongside it, the odds are that someone is betting big on FB and using the puts as a hedge, since the puts represent a smaller volume in the call/put ratio. Instead of the options being a hedge for a bigger stock position they hold, these types of option clusters indicate that the option order itself is the big, independent play, and it's hedging itself with lower volume order vs the higher volume (4,000 calls to 1,000 puts).
Then I do an easy confirmation. I check the tickers general trend the past week or so in a chart, do a news search on twitter of their ticker for news catalysts and sentiment, and google and YouTube to see if the crayola kids think it's a good nerd play.
Example: Here's the screenshot on some ABNB UOA I noticed and played this week.
It went to 200% and change within a couple hours, but I had unfortunate diamond hands and sold for about half that. ABNB UOA
So, this a softball. First, you can see that ABNB all of a sudden explodes with all these options showing up at 12:52–that's our cluster. Second, the clusters have both calls and puts in that minute timespan, with some put orders showing at the bottom of the cluster. Some of the calls are deep OTM, as far as 200c. Third, the call orders far outweigh the put orders in both amount and volume. Awwwww shit, looks like we got more than a hedge—we’re onto something.
Confirmation time: ABNB had been on a general uptrend, and I typically don't like to chase, but I combed twitter and saw their were rumors of the CEO speaking the following day, and that news had just broken of their DC booking cancellations. I looked back into the morning, and saw a few more unusual blocks, and a few more rolled in just after the cluster pictured above. Passed the smell test. Options bought, tendies gained.
Sparse Orders: SNAP example
The same principles can apply to orders on tickers that pop up individual orders, not large clusters, which a) haven’t had much attention b) have been on a steep downtrend—this makes the order unusual, and/or c) seem to keep popping up in single orders over a few hours to a day.The same principles as above apply, but if you see these types of orders with very little time left until expiration, you can assume assume it's probably not a hedge. SNAP isn't the best example of the week because there wasn't a put order in this block. But, there was positive TA sentiment when I searched, SNAP had been on an oversold downtrend, and I don't have screenshots left of the better ones I saw and went after. Plus, importantly, IT WAS TOWARDS THE END OF THE DAY (this is huge, EOD is prime time for AH news whales) SNAP UOA
A better example from this week though is SPCE, which had only a few orders sprinkled throughout the day, and one toward the end of the day which was DEEP, DEEP OTM expiring 1/15. *That’s a flag for us—sporadic listing throughout the day, OTM toward the end of the day. * BAM! EOD SPCE OTM calls sprinkle in, ARK invests to kick off AH, SPCE moons.
Sparse Orders Patterns: Connecting the dots on tech rebound with FB and SNAP
Seeing the SNAP orders above sharpened my eyes that day to looking for a pattern with tech on the whole, since big tech had been so royally gaped the past week. I kept seeing FB options like this pop up https://i.imgur.com/muVGtq2.jpg
Sometimes you can put together sporadic listings and create a working theory based on a sector. Because this and similar FB orders were deep OTM and one day out, I knew there was a risk they could a hedge, but also knew that the tech sector was due for a rebound and saw SNAP posting sporadic OTM as well. So, I bought my options for each of those two another week out and closer to ATM (important, more below), to give the whale some breathing room in case was it was a hedge, even though the technicals agreed with the bounce. The whales were right, and it was an easy little overnight profit.
How I’ve Fucked Up 1: Don’t get tricked by trends
Although we like to believe institutions are ahead of the curve, often they are just trend-riding lemmings who follow what's already way, way up. They buy the top, just like WSB tardies such as yourself specialize in. So, when you see shit like this below, take a minute to think before you get excited: NIO UOA LIKE THIS WAS NONSTOP
It was the same for all the memes: PLUG, FCEL, MARA, and RIOT all week, dominating the orders. If something is already too popular, just stay away from it. You can ride something up, but when you see massive orders on shit that's already like 400% IV, just...don't.
How I’ve Fucked Up 2:*DO give the MM’s some breathing room
Even if you’re confident in a move you see that is a few days out, extend your play a week or two further out minimum, and strike it closer to ATM. If you can't do either of those things because you can't afford the premium just skip that play and check back for something new later; I promise a better opportunity will arise. You can recover from bagholding, but you cannot recover from blowing your account on an incorrect 0DTE.
Breathing room is also important because often whales will have the news but not the exact timing. Two months ago I followed a DDOG whale on a Thursday 1DTE that expired worthless the next day. The following Monday (1 trade day later) DDOG made the announcement that rocketed them like 20%--if I'd given them a week's breathing room, it would've been a 15 bagger. Fucking F.
So, to review: look for order clusters or sporadic ticker orders that a) have a mix of calls and puts with one dominating the other b) unpopular tickers that have deep OTM or close expirations c) always check chatter afterward and fundamentals and d) try to put together a narrative of things that are related that catch your eye (this Monday's EV run or this Friday's tech bounce could be next week's airline dominance or cruiseline craze--connect the dots). Initially look for options expiring soon, as they indicate the most riskiness--and therefore confidence--if the MM is not hedging. Shop with a short term eye, buy with a long term choice.
10 Things That Will Help You Not GUH:
1) Monday and Friday morning/afternoon are the most accurate whale times, according to data from Unusual Whales 2) If you don't have PDT always save some spending power for EOD shopping 3) If you don't have PDT never, ever follow a whale with a weekly. Sometimes the news the whale bets on is a 'sell the news' event, and you won’t recover from a drop especially if there is IV crush involved. 4) Always give the whale breathing room by purchasing an expiration at least a week further out 4b) Always give the whale breathing room by going closer to ATM strikes than theirs 5) Sign up for barchart monthly trial (then continue it) and unusual whales--they're each like 20 bucks and thats way less than you spend on an FD. 6) You don't need to learn TA, but you need to check technicals on the tickers you want to chase--almost every major ticker has youtubers or fintwits giving their daily or weekly TA. This way you know if it's a proper breakout happening if the whale hits, and you're not just guessing at when to take profits. Remember, whales can buy wayyyyyyy OTM and sell for massive profit at any point--they aren’t bagholding a call until it's in the money like you are. You may be 10% up waiting for the next 80% GME day while your whale has sold at their target 5% profits on the play and is chillin. 7) Leave at least 10% of your account spending power free each day. I promise, the one time you go full boat you will see the most obvious whale play at the end of the day. Then you won't be able to do shit about it and you'll hate yourself when it's a 10 bagger overnight. Trust me. 8) Make sure the ticker you're chasing isn't just ER anticipation/bets. Always check earnings dates before buying. 9) Remember whales are people, so they can be stupid, too. Don't baghold a position that is clearly fucked for some news that looks unlikely to come. They are gambling addicts just like you, except they have more money. 10) Always take profits if you ask yourself if it's time to. If it's good enough to screenshot, it's good enough to close the position. Positions: Dumped a ton of stuff and loading up Tuesday because long weekends scare me, but saw some ineresting 2/5s I held including WKHSc PLTRc SPYc (1/19, 1/22) LMNDp And a couple tickers that I couldn’t post lol. also have AAPL and JD leaps
TLDR Use a service to follow whales so you can get ahead of announcements. Look for clusters of options activity that hedge themselves via call/put ratio, and do a legitimate check for TA and catalysts to confirm their moves. Never follow a whale into a weekly, but use weeklies are your best screener.
