Poker Articles

By Fox | Published May 17 2005, 05:47 PM
The recent reload bonus on PokerStars has me playing alot of single table tournaments again. It feels like coming home. I built my bankroll playing the $30 STT's at Party and I figure if I can beat that terrible structure I can beat anything. This has proven true as I have played higher at sites with better structures and done very well in the past few months. I'm up a little over a thousand in the past two days, playing two STT's at a time. I make sure to start the second one at least 10 minutes into the first so that I don't end up in two heads up matches at once.

It seems like the $50 STT's at stars have players that are as bad as the $30 tables at party, which I would say is equivalent to the $10 or $20 players at UB. The quality of players brings up another subject I've been meaning to discuss...

Why do people complain about bad players? I LOVE BAD PLAYERS!!

Bad players are how I make my living. Every mistake they make pays me money in the long run. If you get sucked out on for god's sake just tell the guy "nice hand" and stop teaching him how to play. The most powerful way to change someone's behavior is shame, and if you shame people into playing better you are throwing away money. Make a festive environment for these boneheads and let them throw a party with their money.

As a "professional" player I consider myself to be in the entertainment business. I provide entertainment for people as best I can by providing them a worthy opponent who is polite and fun to play with. If I was a jerk to the guys who called me with crap they wouldn't do it again and they would fold their hand the next time I want them to call with their trash. I think the majority of people complaining that the players are too bad for them to beat simply don't know how to change up their game.

If the players are loose and wild then you need to play solid hands and play them aggressively. Don't get tricky yourself, just get paid off when you get your big hands. The money is huge when you play well against bad players as long as you remain patient.

I actually defended a terrible player at a 5/10 table on Party about a year ago. He was russian and didn't speak english too well, and his poker skills were missing entirely. He actually berated me for only playing the "pretty cards" preflop and said I should play the cards that were yet to come and not jsut the first two. I agreed and told him he should teach me more so he followed me around to various tables for a month until he went broke. I probably made $500 from being nice to the guy.

I guess the moral of the story is - Learn how to beat bad players and how to adjust to every game situation.  Then you won't be educating bad players, you'll be breaking them.