What Is Poker? Can A Rich Man Ever Truly Play The Game?

Can rich nerds like Gates and Buffet ever know what it's like to play real poker?

I posed myself this question the other day: "What is poker?" See, it might seem an easy question to answer with a stock reply such as "It's a card game where gambling is involved", or "a card game involving both luck and skill" etc... But this sort of answer would lump poker in with the other games of our world, when it is in fact a game that stands alone. It's not just a game of cards, it's the money game. 

Let's get a little abstract. Is playing 1cent-2cent poker with a $1 buy-in, poker? Simple answer is yes, obviously. Yet, if I was playing such a game I would feel it devoid of some of the elements I deem fundamental to the game. Namely, the prospect of winning or losing sums that are significant to me. I wouldn't be "gambling" because I couldn't win or lose anything. It wouldn't feel like real poker. Playing poker for no money just isn't poker in my book. It's a mock version of poker played for fun that doesn't retain the most important aspect of the real game, which is that sums of money which are significant to the player can be won or lost. 

At a kitchen table game with a $5.00 buy-in things swing drastically in a different direction as people with small net worths are now competing for spendable cash. A winner likely earns enough for a round of drinks, and still has some left over to afford a decent meal. Surely, this type of a game is a real poker game... But how do you think Phil Ivey would feel playing in it? With the swings of the game being completely inconsequential to the player, he or she becomes removed from the game. I don't think you're playing poker if you don't have "something" on the line, a stake that means enough to you for the game itself to have meaning. Perhaps this lays bare the truth of my lack of surety about what poker really is. If the game has no meaning to the participant, than it just doesn't feel like real poker.

If Michael Jordan tosses a crumpled up piece of paper across the room into a waste-paper basket, and nobody even sees it, is he really "playing basketball"? I think it's reasonable to conclude that when the game is stripped of intended meaning it isn't really the same game anymore.

Many people reading this right now probable think I'm wrong, and that "poker's poker". But let me ask you something, is video poker, poker? Is the Caribean Stud Jackpot house game, poker? They use the same hand rankings, yet, they are not the same game. If you played poker with a monkey who was trained to raise every bet would you consider that poker? Defining what real poker truly is, is a question with a bit more depth. Not only is there the consideration of skill, but also the issue of perspective.

I'm not saying that if a serious pro player sits down with a rich guy to play heads up holdem that it isn't a real poker game. Quite the contrary, the pro would in fact be playing one of the realest of the real forms of the game. His business, his income, his LIFE are kinda in the balance here. A huge score in such a game could boost his confidence and his bankroll enough for him to genuinely increase his station in life, and to improve his career prospects (bigger bankroll = bigger games with more earning potential). That's real poker. But what about the business man? Is he playing real poker? 

The businessman may be getting a kick out of the game, and even taking it seriously. Still when it happens that people play so far below their means that the financial outcome of the game bears ABSOLUTELY no significance, the game changes shape from the perspective of that particular player. Let's say our businessman is worth 1 billion, and the buy in for the game in question is $5000, so 0.0005% of his net worth. From his perspective, it ain't real poker, it's just messing around playing cards. The game might as well be Parcheesi. For him to truly feel what it feels like to play poker, he would have to call up Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg and the boys and fire up a $50k-$100k NL game with a 10 million dollar buy-in :)

REAL POKER: Professionalism At The Table

I was planning on waiting until I suffered a brutal downswing in my regular $4/8 kill limit holdem game before posting a new blog here. You know, so I could vent and try to carve out some wisdom about how to deal with a frozen wave of cards like you fuckin' read about. But this hasn't happened yet, and I'm mildly inspired to rant about a completely different topic: professionalism at the poker table.

Before discussing my main topic I'll recap my results of late: My bankroll stands at $6750. My rate stands at $21.57/hr for my first 195 hours of 4/8 kill. So, I'm actually making MORE money in that game than I was when I last posted. I've considered playing more small stakes NL, or PLO, or this juicy $4/8 kill Omaha high/pineapple they've got here. But really limit holdem is my best game, and my philosophy comin' back has been if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Also, I get to look over at the goings on of the local $20/40 kill game and scope out when the game is best, who's winning, and when I'll want to schedule my sessions once I get my roll back up to snuff for that game (10-12k). It's especially tough playing low (lower than I've ever played before by a longshot) when there's a great $20/40 game right there on the next table. But getting in the hours has certainly been made much easier by my stellar results.

