Which Help Should You Get?

My last two columns said that some players need help against irrational fears (“monsters under the bed” — MUTB), while others are too fearless. This column will discuss when to emphasize caution or fearlessness. Base that decision on a realistic situational analysis, not on your feelings.

Although feelings damage decisions, many players don’t consider them. Instead of analyzing their feelings’ causes and effects, they rationalize, giving good reasons, but not the real reasons for their decisions.

Timid people will tell you why real monsters might be under the bed. Reckless people will tell you why fearlessness pays off. Both will be partly right, but their decisions are based primarily on their feelings, not realistic analyses. They do what they feel like doing, then think of justifications.

Don’t pretend that your feelings don’t affect your decisions. If a situation requires acting more cautiously or fearlessly than you’d like, suppress your feelings and select the approach that maximizes your EV [expected value]. This continuum illustrates your choices:

MUTB Risk-Avoider Average Risk-Seeker Reckless

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

When deciding which approach to use, consider the following factors:

• Your bankroll


• Your stack size


• Cash games versus tournaments


• Your opponents


• Your relative skill


• Your motives

Your Bankroll

The larger your bankroll, the more chances you should take. If you encounter a positive-EV situation with significant risks, you can afford to exploit it. If you lose, don’t worry about it. Since you made the right decision, you won “Sklansky bucks.”

His fans coined that term years ago. They knew — and you should know — that your long-term results will be approximately equal to your EV. If you make enough positive-EV decisions, you will win. If you make enough negative-EV decisions, you will lose.

However, with a small bankroll, your first priority must be survival. If you go broke, you’ll be out of action and unable to exploit any opportunities. So, pass up some positive-EV situations, especially high-risk ones, which can bust you.

For example, because of recent losses and expenses, your bankroll is down to $1,000. You can choose between:

• A wild, drunken $15-$30 game
• A loose-passive $4-$8 game
• A weak-tight $2-$4 game

Which one would you choose? You’ve probably got the most EV in the $15-$30 game, but the risk of going broke is too high. Loose-passive games are the easiest to beat, but the swings can be too large for your tiny bankroll.

Play $2-$4 to build up your bankroll. You may hate playing there, but you can’t afford to play higher.

Your Stack Size

Your stack is essentially your “working bankroll” for this game. If you can’t or won’t buy more chips, apply the same general bankroll management principles. With a big stack, take sensible chances, knowing that you can afford to lose the bet. The smaller your stack, the more cautious you should be. You may have to pass up some positive-EV opportunities, but that’s rationally allocating your resources.

Many players just can’t do it. They get so bored waiting for premium cards and opportunities that they essentially decide to get some chips quickly or go home. They shove in their stacks, sometimes with absurdly bad cards, and usually go broke.

A more understandable error is to make a positive-EV play that’s too risky. Let’s take an artificial situation to make the principle easier to understand. You’re in a soft no-limit hold’em game that you’re confident you can beat. Because of two bad beats, you’ve had to rebuy twice, using up all of your cash. Your stack is $100, and you can’t buy any more chips.

You’re heads up with the A♠ Q♠. The board is 8♠ 7♠ 3♥. The pot is $20. The obnoxious drunk who gave you those two bad beats flashes his cards (perhaps by accident, perhaps deliberately), showing a pair of red nines. He taunts you, “I know you’re on a draw, but you don’t have the guts to call me.” He then bets $100, making the pot $120. You’ve got 15 outs twice, which gives you a 54 percent chance of winning $120. Calling clearly has positive EV. What would you do?

Many people would call, but the wiser decision is to fold. When we were discussing this column, David Sklansky put it this way: “If making a good bet now might prevent you from making a better bet later, don’t make it.” You would probably want to make that call against anybody, and you especially want to beat that obnoxious drunk, but ignore your feelings. Since it’s a soft game, you’re going to get better opportunities. So, fold this hand and wait for them.

Tournaments Versus Cash Games

The optimum level of riskiness varies enormously in tournaments, because the value of each tournament chip changes constantly. Generally, the value of a chip that you lose is greater than the value of one that you win.

The ratio of these values depends on many factors: your stack size, the number of players left, their stack sizes, the way that they play, the blinds and antes, the payout structure, and so on. One top-three finish is generally worth more than many small cashes, and the larger the field, the more important finishing first through third becomes.

The last three winners of the World Series of Poker main event were 23, 22, and 21 years of age. As I wrote in “Why Do Kids Dominate the World Series of Poker Championship?” (Card Player, Oct. 1, 2010), one reason for the kids’ success is their fearlessness. They are much more willing than older, “wiser” players to apply Amir Vahedi’s principle: “In order to live, you must be willing to die.”

But fearlessness is not always a tournament asset. In a few situations, you actually should fold pocket aces before the flop.

Mathematicians have developed a system called the Independent Chip Model (ICM). It helps players to put the proper weights on all of the factors mentioned earlier in order to determine the EV of folding, calling, or raising. The math can be extremely complicated, and many players can’t or won’t do it. They just “go with their gut.” If they lean toward risk-taking, they often will call or raise when they should fold. Naturally cautious people make the opposite errors.

Final Remarks

Even though I’ve encouraged you to suppress your feelings, don’t ignore or deny them. Doing so will just increase their destructive effects. You can’t control your reactions if you don’t know what causes them.

Monitor your reactions, their causes, and their effects. If a situation requires an approach that is too uncomfortable, you won’t think or act well. You therefore should avoid such situations.

This column has discussed three factors to consider when deciding how much to emphasize caution or fearlessness: bankroll, stack size, and tournaments versus cash games. My next column will discuss adjusting to different types of opponents, your relative skill, and your motives. ♠

Dr. Al (alan[email protected]) coaches only on psychology issues, such as controlling impulses and emotions and coping with losing streaks. He is David Sklansky’s co-author of DUCY? and the sole author of four poker psychology books._