I might do a pretty consistent DD post (a couple times a week) on what I’m seeing at the end of each day if there is interest, and if it’s not a day I don’t have a ton of real work. If something quick catches my eye I usually throw it up on my twitter @yourboymilt (there’s no notification thing on here mods, just trying to be helpful— not selling anything) I’ll also probably throw some more potential Monday positions on here over the weekend once I decide to do some more research. Later.

“Daniel, can you run through the case for me one more time please?”
I looked across the desk at my new assistant. He was exhausted, I could tell. His brain was frazzled from repeating every tiny detail so many times.
He took a sip of water and prepared to do it again, just once more.
“The target is Liam, he was twenty three years old at the time of his disappearance six years ago. He lived with his parents, Brenda and Steve and was a single father to Macy, four years old at the time. He was a responsible young guy and an outdoorsy person who often took his daughter to the local woods.”
“Good.” I replied. “What happened to him on March 6th?”
“He’d spent a day in the woods whilst Macy was having a rare overnight visit with her mother. He didn’t get to hike alone often and took whatever opportunities he could.
“He returned to the home that evening, agitated. His parents said he wouldn’t calm down and kept repeating that something was following him. His behaviour was erratic and paranoid.”
Daniel took another sip of his water and rifled through the mounds of paperwork on the desk to jog his memory of the timeline before continuing. He was doing well, but I enjoyed watching him sweat.
“His parents managed to calm him enough to get him to sit and eat dinner. There was no one surrounding the house or in their garden, despite searching.
“Still unsettled, he told Brenda at 9pm that he was going for a walk to clear his head. She thought it may help and didn’t stop him. When Liam didn’t return by 11pm Brenda began to panic.
“She tried to call her son but his phone was switched off, which was very unusual. She didn’t know what to do. Her and Steve drove around the local area but couldn’t find Liam anywhere. He didn’t return home and was reported missing the next morning.”
“Has there been any evidence since?”
“Nothing. Not a single sighting either, which is odd for a case like this. But there are numerous theories, most relating to a photograph that Liam took and posted online only hours before he returned to the home.”
I picked up a photograph that stuck out amongst the local news clippings and documents I’d managed to acquire from police, rescue forces and PI’s.
It was one I’d spent hours looking at.
It showed Liam, a handsome young guy beaming at the camera, trees around him and his face reflecting the happiness he felt within nature. I’d started to feel like I knew the missing boys face better than even his mother did, having studied it so intensely.
It would’ve been fairly innocuous, if it weren’t for the shadowed figure just visible in the background.
Humanoid in shape, the figure appeared to be standing behind a tree, watching Liam as he walked through the forest. It’s features were clear; eyes, a nose and a smile, all engulfed by darkness. Every time I looked at it I felt a chill of fear and excitement.
The case had gained very little traction; police had mostly written Liam off as a runaway. They kept up a cursory investigation but explained away his erratic behaviour with drugs, despite everyone close to him insisting that it was completely out of character.
Most professionals involved had disregarded the photograph as an optical illusion.
Not all were so eager to declare the mystery solved. Difficult to find Internet forums discussed the photograph regularly, coming up with a colourful array of theories.
Did Liam run away and stage the picture? Was he kidnapped by some sort of Bigfoot? Did he stumble on something he shouldn’t have in the woods and paid for it on his later walk?
Some even speculated that his ex, Janie, killed him to gain custody of their daughter. This was a theory that was fiercely denied by both Janie and Liam’s family. The couple maintained a good co-parenting relationship and the arrangements for Macy were agreed.
His mother contacted me when police officially closed the case after seven years of following useless leads and tips from conspiracy theorists. Macy had started to ask about her dad, to question what happened. Brenda couldn’t bear the not knowing.
“I got your number from a friend at a support group I attend. She said you’re the best.”
That’s all Brenda said to me when she called.
She couldn’t pay. Usually my services are very expensive but Liam’s case intrigued me, so I took her on pro Bono.
It was Daniels first case, and my first working alongside someone else. It was unusual, to have someone in the office who wasn’t crying, or lamenting me for not being able to resurrect the dead.
It was going to take a while to adjust but after the incident in the bar with Olive I was grateful not to be alone. I hoped I’d made the right decision, Daniel’s online credentials were shining as he reeled off the case in perfect detail.
If it worked out I would have so much more time to work out who was trying to stop me getting to the truth.
I thought of Valerie. The hour that I waited for her in the park to turn up and how cold the bars were on that swing. We were sixteen, confused and in love, her disappearance broke my heart.
I couldn’t be more desperate to follow the lead but I had to be smart. I needed Daniel to acclimate before I trusted him to help me with something so important.
I had to see how he’d cope when faced with a monster.
In Liam’s case, everything pointed to him having been taken against his will by the entity in the trees. I’d had the photograph studied by experts in editing, all of them said it was untouched.
That was rare. I’d never before had a piece of evidence so compelling. I ran the risk every time of unearthing another human monster and another human tragedy. Or finding someone like Kai, who didn’t want to be found.
Not this time.
“Tomorrow we’re travelling to the woods and we’re going to retrace Liam’s steps. Are you ok with that Daniel?”
He looked nervous. Daniel was young, inexperienced and sceptical of almost everything I’d told him, regardless, he showed promise.
I’d tried to be upfront and whilst I was grateful that he hadn’t left immediately exclaiming my insanity, I was concerned that he was woefully underprepared.
I’d met him online two years ago, where he’d obsessively categorised missing persons cases, sparing no detail. His reservations were natural.
It’s a hard pill to swallow, finding out that monsters are responsible for a huge number of unresolved disappearances.
Daniel thought that I was making some kind of sick joke, that it was an initiation.
He nodded and we parted ways, him carting a huge folder out of the office to study the case overnight. I’d tasked him with mapping the route and helping us find the spot that Liam took the photo. I wanted to really test him.
I pulled up an hour or so before sunrise outside his small flat, just above a shop.
He’d dressed ridiculously, in a shirt and blazer. I held my tongue, making a conscious effort to come across nicer.
“Morning Amelia!” He beamed, feigning a cool exterior. He couldn’t hide the sweat on his brow or the small tremor in his hands. Not from me.
“Are you ready?”
“I am. Last night I did some research into the local area and the woods Liam went missing in. Did you know there are eight people who disappeared in those woods in the last decade alone?”
“I didn’t know that. Good work. I think we could be dealing with something very dangerous... I have to ask, Daniel... Why the suit?”
I just couldn’t stop myself.
“I’m working. These are my work clothes.”
I laughed a little and touched the accelerator with my woodland walking boots, feeling a little smug as Daniel whimpered a meek protest.
“You’ve not done any field work in your research have you.” I smiled to myself, revelling a little in his fear.
“I find my skills are on a computer. I can dig up dirt, hunt anyone down via their digital footprint and put together a comprehensive file. But no... I’ve never taken it out of my bedroom.”
“Do you know why I offered you this job Daniel?”
“Because I’m thorough. I’m useful.”
“No. That’s not it.”
I smiled again as I took a hand off the wheel and reached across him to the glove compartment, pulling out a pack of cigarettes and lighting one as I wound my window down slightly.
Online sleuths were ten a penny but there weren’t many with the skills that Daniel had, I’d chosen him for a reason.