On a sidenote, this may come off as cocky, but I feel like sticking a disclaimer out there for any new or young players out there who think that they're hot shit or what not: I'm a battle-hardened $20-40 to $40-80 limit holdem winner (with hundreds of +EV hours logged in bigger limit games, and mid stakes NL as well), and I'm winning this much money in the small game because I have a lot of experience. I don't want some 21 year old kid who plays a bit of poker thinking that they suck if they can't make $20/hr in a friggin' $4/8 game! It's bloody hard to do it, and I'm also convinced I've received above average cards. For a serious noob, to earn $6-8/hr in a $4/8 in the long run (what with the brutal rake effect and all), would be both a great accomplishment, and a result indicative of an adequate skill level to play higher (like say $8/16 or $10/20). Personally, I'd be stoked if I could maintain a rate of 2 big bets per hour in the long run at $4/8.

Why does professionalism matter at the poker table? 

I can see the gears clicking in a lot of 20something players' heads when they see me cavort and constantly shoot the shit with all of the other players. They must think: why the fuck is that guy being so social?! Afterall, they've come up playing online poker (and can still play here in Canada because we've yet to suffer the repercussions of an overly self-interested government like you unfortunate suckers in the US), and consequentially many have a poor understanding of the social aspects of the game, or the reasons behind keeping the mood light and fun at the table. In fact, many of the young players I've encountered lately lack any sense poker etiquette or respect for the game. Even experienced players who know that a happy game is a good game for all, often still miss the point because they too have little respect for the game itself. If you truly understand poker, and love the game, then you'll never berate a player again for drawing out, or making a funky play that beats you, or anything like that. In fact, you'll do your absolute best to be as courteous and entertaining as possible to every player in your game at all times, no matter how many tough beats they deliver to you. This is in part because as a pro, before you ever snap and/or tilt, you'll just leave the game. Part of being professional is striving to play your absolute best in every pot, and recognizing that when you can't do this anymore it's time to take some rest.

But enough with the obvious stuff. So a game where the players are talking and having fun while they're gambling is more profitable for a pro, duh. And by chatting with players you can get a read on them and figure out some subtleties about the way they think and in turn use this information against them in the betting, duh. And we all know that letting your opponents see your frustration only works to your detriment because it instill them with confidence as it builds up the idea that you're unlucky and/or playing worse, DUH. This stuff is really just the tip of the iceberg:

Poker is a beautiful and complex game that's still got a bit of a bad name. Online poker companies and the newfangled "poker media" have fueled all sorts of lies about how anyone can become a champ overnight and win a bunch of money. In reality most unskilled gamblers honestly have a WAY BETTER chance of turning a significant profit by playing slot machines then they do at this game of skill. Yes I said it, poker is a game of virtually pure SKILL. Obviously there are a few oddball cases of rank amateurs who make big money in the game ("God Bless Chris Moneymaker" - M.Matusow 2003 ), but over time there's a very small percentage of players in the overall poker economy, likely only the top 5-10% of them (with the top 1% making a majority of the money) that end up with almost all of the money. Also, I have personally known 2 20something poker millionaires who have blown their bankrolls. One of whom literally went from a 2.2 million USD bankroll, a 150k sports car, and a penthouse apartment just off the Las Vegas strip, to living in his parent's basement, completely busted. Now if the house rakes were lower, there would be a greater chance for a higher percentage of players to be winners. Alas, casinos must charge something, and this 'something' makes a lot of decent and otherwise small winning players into small losers. But I digress, my point is just that poker is a skill game that in the end has a very strong tendency to reward the players with the highest levels of intellect, heart, and perseverance. 

