Our Team Members
Our team members work consistently, passionately, and diligently, seven days per week, to assist you. They have been to numerous industry conferences to meet operators face to face, attended scores of poker tournaments to meet clients face to face, and have traveled to the field offices of the advertisers and partner sites we work with in order to inspect their operations first-hand.
ProfessionalRakeback.com has always been owned and operated by professional poker players and advantage gamblers who earn their living using mathematics, statistics, good judgment, and shrewd negotiation tactics to prevail. Our team of expert players includes true professional poker players, gamblers, and sports bettors who know how to win, and they want you to know how to win as well! There is room for everyone to have a good time, a safe time, and to significantly improve their skill at wagering, and our staff is happy to help our readers in these endeavors.
Get in touch and meet our expert gamblers, detailed researchers, and professional journalists who create all the great content you enjoy reading on our website. Jake Rake is the head poker writer at ProfessionalRakeback.com.
Jake Rake
Directing Manager
Jake Rake is currently best described as the directing manager of ProfessionalRakeback.com. He also frequently contributes insight and direction and lends his first-hand experience to all of PRB's poker site reviews. Jake still writes articles and editorials about poker etiquette and the social responsibilities poker players have not only to their individual communities but also to the rest of society.
Jake began playing online poker in 1999 and turned professional in 2003, just in time for the poker boom inspired by Chris Moneymaker's epic win of the WSOP Main Event. Jake played full-time online first as a clueless recreational player then as a prop player who worked for dozens of online card rooms starting games with anyone who dared sit down against him. He is also an avid high-stakes poker player to this day, playing online at multiple poker websites as well as in casinos and card clubs all over the world.
Jake eats, sleeps, and breathes poker and online gaming. This is a man who has read every online poker forum morning, noon, and night since 1999, trying to find fun and interesting information to share with our readers.
Jake has become an ardent student of crypto-currency since it was first introduced in the online poker world in 2013, and he thus has well over a decade of experience covering this field!
Max Golden
Editor-in-Chief
Max Golden is a professional writer with experience covering the fields of real money online poker, casino games, and other kinds of gambling. This extends to the world of brick-and-mortar gaming, and he often travels to casinos across the United States for both business purposes and pleasure.
Max got his start in poker, as many did, in the wake of Chris Moneymaker's epic 2003 World Series of Poker victory. Depositing a tiny sum on Pacific Poker in 2004, he soon grew his bankroll through bonuses, freerolls, and soft opposition in low-stakes Limit Hold'em games.
After about a year, Max switched to No Limit Texas Hold'em and hopped around from site to site, taking advantage of the many promotions and bonuses offered to online poker players in the mid to late 2000s. He took the plunge and decided to pursue playing professionally for a living, which he did for close to a decade.
In the wake of Black Friday, online poker in the United States dried up to a certain extent, and so Max started to look for other ways of earning an income. Writing appealed to him, and he decided to write about what he knew best: poker.
Today, the bulk of Max Golden's time is spent researching, writing, and editing articles, including online gaming news, overviews of lucrative promotions, and poker room reviews. But he still takes the time, every once in a while, to fire up a few tables and square off against the fish. Max has a keen eye for value, and so he also enjoys advantage play on games other than poker and has learned how to maximize live casino comps, freebies, and other goodies.
Allen Woods
Social Media Manager, Assistant Editor, Writer
Allen Woods is a professional writer and social media manager with experience regarding gambling of all kinds. Allen has spent time traveling around the United States visiting live casinos to play poker, video poker, and slots. In addition, Allen's knowledge extends to the online arena of real money gambling, including offshore poker and casino websites.
Allen also has experience as a professional music educator. He graduated from Boise State University in 2016 with a bachelor's degree in music education. Allen taught music in public schools in Idaho and Nevada between 2016 and 2021.
Allen first expressed interest in the gambling world when he was a young child. His parents both enjoyed casinos and often brought him along on excursions to various casino-hotels. Allen was immediately entranced by the excitement he observed in the casino and soon began researching how these games worked and learning how to play.
Once Allen reached adulthood, he began visiting casinos from time to time engaging in live poker and blackjack play. Because of his keen awareness and understanding regarding some of the potential downsides of gambling, Allen was always very calculated and careful with his approach when visiting a casino. He would often take advantage of specific promotions and bonuses and make the most out of the casino comp systems.
Soon, he started to take poker more seriously and spent a lot of time studying and learning how to play Texas Hold'em. Allen has seen a fair amount of success playing live poker over the past ten years. Although he does not and has never considered himself to be a professional poker player, he has managed to play profitably for many years as a hobby.
In early 2022, Allen started to use his experience and knowledge to write about online and live gambling topics. Today, Allen spends much of his time curating and researching online gambling content. He often reviews online casinos and composes news articles regarding all kinds of gambling-related topics.
Allen is also the lead social media manager for ProfessionalRakeback. He moderates numerous gambling-focused subreddits on Reddit and handles other social media commitments from time to time.
John Mehaffey
Content Contributor
John is from Atlanta. He spent five years in South Dakota near Deadwood, home of Wild Bill Hickok and poker’s Deadman’s Hand, which is a pair of aces and eights. Local legend believes the kicker was the nine of diamonds.
John was a professional poker player during the online boom. He owned a rakeback site called Rake Rebate Review from 2004-2006. His first poker job was as a prop for Americas Cardroom in 2001. He also propped for sites like Absolute Poker, Big Bet Poker, Poker World, and Games Grid. His poker journalism work helped uncover the Absolute Poker cheating scandal.
John moved to Las Vegas in 2010. After Black Friday in 2011, the largest U.S. poker sites left the market. He decided to start the Las Vegas Blackjack Survey. That later became the Las Vegas Table Game Survey. It is found on the Vegas Advantage site he owns with his wife Kristina.
These days, he plays little poker. Most of his time is spent compiling Las Vegas casino information and working with sites like Professional Rakeback. When he gambles, it is on full-pay video poker games like Joker Poker and Bonus Poker Deluxe.
This website was founded by a professional online poker player for themselves and their friends, hence the term “Professional” in the website’s URL. The website originally catered to the high-volume winning poker player; however, it has evolved into so much more over the last 2 decades.
Just like Las Vegas, the internet never sleeps, and neither does the staff at Professional Rakeback. We are constantly investigating new news stories and changes in government regulation, creating new poker and gambling guides, and researching and reviewing new websites. Our team never stops working to provide quality content.
Our team of professional writers and researchers has continuously been engaged in publishing all over the web on dozens and dozens of websites and periodicals. You can easily find them constantly updating Wikipedia, Fandom, Reddit subs, industry forums, and other high-profile websites to keep information up-to-date and accurate.