“I hired you because I traced you back to the email address I received the anonymous files from. I haven’t come across many internet detectives with the balls to hack a secure police system.”
Daniel grinned, it was a victory he needed to help subside his nerves.
“Like I said Amelia, my skills are online. I saw some old posts of yours about this case on the forums and I thought I’d give you a hand. We’d been talking for some time and I really wanted this job.”
I felt my whole body cringe. I did need a hand. The files he sent we’re regarding the case that kept me awake every night for over a decade. The only one I’d been unable to solve.
Valerie.
I didn’t want to burst Daniels bubble by telling him I’d already seen those files and that they were of no use to my investigation. It was his drive and ability that I was interested in. I let him have his victory.
“Tell me if I’m overstepping but I didn’t realise that you... knew her.” Daniel continued, plugging the silence that had followed his admission.
“You are overstepping.” I hissed back. “We aren’t discussing Valerie today. Who is the target?”
“The target is Liam-“
“The target is Liam.” I asserted with finality, tossing the end of my cigarette out of the window. I wasn’t ready to let him in, not yet.
We continued towards a small village silently, an antiquated sign marking our turning off the busy stretch of road and into meandering hills and valleys.
Abelfort
I stopped the car abruptly in a small, deserted car park on the edge of the woods.
“Where did he enter?” I asked.
The woods weren’t especially large, not in comparison to the vast national parks of America. For England, however, it was more than just a small smattering of trees. Certainly enough to be classified a forest.
Choosing the correct entrance point was vital to covering similar ground to Liam.
“He lived over that way.” Daniel clutched a piece of paper and pointed to his left, dawn just breaking in full over the tree line. “So he will have gone in through something the locals call the cross tree.”
He pulled another scrunched piece of paper from his pocket and I despaired a little as I noticed his formal shoes. They looked expensive. He unscrewed a photo of two trees that had intertwined about two metres up, creating a perfect natural archway.
It wasn’t hard to find.
There was something about the way the trees danced with each other in the morning light that made it look more eerie than peaceful. Like two lovers in a violent, passionate embrace.
“There’s no need for work clothes in this job, you know?” I joked, trying to make conversation and squash the earlier tension as I held my copy of Liam’s selfie up to various different trees.
“I’m learning that now. There was no induction pack.”
I scoffed. I supposed I wasn’t such a traditional employer. When should I have broken it to him that we were extra busy during holidays?
The forest terrain was treacherous. Even through my boots I could feel the protruding tree roots and uneven surfaces. Daniel was struggling, shivering a little under the canopy that blocked out the freshly risen sun. We walked for hours.
I wasn’t sure what exactly to look for, I couldn’t liken the monster in the photograph to anything else I’d dealt with, leaving us in unfamiliar territory.
Finally, after starting to feel hopeless, I noticed something.
I faced Daniel and held my finger to my lips, stopping him in the clearing we’d reached.
The sounds that accompanied the trees had stopped, there was no birdsong, no tree branches moving in the wind, not even the sound insects rustling in the leaf litter. Instead there was a feint hum, surrounding the area and vibrating from every direction. It was low pitched and hypnotic.
Daniel started to shake as he noticed the low, rhythmic tones. I felt my own heart start to pound a little.
Whatever was near was doing a great job of trying to insight panic. I wondered if that hum was what Liam heard, alone, following him through the trees as he made his way home.
That would fuck with anybody.
“Come on! You didn’t hide very well the first time, why are you hiding now? We’re here for Liam!” I shouted into the open space.
I was angry. Angry that something would be so blatant and yet so cowardly. It was trying to use us as playthings.
“Who said that was the first time.”
The hum came to a grinding halt as the creature spoke and its words echoed directly through me.
“Come out. Face me.”
I noticed that Daniel had dropped his map and his whole screwed up pile of printed documents. The internet wasn’t going to help him now and he knew it. I was confident I could keep him safe... for the most part.
The leg came first. The burnt looking, shadowed leg that lengthened and contracted as it moved, like a slinky making its way down a steep set of stairs. The body followed. Unlike anything I’d seen before the monster moved like the laws of physics didn’t apply.
It wasn’t typical of the monsters I was used to facing. Many of them resembled humans, or at least things that humans might recognise. This, however, was something entirely new.
For a moment, I felt exactly what Liam must have felt. The panic, the terror, the desperation to flee and go home. It wasn’t a good feeling.
As it stabilised, fully in our view it morphed into the human-like shape I’d grown so familiar with when studying the photograph.
It’s extremities resembled the branches and roots of the trees around it. It’s eyes formed in the space between the shadows, glowing a yellow that just stood out amongst the winding branches.
And that grotesque, sinister smile.
Not all monsters were so unpalatable, but I could feel the hatred coming from inside this one. Like it’s sole purpose was misery.
“What happened to Liam.” I quivered desperately.
“Which one was he.”
Without the forest to obscure it the monster voice echoed with each word, like a second, and third, and fourth voice all lived inside it. A mocking laugh following every letter.
“The one you couldn’t resist so bad that you let him take a picture of you.” I held up the photograph, inching slightly closer.
”mmmmmm.... hahahahahah.”
I took my eyes off the monster long enough to recover from the profound effect that his evil smile was having on me. I turned to Daniel, scanning his torn and muddied clothing as I noticed a damp, dark patch on his posh suit trousers.
I hadn’t intended to scare him so badly. I hadn’t expected to be scared so badly myself.
“Is he alive?” I shouted.
”Of course not. He tasted so good. How do you think you taste... Amelia?”
I felt my face sink. I tried to control it but I couldn’t.
“How do you know my name?” I demanded, shaken.
”Your reputation precedes you. There are so many out there who would consider me a hero for removing you from this world.”
I took a step back, piecing together the parts that didn’t make sense. A monster like this wouldn’t reveal itself. It just wouldn’t.
This was a trap. Just like Olive.
“Who hired you?” I screamed, my hands clammy and sweat forming on my neck. I tried to hold my composure.
”There’s plenty of candidates aren’t there. Your work, your life, your involvement with that pretty, young girl... What was her name? How did she taste Amelia?”
I swallowed a lump in my throat. The sickening voice spoke with such knowing of my intimate personal tragedies.
He knew way too much. And we’d found him far too easily.
“Who are you working with? How do you have these details?”
*”I bet you’d love to know the answer to that. You still didn’t answer my question though. What do you think you taste like?”
I snarled. I wasn’t going to get anything from him and I knew it. Distressed, it took me a few moments to notice the creature extending a long, branch-like arm towards my new assistant.
“Daniel move!” I screamed, watching in horror as he leapt backwards, stumbling in his muddied shoes and tripping to the ground.
I ran towards the monster, fumbling in my pocket for the knife I’d used to sever my connection with the sirens. One that had got me out of many scrapes. The creature noticed the small blade in my hand and it’s smile extended, past the perimeter of its face.
”They said you had weapons... Your weapons won’t be effective against them. You have no idea what’s coming.”
I plunged the knife, deep into the shadowed mass as it stood and waited, laughing, accepting its fate. It was apparent the entity was nothing more than another message, a living warning on a suicide mission.
That terrified me even more.
As the knife made contact the creature started to disappear, fading into blackened particles. I didn’t like to kill anything, that was never my aim, but no one deserved to die like Liam did either.