Poker's just like any other sport or skill game, and I wish that the poker media industry would work harder on billing the game for what it truly is. Misrepresenting the game is very unprofessional and passé, and I'm anxious for the day when the same will be said about poker tournaments as well. In my opinion, they are a whole load of silliness, and they diminish the relevance of many of the skills a true pro must possess in order to thrive. In poker we keep score mostly in private, in dollars, not in trophies. Your score is for you to ponder. A heroic triumph or an epic fail are only measurable in metrics that you construct for yourself. Being a tournament winner means little, being a winner in life means everything. And if you don't believe me that tournament players are generally weak, just go ask ANY group of high stakes cash players if they'd like to see a "tournament superstar" added to the roster of their poker game. They'll be licking their chops at the prospect. And the reason for that is because they know that they are more skilled at poker, plain and simple. Take those same cash pros and put them in tournaments and they'll utterly dominate, the whole time wondering what's going on in the real games in the next room. Poker tournaments are to poker as mini-golf is to golf. They just don't encompass the true spirit of the game.

So I've tried to elaborate on why it's important to be polite at the table, and I've given some comments on poker in general. It's time to talk about professionalism in it's purest form. There are tens of millions of poker players, and they're all supposed to be allowed to play the game however they want, and that's the beauty of the game of poker. Let that sink in for a moment. Now, let's talk about "the pros". Are you really a true professional if you somehow try to infringe on another player's right to play however they want to play, to gamble however they want to gamble? Obviously, if they play poorly then it's money in your pocket, we covered that earlier, duh. So the very thought of being aggravated by another's play is a complete waste of mental energy. Also, displaying such aggravation immediately shows that you're an amateur, a pretender, or quite new to the game. If you happen to berate another player for a play they make, sure, you're obviously directly costing yourself a little bit of money, but also you're disgracing the game you're supposed to love. If you can't keep it together and focus only on playing your best and being cordial, then you aren't a pro and you need wisen up. Otherwise you'll always be just a donkey in a horserace, staring at what were your chips as they now sit in the stack of a smiling professional.

It's Vegas Baby

This is an article in the series entitled 'The Smartgambler Saga'  

My next few entries will likely be dispatches from Las Vegas Nevada. I'm planning to stay here until late March and build up my bankroll to tackle some bigger games than the ones I've been playing in for the past year...
It's been over a year since I last made it down to Las Vegas and let me tell you there was a hell of a buzz in our car yesterday as we rode in over the southern mountains from Boulder City into the epic lights of the city at night. Finally catching a glimpse of the Vegas skyline was almost as exhilirating as seeing the Grand Canyon for the first time, something I did earlier that day. My girl and I rode in her 1993 unregistered Subaru Impreza from Toronto all the way to Las Vegas. We took our time seeing the sights as we passed through the cities of Buffalo, Columbus, Indianapolis, St.Louis, Tulsa, Oklahoma City, Amarillo, Albequerque and Flagstaff. I think the most fun we had was in the smaller towns though, Tucumcari for example, was like a time warp into the Old West. I got my family who live back home in Ottawa, a few pieces of Navajo Indian jewellery at a trading post. The second half of the trip really got me in the mood to gamble.

Updates From The Land Of Cheap Games

If you've been following me on twitter (@oldtimepoker) you no doubt are aware that I've returned to poker in a big way. And by "big way" I mean, I'm playing a lot, not that I've made any sort of splash. In fact, I'm starting WAY at the bottom, and playing in games smaller than I ever have before. Why? Because I'm playing on a 3.7k bankroll. That's why :)

The aforementioned games include the "staple" 4/8 kill limit holdem, the "crazy game" 4/8 kill Omaha/Crazy Pineapple mix, $1/2 NL with a $100 buy in, and I played one session of $1/2 PLO no max buy-in (that game was actually too big for me I'd say). You can find all of these fine games plus 20/40 kill limit holdem and some much bigger NL and PLO action here in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

In the past the smallest game I've ever played with any sort of consistency has been $15/30. I have a lot of stats on my $20/40, $30/60 and $40/80 game, but hardly anything for low stakes. Now, looking back, it's kinda funny to have all of these sustained good results over a 4.5 year period (since I started using the stat tool on cardplayer.com, which by the way is pretty handy because it can spit out excel spreadsheets for you). I made $33.50/hr at 20/40 (Toronto, Commerce and Calgary), $42.40/hr at 30/60 (Bellagio mostly), and $34.70/hr at 40/80 (Commerce), over several thousand of hours of play. You'd think it would maybe be hard for a semi-hardened limit holdem veteran like me to step way down to 4/8, but honestly, it's been awesome.

