Tough Times Call for Tough People

The downturn of the banking industry, the credit crunch, and the loss of trillions of dollars of assets by millions of Americans have a compounding economic effect on the nation as a whole, on the discretionary income of its citizens, and thus the nation’s poker games. As I wrote at great length in The Home Poker Handbook, each poker room, poker site, and home game represents a micro economy. Collectively, all of the poker games in the world constitute a macro economy. For that economy to thrive, money must pour into it faster than money leaves it in the form of winnings, rake, and tips. Unfortunately, at this particular juncture in American economic history, more than 20 percent of America’s net worth — mostly in stocks and home equity — has been wiped out. Even people who aren’t poor are feeling poor, and that has slowed the flow of money into the poker economy. Those of us who play regularly are competing for a smaller pool of dough.

But, as the legendary Benny Binion once stated, “Tough times don’t last, but tough people do.”

Anybody who depends on poker for part or all of his income must have the grit and heart to make it through tough times — not just tough economic times, but tough personal times, as well. Relationships change, loved ones die, and tragedies occur that affect you emotionally and impair your ability to play your best. When your game is negatively affected, it will affect your life. When your life is negatively affected, it will further affect your game, a compounding negative spiral.

Surviving tough times also requires living a lifestyle in which you are prepared for famine, and are not just living high during the feast.

One type of player who’s particularly vulnerable to tough times is the one with a “good enough” mentality. For lots of things in life, good enough is indeed good enough. But, those who settle for good enough during the feast find themselves nowhere near good enough when the famine comes. Among other things, they have designed their lives around behaviors that result in giving less than their best. There is a whole realm beyond good enough, and those who live there will always fare better in tough times. Others seem weak mentally, and tend to collapse when things get tough.

I see a lot of people packing down the free booze at poker tables these days — people I’ve never seen have a drink while playing. Their response to tough times is to seek solace in booze and sometimes drugs. While this may temporarily ease their emotional and mental anguish, it surely doesn’t help their poker decisions. If you find yourself drinking or getting high before or during your play, you need to get a grip, now, or you’re gonna be a bust-out.

Another type of player who’s ill-equipped for this moment in economic history is the one who lives fast and loose, out on the edge. If these players can play a higher game, they do. If they can create an expensive lifestyle, they do. This is part of the gambling world’s allure. But it also creates unnecessary risks. When the poker economy shrinks, their bankrolls become nonexistent and their lifestyles disintegrate. Live your life not on the edge of your means, but comfortably within them, or you won’t make it through this.

What do you do to avert problems during tough times? Be properly bankrolled for the game you play. Maintain six months’ living expenses in addition to your bankroll requirements to carry you through bad runs. It’s important to maintain your strength, courage, character, fortitude, and heart throughout the bad times. Keep your head up! If mistakes got you where you are, look back and learn lessons from them, then forget about them. Don’t beat yourself up over them.

Never lose faith in yourself; always strive to win. I know this sounds obvious, but many players just give up or get steamed, and live their lives on varying levels of tilt.

There are some players in Vegas who have ridden out previous recessions, and they are still here, paying their bills, investing for the future, taking care of their families. They aren’t “good enough” types. They don’t lean on the crutch of booze and drugs. They don’t live so far out on the edge that they can’t find their way back to the center. They manage their money away from the game as well as they do in the game. And they are, as Benny Binion would have recognized, tough.

The national economy will settle into a new place, and find a new rhythm. Other factors will contribute to poker’s macro cash flow, from changes in the UIGEA [Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act] to new markets opening the game, and other variables that we can’t even see on the horizon. When the cycle turns, as it inevitably does, the tough ones, who manage their lives well, will still be here to take the money.

You can’t change how you got where you are, and you certainly have no control over the macro economic cycle. But in life, just like in poker, you can only play your hand from where you stand. When life — or the economy — or anything else, for that matter, deals you a bad beat, all you can do is play the next hand. And when you do, play it the best that you can!

Longtime poker pro and author Roy Cooke’s Card Player column has appeared since 1992. A successful Las Vegas real estate broker since 1990, his website is www.roycooke.com. Should you wish to inquire regarding real-estate matters — including purchase, sale, or mortgage — his phone number is (702) 396-6575. Roy’s longtime collaborator John Bond’s website is www.johnbondwriting.com. Find John and Roy on Facebook.