One by one the particles faded into nothingness, leaving behind a lighter atmosphere. As the last of the creature was obliterated the colours in the forest grew brighter and the sharp tweet of a bird broke the silence.
“What the fuck was that!” Daniel’s voice bought clarity to the area as he hoisted himself up from the floor. The creature was gone. I clung hard to my blade.
Clarence, a good contact working closely with monsters, hadn’t explained to me how it worked or what it was made of when he’d given it to me. He said it was a secret of the organisation he worked for and if they found out I had one he’d lose his job.
I’d tried to turn him down at first, insisting I’d rather die than kill, but I’ll be damned if it hadn’t come in good use more than a few times.
“I meant...” Daniel continued, breaking my stream of thought.
“I know what you meant and I told you when I hired you, open mind. You need to adjust to the things you’re going to see. Now get us back to the car, please.”
We stumbled through the trees and out of the woods. Daniel was embarrassed, he tried to hide the wet patch in his trousers but he knew I’d seen.
“It’s ok to be scared you know.”
“You weren’t. I don’t want to be scared anymore Amelia, this was awful... and the most exciting thing I’ve ever done. I’m ready for our next target.”
“Me too... But first we have to inform Brenda that her son won’t be coming home and that her granddaughter no longer has a daddy.”
I shed a tear for Liam as we loaded the car and got back on the road. I had nothing to give his mother, no evidence of life or death and not a single real answer.
Daniel was wrong too. I was scared.
Monsters and the people that work with them are responsible for so much damage. And I know all about it. There was a chance that these warnings lead to Valerie, and an even bigger chance that I was being trapped.
Whoever was after me already knew the answers to my cases and they’d reached the monster first. They were able to make such a terrifying creature willing to die for their cause.
This wasn’t just about stopping me finding Valerie. Someone wanted me dead.
TCC
case 3

Your friend just got the hot tip on a race horse who is a sure thing and you think fuck it... why not.
The bookie you use takes your bet and prices the horse 25/1... the horse wins the race by 75 lengths and you’re convinced it’s worth betting again.
The next race, the horse comes back and for some reason the bookie didn’t even bother to price the odds correctly and prices the horses odds at 20/1. You take your winnings from last week and pile it all on your favourite horse to win again.
This cycle continues for a few weeks until you’ve taken your initial sum of money and cleared out the bookie for hundreds of thousands, millions perhaps.
This weeks race comes up and the bookie realised how much money you’ve made from this one horse and decides he doesn’t want to live with that kind of a loss to his balance sheet.
You place your bet with all of your winnings for this weeks race and again, the horses odds stay the same.
The bookie then makes a trip to the racecourse where your horse is, pauses the race and starts to smack your horse with a baseball bat to its legs for a while and then finally lets the race proceed.
You lose your bet, all your winnings and the bookie is back to where he started because he couldn’t face having to lose all his money.
If this was a true story, the bookie and whoever helped him set this whole incident up would be sent to jail for defrauding the gambling industry and fixing the outcome of a race.
What’s so different about what happened to GME and what this story described?

Entry for the Extreme Environments catagory.
​
​
“Anything else I can get you?”
“No, no. This is great, thank you.”
The human started sipping his drink as ChashelVel nodded and made his way back to behind the bar. He immediately started to clean out the citrousy, alcoholic remnants of the drink he had just served from the blender that had created it, blinking his nictitating membranes in astonishment as he did so. Vel would never understand why anything would willingly drink something that was half ice.
Not that Vel was complaining about human patronage. His little bar had been hanging by a thread a few years ago, and now he was already planning his second expansion. And it was all due to these crazy humans.
Vel’s little establishment was certainly nothing to look at. It was a ramshackle old building, only held together with patchwork and prayer, as some of the visiting humans liked to say. The keshfiber floorboards and frame were old and weathered, their natural luster long since supplanted by dull grey. Vel had placed giant, leafy, potted plants inside wherever he could in a desperate bid to hide some of the most noticeable wear and tear. By blind luck, this had created an aesthetic that humans went wild over.
A crisp, refreshing breeze was blowing in from off the sea, carrying the briny scent of the water with it. The open air patio of Vel’s bar looked out over the short span of beach leading up to the water, and sapphire blue waves were lapping at the white sand not 50 meters away. The moons were to thank for that, as all three of them were directly overhead, and the tides were at their peak as a result.
Vel flicked his eyes over to his thermometer. 37.5 degrees; it was nice and cool for him. He had initially set up his bar here so that members of his own species could have a place to relax if they had been overworked and wanted to drop a climate zone and cool down for a few days. Vel had never dreamed that anyone other than a fellow Vendrrin would be a patron here. There wasn’t a species in the entire Federation that could handle the heat his species thrived in, and even at a Vendrrin’s coolest acceptable temperature ranges, most xenos would be incredibly uncomfortable.
To anyone from another species, Vel’s little pile of sand was just the mostly inhospitable northern edge of the extremely inhospitable habitable climate band on a farming world meant for the sapient species with the highest known temperature requirements. But not humans. They saw this hunk of beach as a tropical paradise, and they were out here playing in these temperatures. It was utterly bizarre, but it had been a boon to Vel and he was determined to enjoy every second of it.
“Hey boss, when can I get out of here for the day?”
“I don’t know, KlevinkthTial, is your work for the day finished?” Vel tried as hard as he could to keep his frustration and disappointment from seeping into his voice, but it became more and more difficult with each syllable he uttered to his newest employee.
“Well, yeah, mostly. The new filter system is all set up, I just have to attach it to the pump. I can finish up first thing tomorrow.”
“If it will be so quick, why can’t you just do it now?”
“Come on, I’ve been at this all day. Some of the humans are supposed to be setting up a new game today. Botch-something. I wanted to check it out”
“How much water is left in the tanks to get us through until tomorrow if we don’t get the filters up and running now?” Vel knew the exact amount, but was curious about the answer he would get.
“Eh, a few gallons,” Tial said tentatively.
“This is a bar. 90 percent of our income is from serving drinks. We need water to be able to function. You understand that right? We won’t make it halfway through the evening. Now go hook the filters up to the pumps and make sure everything works. Then you can be done for the day.”
The young Vendrrin grudgingly headed back towards his task with a sigh. Vel blinked his membranes a few times in frustration as he watched Tial walk away. At least Tial had been honest about the water levels. Vel could work with that.
He spent the next few minutes tidying up his bar before contemplating the humans managed to distract him from his concerns about Tial’s work ethic. A group of humans was playing a game of volleyball on the beach against a group of Vendrrin. While the humans had a remarkable advantage in strength and raw speed due to their high-g origins, the Vendrrin’s advanced reflexes were allowing them to put up a surprisingly good showing.
Vel’s eyes flicked once again towards the thermometer on the wall, but this time gaze carried a little further and stopped on the picture he had pinned next to it. It was a photo one of Vel’s first human customers had given him of their pet leopard spotted gecko. And it was like Vel was looking into a mirror. True, the pet lizard was tiny, it wasn’t bipedal, and most of its body proportions were wrong, but everything else was straight out of the uncanny valley.
With the massive diversity of known life throughout the galaxy, convergent evolution had played similar tricks on several other sapient species, but Vel had never heard of a resemblance this close. All of Vel’s employees thought he was strange for keeping the picture pinned where he did, but he had never paid them any mind. He couldn’t explain why, but that gecko helped him keep his perspective on life whenever things were getting crazy.