BUT, the #1 concern I had right out of the gate was: Can I even win any real money in a game this small? I've heard all kinds of old timers say that a game that small has too significant of a rake to be beatable. My guestimation is that I win around 2.7 pots per hour and that they are raked an average of $3 each (not including the optional bad beat jackpot drop, which here in Alberta is actually a zero sum proposition). So, I'm guessing here, but I think I'm getting raked around $8/hr, and losing out on a total of $10.70/hr when I don't hit the jackpot. Relying on the jackpot isn't a good policy, so let's just assume that I'm getting raked $10.70/hr... That's 1.33 big bets per hour! Daunting to say the least. But how does this really affect my bottom line?

In $20/40 I figure every pot is max raked and I win around 2.8 pots per hour, so it's easy to say that I'm out $17.00/hr, and that if I can beat the game for 1.5 big bets per hour, I'm totally in the clear earning $60 minus $17 for a profit of $43/hr. This is a normal result for me when I'm in an average game and playing well (which in the past was not always the case as I practiced very poor game selection in my 20s, alas, I digress.). So, if I could only beat the 4/8 game for 1.5 big bets, things would look like this: $12 minus $10.70 = $1.30/hr profit! HORRIBLE! My wife played 4/8 for 200 hours awhile back and her results looked only slightly better than this. When I first did these calculations, I got a little afraid, but then I realized something crucial. $20/40 is WAY TOUGHER than $4/8!!! OMFG these people can barely play! Many of them don't even appear to want to win?! OF COURSE I can make more big bets per hour in 4/8 than I can in 20/40. The question then becomes: how many more?

Well, I can't answer this question without a lot more stats, but I'm proud to say that in my first 85 hours I've been on the plus side by a margin of $16.07 per hour. This means that I've been beating $4/8 for approx. 2 big bets per hour more than I would estimate being able to win in a normal $20/40 game. Not bad at all. If I can keep my rate above $15/hr for 4/8 I'd be thrilled. My guess is that I've been running slightly above EV (winning an extra kill pot or two) and that $12 or $14 is probably as good as I can hope for long term. But I'll try and prove that wrong. And I'll keep you updated on this blog and via twitter as to how things shake out.

Everyday I look over at the 20/40 game, oftentimes licking my chops. But you can't play 20/40 on a 3.7k roll, I have to earn my way up the ladder this time, and do things right. I'm sick of my life being on the wire, and I'm sick of squandering my talent chasing the dream of making a huge score. In poker, the winners are the guys who think long term, and don't quit. I've been the most erratic player for the past 7 years, frequently taking weeks off, road tripping allover the place incurring high expenses, starting all sorts of other ventures and barely playing poker, never sticking to a solid, easy game to rebuild, etc... It's a losing philosophy. If you want to be successful, you've gotta play A LOT, and also, make sure to keep eating slices of humble pie on the regular.

Running Bad Or Playing Bad?

This is an article in the series entitled 'The Smartgambler Saga' 

Lately, I've been taking a look at my results and asking the age old poker question. Am I playing bad or running bad?
I just hit one hundred hours of play in my new regular limit holdem game in Calgary. The stakes are a modest $15/$30, but with the inclusion of a full kill, occasional over buttons and many players belonging to the "loose and clueless" category, there is more than enough reason to believe that a serious player can make his bones in this game. And that's what I've been trying to do for the past 100 hours, with less than stellar results.

One Million Donkeys

This is an article in the series entitled 'The Smartgambler Saga' 

Whenever I run sour playing a biggish game, I like to try and remind myself that it'll be allright. I know I'll be allright because there's always a good game, live or online, there are a million donkeys out there.

Depending on who you ask, taking shots is not always thought to be an advisable strategy for ascending the poker ladder. Many pros advocate taking it easy and trying to get comfortable in a cheap game. Gradually moving up in stakes over long periods of time, one little jump at a time. I try to do things this way, but the truth is, if you are in this game you must both love to gamble and to challenge yourself. If you play too small as a pro, to quote the legendary Mike McD " you're whole life can become a f%*@ing grind".