Works both ways,I'd say only look up unknown ones whos play you're not entirely sure about or are just curious about his results.

Agreed with imonupstreak, it can go both ways.At the lower stakes, I would imagine it's very likely they are not a good player hiding stats.At the higher stakes, it can be a good player hiding stats, a good player on a downswing (very common, though a little less so with the stat reset option these days, that is utilized a lot too), a regular player that may be breakeven or even losing... that probably covers most of it.It's likely when you're playing at $100+ vs a blocked player that they are NOT a fish, that they are at least a thinking player. I'd assume you're facing a thinking opponent that may be slightly losing to slightly winning (IE, plenty of potential leaks for you to identify and exploit, but also by the same token the blocked opponent can probably adjust at least minimally intelligent, if not well). And at low stakes, I would assume it's often a fish that knows about sharkscope or a player on a downswing (and in lowstakes, downswing + block is not a sign of a tough opponent you'd think about avoiding).That's about all I can think of to generalize here. Just my opinion/experience/observation.

Yeah it's wierd. I play low/mid stakes 60/100s regs/turbos and I've encountered some very solid players IMO with locked stats. I often lock my stats when I decide I want the freedom to sit regs without all the chat like 'why are u sitting me'. And also I often do something early on with locked stats like a 4x raise preflop so they think I'm an uber fish...:) stupid gameplan?

The first part sounds fine if it really works (if regs don't know who you are and you block when moving up or something that could work, but if you're moving up to sit regs that's kind of counterproductive in most cases).The second part sounds silly to me and a distraction (doing something purposely -EV or fishy, combined with blocked stats to create a fish image). The problem with that is, what kind of fish image do you create? What experience do you have manipulating this? How will your opponent react to this? If you can't answer those questions then I can't imagine that this strategy could possibly be better than simply playing your usual max EV game.

Well I think I've gained significant ev from it. I don't play a massive amount of volume so don't feel I'm majorly we'll known. Also when sit first I don't get sat loads but when I lock stats I get sat quick or I sit someone and I really feel a different dynamic is going on from usual reg on reg play. They play me like a fish. Less 3 betting more abc poker and less fold equity plays. If I do a 4 x raise early or a slightly spazzy move postflop really feel I can make exploitive adjustments to their usual exploitive moves against fish - just a theory though but there is a rational behind it! Although after 1 game they seem to play me more like I'm a ok player:)Edit: I must admit I have wondered if this is just stupid but has felt like I've gained a lot of chips in the process...

What Ryan said. The reason a good regular would block their stats is not getting enough action, which doesn't happen at low to mid stakes. So unless you are playing higher stakes, you can safely assume that blocked = not a good player.

Their are other reasons to block also which have no impact on winning or not. I have always blocked my stats because I don't like my friends/family knowing how much I have made. I've done this from when I was slightly winning but a fish, to now where I consider myself atleast competent. I know a few people that are like this; it's considered rude to ask people how much money they are making at their job, I don't see why it should be any different for poker. Moral of story: your going to get plenty of info if they are bad after a few hands anyway, don't go making assumptions until they give you reason to, and blocked SS isn't a reason.

I was bit drunk when i commented before, so i thought i'd wite a sober reply. I have blocked stats to play regs before when i was getting a bit tired of the fastest finger first thing on pokerstars and i wanted to play regs and thought perhaps it gave me an advantage my opponents not knowing whether i'm a winning player or not from the offset. Anyway, to comment soberly i think you're completley right Ryan it must be better to just play my normal game. I think one of my biggest leaks can be fancy play syndrome. I've done what i've mentioned a few times doing spazzy plays etc early usually in reg speeds for just a few chips and its worked out but i'm not sure if i got a bit lucky. I did think there might be advantages/value for a reg to think your a fish or table image advantages, but i dunno probably just playing my normal game and trying to adjust as best as possible is always best. Basic idea was if regs think your a loose aggressive fish they might adjust at first with more of a value range and play tighter and maybe i can take advantage of it...also to add yes i also lock my stats sometimes when downswinging/breaking even:)

Thanks for the follow up here, really turned into an interesting thread.It's really hard also to judge the results of these things, it's like if you play 500 games and predict your red line, then look at your red line for the first time (do that 10x for your next 5k games and report back how close you were with your estimates each time), I would imagine it's likely any of us would be pretty far off/not much better than guessing the red line were the same as the results.Might be an interesting exercise to do though.

That would be very interesting! Unfortunately i'm always looking at my ev line and not sure i would have the discipline not to look for that long! I would say many would predict they were running under EV myself included as facing the truth in poker can be hard imo. Yes i see what you're saying these things are very hard to judge and i certainly don't make these plays as a consistent strategy so its even harder to work out if there is any value at all i guess. Was reading a very interesting article the other day by Sklansky in one of his books about how some players are basically breakeven, but by shear luck have phenomenal success, become famous poker players and then their winrate returns to what it should be after a year or so(ie. breakeven) and we never hear from them again - boggles the mind how you could run that hot, but someone has to and in his opinion i think he said it was more likely to happen to a hyper loose aggressive player for various reasons...

I have my stats blocked on all sites where I play for safety reasons. Poker is kind of "decriminalized" in my country, as playing online could be illegal and/or subject to taxes but no one cares and no one has got hurt so far, so I try not to make a target out of myself ;) Also some people IRL know my nickname(s) and rail me sometimes and I don't want them to know how much money I have won.

When I started with HU SNGs in 2011 I did lock my stats. I did terrible (lots of tilt) and quickly lost plenty of buy ins. About 2 months later I focused on theory for quite a while and did book coachings and so on. Knowing that lots of regulars would sharkscope me, I unlocked my stats (because they would not reflect my current skill status) and locked them up once I was a winning player on sharkscope.

Unless I'm missing something, Sharkscope seemed to have flipped a switch tonight and every player on Pokerstars is listed as opt-in, eg. blocked.Not necessarily a bad thing, as it may help to preserve the casual player. 

I honestly doubt that a single fish will quit because sharkscope has auto-opt-in now. As for regulars quitting because of auto-opt-in: YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Hi together,I play a lot of Husngs with a decent (arround 8%) ROI .It depends at Ongame I onlyhave 3% ROI but there I get 40% Rakeback as their Rake is with 8% very high.I also have my Stats at all sites blocked.The reasons are first of all that a lot of fish know sharkscope as well and hence do not sit you when you have winning stats.Besides that a lot of bad "regs" assume blocked stats with an embaressed player with loosing stats.It is profitable to play against these kinds of villains, propably more profitable than make your profits publicand wait even longer for an opponent. The negative aspect is that some regs sit you but after 2-3 games they usally do not sit me anymore.Poker is a game of incomplete Information so you should give almost no information away.BTW: Do you all know the site: http://pokeroptimizer.com (only stars)It seems to be quiet accurate but only displays games in the last 6 month if I understood it right.What I witnissed is that a lot of blocked players at stars have quit good stats at this site....Sorry for my bad english and keep crushing!