Vel had to consciously pull himself back to his cleaning before he meandered too far into his own thoughts, and turned away from the gecko picture. He set about his tasks with a renewed vigor, and had just finished organizing the glassware when his favorite customer slid onto the barstool directly across from him.
Daniel Cross was a large man by human standards, barrel chested and with arms thicker than a Vendrrin torso. His massive frame was covered by a baggy pair of shorts and an incredibly loud shirt patterned with leafy trees, while his feet were covered only by open toed sandals. Dark sunglasses obscured his eyes, and the rest of his face was hidden behind the mop of sandy brown hair on his head and a bushy beard of the same color. He was half a head taller than Vel, and easily five times as wide. Vel didn’t even want to consider the disparity in actual mass between them, and his bar seemed to agree, groaning slightly as the burly human leaned across to greet his old friend.
“Well damn, Vel, when you told me you were expanding, I thought you’d at least make the place look a little nicer.”
“Hey, you dumb apes like the look of this place for some stupid reason. Who am I to disappoint my customers. It took a lot of time and effort to find enough keshfiber that was so weatherworn.”
“Smart man. Now, I’ve heard tales on the ride down that you have somehow learned how to make a proper margarita? If that’s true, I need two of them. The haul out here was an absolute bastard.”
“Lucy still giving you trouble?” Vel asked, as he started pouring ingredients into the blender.
“Trouble’s an understatement. She needs to have her whole damn drive core replaced. I don’t know if we got a faulty model or if it was just installed incorrectly, but I’ve got no clue how it managed to get us here. Spent a lot of sleepless nights just trying to keep Lucy from sneezing us out of sub-space. You know Bill, though. If I can fix it, he isn’t going to spend the money to replace it. Sometimes being gifted’s a curse, ya know?”
“Where is Bill?”
“Oh, he’s still in orbit wheeling and dealing. Doesn’t need the engineering crew to haggle, though, so he sent us down for R&R early. Probably knew we’d revolt if he didn’t.”
The blender pulsed, loudly interrupting their banter for a moment. When it stopped, Vel was quick to fill a pair of glasses with the slushie concoction and set them in front of Dan. The massive slab of mammal immediately grabbed one of the glasses and drained it in one long pull before slamming the glass down with a shudder.
Vel was about to ask Dan about the rest of his crewmates, but stopped before the words could form. The massive human had suddenly stiffened, his head had tilted to the side, and his face was clearly strained. Realizing something was obviously wrong, Vel started scrambling for a communicator to call for first aid. “Are you all right? What happened?” Vel asked, trying to figure out what had gone so suddenly awry.
“Ah, no. I’m fine. I’m fine. SHIT. Whoo, damn!” Dan shuddered violently one last time and then settled easily back into his previous, relaxed posture with his trademark grin on his face. “Brainfreeze, Vel. It was just a brainfreeze. I’m fine. Calm down, little buddy. Holy shit did that hit the spot, though. Damn good magarita, by the way. Whoever taught you to make these deserves a raise.”
Dan eagerly raised his second drink and started sipping. Vel stood staring at him slack jawed and with membranes blinking furiously, his hastily found and forgotten com-pad dangling precariously from his fingertips.
“Brain what?”
“Yeah. If too much frozen food hits the roof of our mouth, it starts pulling heat from our brains, and… You know what, don’t worry about the details. It’s just a thing that can happen. It kinda hurts, some people enjoy them. There’s no need to worry about it.”
Vel was sure of it now. Humans were all insane. Any creature that would drink ice and willingly subject themselves to what was obviously excruciating pain couldn’t be all there mentally. Vel’s eyes flicked over to his gecko picture, and he took a few deep, calming breaths. He reminded himself that the universe was more massive than he could possibly imagine, and he was just a small piece of it. The details didn’t matter, and there was no reason to stress. With a final series of slow blinks, Vel started cleaning up the mess he had made scrambling to call for aid.
The two old friends sat in silence for several minutes, the big human sipping his drink, the slender reptile fastidiously organizing his bar. A fresh breeze blew in from the sea, rustling the fronds of the potted plants and blowing some of Dan’s sandy hair out of his face.
“You know, Vel,” Dan finally said, breaking the silence. “You really should look into buying more property along the coast of this sea. Especially farther north. What’s the climate like on the North shore?”
“About 25 degrees,” Vel replied after giving it some thought.
“Year round?”
“Pretty much.”
“Yeahhh. You need to invest in as much of that as you can. Once word really starts getting out about this place back in the Commonwealth, you are going to be absolutely flooded with humans. 37.5 is a bit on the warm side for us, but 25? That’s perfect. Mark my words. Within a generation, this place is going to be a tourist Mecca.”
“That’s way too cold for Vendrrin to operate in easily.”
“So? Buy the beach, build the resort, then hire humans to run it.”
“But Colventheth is a farming colony.”
“For now. But with those moons? Hawaii aint gonna have shit on this place. Most of our colonies aren’t fully terraformed yet. Bet your ass there will be people lining up to spend a month each way on a freighter just to spend a week here.”
Vel blinked doubtfully. “I don’t know. It just sounds…”
A thunderous boom and an accompanying low, dull roar prevented Vel from finishing his sentence. What had sounded like an explosion had come from the rear of the building, and what sounded like rushing water was filling the auditory void the blast had left behind.
“The hell was that?” shouted Dan.
Before Vel could answer, KlevinkthTial rushed out of the kitchen area panting, his jumpsuit soaked completely through with water.
“What did you do?” Vel bellowed, grabbing Tial by his soggy jumpsuit.
“I don’t know. I hooked the filters up just like the instructions said, I was running the test protocols, and everything started overpressurizing. Before I could turn everything off, a line blew somewhere, and then the pump just exploded. Now the tide is just forcing water through the system, and I don’t know how to make it stop.”
Tial may have been a slacker, but he was no idiot. Vel looked him over in a flash, and he was clearly mortified. Consequences for Tial would have to come later, though.
“Where did the line blow? Was it in the building anywhere?”
“I don’t know, I didn’t have time to find it.”
Without waiting for another word, Vel sprinted into the back of his bar. He barely noticed Dan effortlessly vault the counter and follow him. Vel tore through the kitchen to the backmost corner of the building to find the utility space in ruins. The pump motor had exploded, everything in the vicinity had been soaked, and water was gushing out of the ruined apparatus onto the floor. It looked awful, but other than the pump, nothing major had been destroyed. A quick patch would prevent any more water getting in, and then it would be just a simple mop up. Unfortunate, but not a disaster. Vel grabbed one of Tial’s wrenches and started towards the destroyed pump.
“Hey boss! I found the blown line!”
Vel turned towards the sound of Tial’s voice, and his heart nearly stopped. Tial was standing behind the door to the walk in freezer, tentatively holding it open an inch and using the door to shield himself from the dangerously cold air that was rushing out. Water was streaming from the opened door, far more than was coming from the pump.
