Leaks - Part I

No, this is not an article on plumbing, although some of the characters we'll meet here could use some repair work. The title refers to an unhappy condition that many poker players as well as other gamblers share, and even many successful players are not immune to this condition.

Lots of very good gamblers don't do nearly as well as they should because they spring "leaks." If you're not sure what a leak is, here's a typical example. There's a guy we know who plays pretty good middle-stakes poker. That's not a problem; in fact, he's a long-term winning poker player, and that's a feat in and of itself. But he has a leak; he thinks he knows something about the horses. Alas, he doesn't, and that's his problem. What's worse is that he thinks he knows it all, and because of this little flaw in his personality, he's unwilling to listen to anyone who does. He sits at the poker table with the Daily Racing Form folded up on his lap and takes a couple of quick glances at it and tries to handicap whenever he is out of a hand. Then, he gets up, goes over to the simulcasting room, and places a bunch of bets.

We've watched this guy off and on for some time now as he systematically piddles away his not insubstantial poker winnings on the horses. He has a serious leak, and he's not alone. Las Vegas, Atlantic City, and other gaming meccas are full of players who are legends at one game like sports betting or poker, but they bleed profusely from self-inflicted wounds incurred at the craps tables, baccarat, or even slots.

Leakers seem to come in two broad categories, the ignorant and the driven. The ignorant develop leaks because they don't know the statistical nature of the games they play, and don't realize they are jeopardizing their bankrolls. They believe in all sorts of things that just aren't true. They think a machine " … is due," because it hasn't paid a jackpot since the Reagan administration and now it's ready to part with its coins. Some believe just the opposite. When a machine has paid out some jackpots recently, they believe it's hot and ready to deliver again. These false, fixed beliefs are delusions of sorts - breaks from reality represented by opinions that are completely at variance with the truth - but the ignorant just don't realize it. And knowledge is power in gaming just as surely as it is in most endeavors - maybe even more so.

Another guy we know who is part of a successful video poker team routinely gives back his winnings playing the reel-based slots. When asked about this, he laughed and said, "Well, sure, but I get it back in comps." This, of course, is nonsense. If he understood how casinos comp their regular players, he would realize that by sticking with video poker, he would earn the same comps and keep his money, too.

Our friend, of course, is not alone in his benightedness. We know successful card counters who bleed back their blackjack winnings at the craps tables, and horse players who do extremely well placing win bets and exactas, but can't resist shoveling money in on the exotics like a pick-6 that they cannot beat unless they completely revamp their betting style. Most of these cases are relatively benign. These people enjoy the action and like variety. There is no real problem here since they tend to be recreational players, and all they are really doing is costing themselves a couple of bucks. In fact, many of them eventually figure out what is happening and plug their leaks.

Of more interest to us are the driven ones: players who do not just leak money, they hemorrhage it! Here's an example that, to be perfectly honest, we didn't believe at first. The incident concerns a well-known professional poker player who won a major tournament and well in excess of $100,000. He picked up his money, and turned around and found a dozen creditors standing there waiting to be paid. Alas, despite the size of the win, it wasn't enough, and the last guy in line who got shortchanged slugged our hero. Not many people win a major tournament and get a crack in the jaw as part of the prize.

His problem? It turned out to be sports betting, which afflicts more than a few poker players. Apparently, this world-class poker player routinely loses astonishing amounts of money betting sports. While thinking about this apparent anomaly, we were reminded of the life and times of the person who just may have been the best no-limit poker player ever, the late, great Stu Ungar. At the press conference after he won the World Series of Poker for the third time - this feat alone is enough to boggle the mind - a reporter asked Ungar what he planned to do with the $1 million he had just won. Stuey just giggled and responded, "Lose it!" And Ungar is not alone. More than a few of the world's top players are either flat broke or worse.

What in blazes is going on here? How can these guys be so astonishingly successful in one domain and practically brain-dead in another? We can tell you with 100 percent certainty that it takes considerable skill, resolve, mental subtlety, and emotional stability to play for high stakes in cash games and on the tournament trail. So, what happens to that skill, that stability, that resolve? The answer, it seems, is actually quite simple, and drenched in irony. The same skills that enable these guys to rise to the top of the poker world are the very ones that drag them into a financial abyss elsewhere.

These people, the ones who play at the highest levels in games like poker, play with a devil-may-care attitude. They don't care about the money. They crave action, they know and love the game, and they're ruthless. They don't just want to win; they want to crush their opponents. As another WSOP winner, the late Jack Straus, put it, "If my own grandmother sat down at the table, I'd break her." English essayist, poet, literary critic, former world-class mountain climber, and poker player Al Alvarez understood this. In his classic book, The Biggest Game in Town, he noted that these legendary gamblers don't really view the chips in the game as money; they are just their way of keeping score.

More on this fascinating subject of leaks next time.

Note: My guest co-author for this column is Arthur Reber. Our book, Gambling for Dummies, is available at your neighborhood bookstore. Both my and Arthur Reber's other books are available online at www.ConJelCo.com and www.Amazon.com.