a lot of those guys were only short puts or only calls,depending on the trend, so if he was short calls, he cleaned up
Honestly, I've not heard a single successful option trader warn against short positions. Of course you should be on the short side of options trading, how else do you expect to make a profit in the long run? The reason short strategies often times "work until they don't" isn't because they are short. There's nothing wrong with being short and even naked options. It's because sometimes people trade them unhedged and don't take into account tail risk. They say shit like: "no it's ok because I'm trading way out at 2 standard deviations" blah blah blah. It's hilarious. I always remind them. It's called 2 standard deviations for a reason. It's because IT HAPPENS. If 2 SD moves didn't happen, they would be called "impossible deviations"