The water pipes running underneath the building had ruptured directly below the walk in deep-freezer. Fixing the blown line quickly would require going into the freezer, and the temperatures inside were well beyond lethal to Vendrrin. Knowing exactly what he would find, Vel turned back towards the utility corner where, across from the pump and filter station, the bar’s freezer suit was hanging. Seven layers of insulation thick, and woven through with powered heating filaments, the freezer suit was more robust than a spacer’s vac suit, and was the only thing that would allow a Vendrrin to survive the temperatures that long term food storage required.
And Vel’s was soaked clean through.
Vel was ruined. The only way to stop his bar from flooding was to get the pipes sealed off. And he couldn’t do that without taking a day to dry out his freezer gear, or turning off the freezer until it was safe enough to work in and losing all of his frozen product, costing him his entire inventory. Vel had spent years stocking his long-term supplies with delicacies from around the galaxy. His stock wasn’t large, but it was varied, and it was expensive. Even if he could recover from the loss financially, it might be years before he ever saw the opportunity to buy some of his more exotic items again.
“Eh, that doesn’t look too bad.”
Vel spun to find Dan pulling his head out of the opened freezer door. “What do you mean, ‘not that bad?’ This is a disaster!”
“Nah, it’s just a busted pipe,” Dan said, striding across the kitchen towards Tial’s pile of tools, his feet sloshing as he went. He stopped and picked up a tube of sealant, a patch, and a wrench before sloshing his way back towards the freezer. “I’ll have it fixed in a minute. You just work on that busted pump.”
The Vendrrin entrepreneur watched in a daze, not fully processing what was happening, as his favorite human walked up to the freezer door, wearing nothing but his baggy shorts, loose shirt, and sandals, and simply walked inside to his death.
Vel stared at the freezer door for a full thirty seconds before the full weight of what he had just witnessed hit him and he was able to recover his sensibilities. He was across the kitchen in a flash, pounding on the freezer door and screaming for Dan to come out, hoping against all odds it wasn’t too late. Vel even briefly opened the freezer door, determined to go after the crazed human and somehow drag him out, but just the lightest touch of the frozen air was too painful for the Vendrrin to bear.
He didn’t know what to do. There was nothing he could do. Vel had just watched his favorite xeno die, and it happened for absolutely no reason. If the pipe had just burst anywhere else…
“Tial, help me plug up the pump!” There was a frenzy underlying Vel’s tone as he called for his employee and rushed towards the pump. If he could stop the leak, maybe he could enact some quick repairs, or depressurize the system, maybe there would be a chance that Dan was still alive and would somehow come out of the freezer on his own.
The two Vendrrin reached the pump at the same time, Tial sharing his bosses urgency. The work was frantic, but they worked in perfect sync, and within minutes, the last drops of water had hit the kitchen floor. Vel then turned his attention to the pump controls, trying to find a way to reverse the flow of the system, but it was beyond hope. The entire motor was shot, and every electrical interface was completely soaked.
Vel slumped down against the wall, defeated. He looked up at the freezer suit hanging by his head. Maybe if he were to throw it in the oven to try and speed dry it…
No. There was nothing more to do. It had been at least five minutes since Dan had entered the freezer. Dan was dead. There was no denying that now. How was Vel supposed to tell Bill what had happened? That his sibling had just up and killed himself? Would anyone believe that? Was that something humans did?
The freezer door burst open in a swirling cloud of frozen fog as Dan’s hulking form stepped out and slammed the door behind him.
“Son of a BITCH, it’s cold in there!” he yelled, giving a quick violent shake for emphasis.
He stood in front of the freezer door panting, and every inch of exposed skin was flushed a bright red. His loose and very loud shirt sat rigidly on his body, every fiber soaked and frozen together to encase Dan’s torso in a stiff shell. Most striking, though, was Dan’s face. Every hair was coated in ice crystals, from his eyebrows and eyelashes to the tip of his beard. Even the sandy haired mop on top of his head had lost all flexibility, staying weirdly in place as Dan moved underneath it.
“Well, that was refreshing. Pipe’s all patched up. Everything good out here? Why are you guys staring at me like that?”
“You should be dead,” was all that Vel could choke out in response. He was still sitting on the floor where he had slumped, held in place by shock. Vel was thrilled that Dan was still alive, but was very, very confused as to how such a thing was possible.
“Dead? The hell are you talking about?”
“The cold. You went in without any protective coverings. It should have killed you.”
“I mean, I probably couldn’t have stayed in there for too much longer without getting some frostbite or something. It’s not that cold in there, is it? How low do you have the temp set?” Dan asked incredulously. The ice on his face was beginning to melt, and as he spoke drops of water started to trickle down his face and beard before dripping to the floor.
“-25 degrees.”
“Shit, I’m from the Midwest. That’s damn near golfing weather back home.”
Vel stared at the giant, frost covered monster that was his friend for a long minute, watching as chunks of ice sloughed off his face before finally organizing his emotions enough to stand. When he spoke, his voice was tired and oddly emotionless.
“Thank you, Dan. You really saved me just now. I could have lost everything if you hadn’t been here. Drinks are on the house. Tial, can you start mopping up? I’m going to go make some calls about new pump and filter systems. I’ll be back to help when I’m done.”
Without waiting for a reply from either of them, Vel made his way out to the bar and fished out his compad. As he was scrolling through contact numbers for various plumbers and contractors, his eyes flicked up once again to the picture of the leopard spotted gecko. This time, though, it wasn’t enough to help Vel center himself. It only left him with a nagging question in the back of his mind:
Why was everything involving humans so damn weird?

Hello everyone!
I apologise sincerely for the delay in predictions this week, I had a lot happening, Blood tests for glucose levels and such, a Job interview, overall not feeling super well, but I didn't want to let you guys down.
This is a fun card, not an amazingly stacked card, but a fun one, and an end to the question "Can two team mates destroy each other in the Octagon?".
(c) - Champ
(D) - Debut
FLS - Fight Lose Streak
FWS - Fight Win Streak
NS - No Streak
(#x) - Rank in Division
Lets go!
Prelims
Women’s Flyweight
Gillian Robertson (#13) (9-5-0, NS) v Miranda Maverick (8-2-0, 6 FWS) - This is an incredible match up. Robertson is a savage, one of the most underrated and dangerous submission artists in the division who hasn’t really gotten a strong hold on climbing the ranks. Regardless of her record, she has an excellent ground game, she works incredibly hard to get the fight to the ground, and when she does, she instantly works for a submission position, and most of the time, that works and her opponents succumb to pressure and present their neck or limb. Now, a lot of her opponents are aware of the threats on the ground and now work to avoid and defend takedowns, and thus keep the fight on the feet. This is key for Maverick, and I firmly believe that Maverick can quickly outpower Robertson, she’s an incredibly physically strong fighter who has great power in her hands, and being so young in her career. She has made great strides in her career since her debut in Invicta in which she dominated most of her fights. She has pretty effective striking, and she throws leather when needed, but most of her best work is done on the ground, she’s a very good submission artist and even though she’s probably not going to force the fight to the ground against a great grappler like Robertson, she would know how to get out of submission positions and work back to the feet. I love Robertson, she’s an animal, but she’s relatively one dimensional, and I love what I see in Miranda. So, another hype train i'm gonna ride for a little longer…
Maverick via KO R2
Welterweight
Gabe Green (9-3-0, NS) v Philip Rowe (D) (7-2-0, 7 FWS) - This is a great fight between two newcomers, Green had a fantastic debut against Rodriguez, and even though he did lose, he did manage to put on an incredible performance, he even came in as a late replacement so this wasn’t a full camp performance and yet he still landed 120 plus strikes, and he ate shots from Daniel Rodrigeuz for 15 minutes, it was a beautiful, violent fight. I love how Green fights, he has an interesting defensive shell and he gives off a lot of different looks that allowed him to land a few decent shots on Rodriguez. Green will no doubt look a little bit different this time around because he has had a full camp and is more prepared for this fight. Rowe has turned around his career since his two back to back losses at the start of his professional career. Nothing but submissions and knockouts on his record, but in regards to this fight, he has one major advantage and that’s his reach, he’s very long, and has a 7.5 inch reach advantage, if he can avoid the pressure of Green (and Green is the type of fighter to push forward nonstop), and maybe take the fight to the ground, I can see Rowe getting a slick submission in, because from what I can see when it comes to Green’s chin, it’s pretty damn solid. So the best bet for Rowe in my opinion is to take it to the ground, and slip in a choke.
Rowe via Sub R2
Featherweight
Ricky Simon (17-3-0, 2 FWS) v Brian Kelleher (22-11-0, NS) - Any fight that has Ricky Simon in it, sign me up to watch it end to end because Simon is a specimen. I could easily copy and paste what i wrote about Simon when he fought Pirrello, but this time it’s a little bit different, it’s at featherweight and he will no doubt be carrying more mass, exuding more energy when he throws punches, or slams opponents, and that’s a bit dangerous when coming against someone who has fought in Featherweight beforehand in Kelleher, but the skillset and the power will still be there, i’m just weary about his cardio, Simon has excellent cardio at Bantamweight, but at Featherweight that’s a whole different question. Simon is incredible at creating pressure and throwing everything he has into every round, wild striking, vicious wrestling and a non-stop pace that is as exhausting for us as it is for his opponent, and that’s a good thing. Simon is facing a very durable and experienced, well rounded fighter in Kelleher though. Kelleher has an interesting array of techniques, with his signature, most mastered technique being a guillotine, but his stance (a somewhat blocky wrestling/striking hybrid) allows him to stand firm, defend any takedowns and throw hard, and with Kellehers proclivity to takedown and wrestle, his stance also allows him to dip and level change effortlessly, he’s a very good wrestler as well so he has a huge variety of weapons he can use to defeat Simon, but honestly, i’m still riding a Simon hype train, and I feel like by the time Kelleher throws something, Simon would be somewhere else, out of view and attacking, Simon is fast, durable, exceptionally well rounded and always entertains. Lets go Simon!
Simon via UD
Catchweight (140)
Andre Ewell (17-6-0, 2 FWS) v Chris Gutierrez (15-3-2, NS) - This is an interesting match up. Ewell is someone who a lot of people kinda overlook because of how talent rich the division is, but if there’s one thing you need to keep an eye out for with Ewell, it’s his volume, he just throws, and throws, and throws. He is a kickboxer at heart, and his length and range allow him to adjust his style of attacking to fit the situation. He can keep at bay aggressive fighters by hitting then evading, he can push forward relatively aggressively, but he’s somewhat smart about his range whenever he strikes. His left straight is by far his best weapon, but he does have one flaw, and that is he looks maybe too loose on the feet at times, if you look at the Jonathan Martinez fight, you’ll notice that he was milliseconds away from being cleanly hit by Martinez’s super fast kicks, you can’t take that risk when you fight someone like Gutierrez. Gutierrez is a powerful striker, everything he throws is just… dangerous, and sharp, and has the shortest travel time from Point A to B, it’s pretty awesome to watch him get loose in the octagon, landing heavy leg kicks, body kicks, combo’s, anything really, The way he methodically dismantled Morales was beautiful, those leg kicks were powerful, landing in the same spot over and over again. Gutierrez landed 36 leg kicks in that fight I believe. He had a gameplan and he followed it through. He will need to do the same to disable the aggression from Ewell, chop at those legs, bring Ewells hands lower than they sometimes already are, then target the head. That’s what I feel like will happen.
Gutierrez via KO R3
Women’s Strawweight
Polyana Viana (11-4-0, NS) v Mallory Martin (7-3-0, NS) - Odd little tidbit I noticed, this is the second Strawweight fight of 2021, both the Bantamweight and Flyweight divisions have way more fights, so i’m glad Strawweight is getting a little bit of love. Viana is a great submission artist, she’s always looking for the fight to go to the ground so she can work her magic, Viana is like a snake on the ground, always finding the better positions to fire off a few submission attempts, and whilst her striking isn’t exactly clean or effective, that threat of being knocked out is always going to be there. Martin has a solid stand up game, she’s got decent striking and mixes her attacks very well, and I strongly feel that she will want to keep this fight standing otherwise she’s going to get outworked on the ground. I’m not too sure about who is going to win this fight though, if it goes to the ground Viana has a solid chance of getting the win, but Mallory is a tough striker to beat, and I’m not too sure if Viana will want to risk a striking exchange. This could be a methodical, boring fight, i’m not too hype about this fight, but overall i’ll be leaning on Martin to win.
Martin via UD
Welterweight
Dhiego Lima (15-7-0, 3 FWS) v Belal Muhammad (#15) (17-3-0, 3 FWS) - An incredible match up to start this event. Lima is a super tough fighter, and whilst he hasn’t had a finish in quite a while, he still puts on pretty decent performances. Recently his performances haven’t been super good, throwing but not landing, grappling seems to be his main weapon, but with how inactive Lima has been, and how sporadic his fighting timeline has been, it’s pretty hard to see too many positives in comparison to the rise that Belal Muhammad has had in recent years. Muhammad is an animal at the moment, his style makes it very difficult to take him on, or even read him. He has two major threats for most of his opponents, his wrestling and his powerful, crashing right hand. He typically dips to level change but then launches that right hand. His wrestling is incredible and he is quite controlling when it comes to the ground game. Everything about Belal is something I like to see in a developing fighter. I can see Lima getting hit brutally over and over with those power right hands, then taken down and eventually submitted.
Muhammad via Sub R3
Middleweight
Rodolfo Vieira (7-0-0, 7 FWS) v Anthony Hernandez (7-2-0, NS) - A very interesting fight, and it’s always good to see an undefeated heavy favourite put his streak on the line. Vieira is a submission specialist, not a submission artist, a specialist, that’s a whole different level of whoa. Over 100 grappling bouts, multiple gold medals and tournament wins, Vieira is one of the most accredited grapplers that the UFC has at the moment, that’s still young and still has a chance to show off his striking, but holy crap he’s a solid grappler… he won 5 championships in 3 years, that’s not only impressive, but on a whole different level of skill. He’s called the Black Belt Hunter for a reason and well, Hernandez is going to go to sleep if he’s not careful. Hernandez has had a rough time in the UFC, and i’m hoping they’re giving him this fight not to beef up Vieira, but to give Hernandez an excuse to stay in the UFC. Hernandez has had some decent wins in his career, but most of those wins were in LFA. In the UFC he hasn’t been too successful, his recent loss against Holland kinda showed me that he isn’t great at being pressured, and if Vieira pushes forward, works hard for a takedown and absolutely dominates from there, I don’t see Hernandez getting the upper hand on the ground, he has a punchers chance but I mean… Vieira is a phenom at the moment, a rare addition to the UFC and i’m on the train, first class tickets!
Vieira via Sub R1
Main Card
Middleweight
Julian Marquez (7-2-0, NS) v Maki Pitolo (13-7-0, 2 FLS) - It’s a shame that 2020 was a horrible year for Pitolo. Marquez is coming back from a 2 year hiatus, after suffering a heavy loss at the hands of Alessio Di Chirico, or as we now probably call him, the Hype Train Derailer. Marquez is a powerhouse, he explodes and lands incredibly hard, he has insane power in his hands and everything he does has that extra oomph that you can probably hear in a full arena. Marquez however is somewhat one dimensional with his style, he loves to strike, he loves chaos and hates order, and that’s going to be dangerous for Pitolo because numerous times we’ve seen Pitolo succumb to pressure. Pitolo is a mad man, don’t get me wrong, he has insane striking, he’s wild, a showman and someone who you really want to see fight for a while, but he can’t go one on one against Marquez and think “i’ll just go wild”, he needs to keep Marquez pushing him for the first round, see where the cardio holds up (I don’t think Marquez has much cardio because of how explosive he is), and then start attacking him in the second or third, but again, it’s hard for me to tell how good a returning fighter is cardio wise, so this is a very rough prediction. I’m leaning on the Cuban Missile Crisis to win this one though.
Marquez via KO R1
Lightweight
Bobby Green (27-11-1, NS) v Jim Miller (32-15-0, NS) - Green is lowkey one of my most favourite fighters, the amount of work he does in the octagon is pretty impressive, especially when you watch his fight against Vannata, that fight will go down as a classic I can assure you. Green has gorgeous boxing, he’s incredibly crisp and fast with his punches, and he has his wrestling to add even more frustration and drain his opponents of their gas. Green had one set back during 2020 and that was against the incredibly talented Thiago Moises. Green has every skill that one would need to succeed in the UFC, especially with his crisp boxing and head movement, he’s going to be a dangerous fighter for Miller who has a more grapple heavy approach. Miller has had some significant wins over his very extensive career, recently submitting Clay Guida, Roosevelt Roberts and Jason Gonzalez to name a few, Miller is a dangerous, dangerous grappler, he can strike though but not to great efficiency, he mostly uses his striking to set up a takedown, where he does his most effective work. Miller is on a rough run at the moment, ever since losing to Anthony Pettis, or even prior to that against Poirier, he hasn’t really strung together any major streaks, a win here and there, but nothing to great significance, and since this is the Lightweight division we’re talking about, significance is important. I have Green in this fight, he can keep this fight on the feet, keep at a distance and keep striking, he’ll win this one.
Green via UD
Middleweight
Kelvin Gastelum (#11) (16-6-0, 3 FLS) v Ian Heinisch (#15) (14-3-0, NS) - This is going to be beautiful. Gastelum has incredible boxing, he’s the only one that gave Israel Adesanya trouble on the feet by using his beautiful pressure and interesting hopping technique that got him into range. Gastelum is on a losing streak but he has faced incredibly tough challenges. He went to war with Adesanya, he fought a highly technical bout against Till and has now lost to the submission artist in Hermansson. He is now facing the wild and explosive Ian Heinisch, which is going to be a brutally tough fight because Heinisch is pretty damn aggressive and has explosive takedowns that come with his explosive strikes, overall, Heinisch is an explosive dude and a perfect matchup for a methodical and tactical boxer like Gastelum. Heinisch is someone who is always improving, so there’s no doubt that what you saw in 2020 will be what you get in 2021 and more. That makes me wonder what his game plan will be, whether he will come in with a wrestling heavy approach to negate the power that Gastelum has on his feet, or if he’ll be incredibly aggressive and keep Gastelums back glued to the fence. Either way, Heinisch is going to be unpredictable, and I think it will be a true test of what Gastelum can accomplish if he can handle Heinisch. This is a great fight, one that I don’t want to overtalk this fight because well, it’s hard predicting a fighter on a losing streak, to win, i’ve done that one too many times (Michael Johnson being the most recent one) and it didn’t turn out how I expected… So this is a risky prediction, but War Gastelum!
Gastelum via KO R2
Co-Main Event
Women’s Flyweight
Maycee Barber (#9) (8-1-0, NS) v Alexa Grasso (12-3-0, NS) - An interesting fight to say the least. Barber is coming off a heavy loss and a horrible injury to her knee, so there’s a lot of variables coming into this fight. Barber has always been an incredibly aggressive and tough fighter, she pushes forward, launching punch after punch that can overwhelm her opponents, she put away Robertson very effectively, bloodied up Cifers and destroyed Aldrich. She’s no doubt still a prospect and if she can get past Grasso then that certifies her prospect status in the Flyweight division. The one thing i'm worried about is her knee… It was probably her first ever injury and that would hang on your mind for quite a while. Barber is going to have to get past the excellent boxing of Grasso if she is to win this one though, and that’s going to be pretty tough. Grasso has made her rounds in the UFC before, facing pretty much every up and comer that the UFC threw at her, Grasso is yet to get a solid winning streak going and her main weakness seems to be her ground game, She doesn’t have the best takedown defence, nor the best defensive submissions, her main style is her boxing, and if she can avoid the ground with Barber and keep the fight on the feet, I can see Grasso getting the upper hand. But Barber is a solid, solid prospect and one minor setback isn’t going to hurt her. Barber is still a very promising fighter and i’m gonna lean on her a little bit longer.
Barber via UD
Main Event
Welterweight Championship bout
Kamaru Usman (c) (17-1-0, 16 FWS) v Gilbert Burns (#4) (19-3-0, 6 FWS) - A fight that we all needed to see. Every match up has happened but this one. Usman is an athletic freak, he’s one of the most durable and strongest welterweights in the division right now, his wrestling is incredible, his striking is somewhat great, his cardio is neverending, and he has defeated the best the welterweight division has to offer, all but one. So many people think Usman is boring, the whole footstomp meme is everywhere this week and whilst it’s a good chuckle, I feel like some people are sleeping on the potential that this guy has. There is so much story behind this fight, training partners, Usman leaving his own gym to train with Wittman (which is a pretty great substitute), we might see a change in style from Usman, because I highly doubt he will wrestle with Burns considering Burns is one of the best BJJ practitioners in the welterweight division. I feel like Usman will try to trade hands with Burns, or at least grapple against the fence but not on the ground. Burns is one of the most improved fighters of the division, he was mostly a submission artist but in the last year or two, we have seen him become far more comfortable on the feet, and that throws off a lot of his opponents. His ability to change and adapt, and include striking to his skillset is second to none the best change I have seen in a fighter. It’s kinda like when Gaethje finally learnt to become patient and we saw an upgrade to Gaethje’s skill set. This is what is happening to Burns at the moment, we are seeing a newborn striker who carries significant power and isn’t afraid to show it. This is a super tough fight to predict. Both fighters have a solid chance of winning… but I feel like Usman will be holding onto that gold a little longer. I’m feeling a little ballsy with this prediction.
Usman via KO R4
And that's it!
Again, sorry for the late predictions, been a stupid crazy week.
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Lets have a fun discussion down below, let me know if you agree/disagree with my picks :)
But for now, have a beautiful week, take care of yourselves :)