Some Thoughts from the 2013 WSOP

It is impossible to play enough tournaments to evaluate your ability based on results. I have been playing a lot of small no-limit hold’em tournaments — $1,000 or $1,500 buy-ins. These usually attract between 2,000 and 3,000 entrants. Slightly more than the top 10 percent will receive a payout, and really only the top three or four win more than 100 times their entry fee. If a player was twice as good as average, and therefore could expect to win twice as often as the average player, he would still finish in the top five less than one-half of one percent of the time. A player would have to play hundreds of thousands of tournaments to have a meaningful sample size, which means that tournament results in these big fields are virtually meaningless for most players. You have to be many times better or worse than average to be able to evaluate your play based on your results. (And this assumes your relative ability stays the same.) Therefore, the only way to evaluate your play in these events is by looking at specific hands, not overall results.

Why play tournaments? What is the lure of tournament play? Part of it is the lottery syndrome. Everyone wants to start with a small buy-in and win a fortune. Some old timers used to refer to this as “turning a match stick into a lumber yard.” At least originally, more by accident than by plan, the WSOP has an incredibly good job of creating a product, bracelets that everyone wants. I am always amazed that I opt for the frustration of tournaments instead of just playing the cash side games. A good player might win in more than sixty percent of the cash sessions he plays. A great tournament player will probably play hundreds of these large field tournaments between wins. (And anything less than first will always be at least a little frustrating.) In tournaments you are forced to start, end, eat, use the restroom, etcetera, according to their schedule. In cash games, you set your own schedule for everything, and even have the ability to quit when you want. You never have to put in long hours at a bad table.
Develop stamina and strength: Stamina becomes extremely important. You will frequently be making your most crucial decisions late in a session. The large field tournaments play eleven levels on day one. Eleven levels combined with breaks, including a 90-minute dinner break, and the eventual bagging of chips leads to fourteen hour playing days. This can be incredibly grueling.

Take care of your bankroll and it will take care of you. Every year one hears tales of players who are (or at least were) recently considered to be great, but are now broke. These are household names who have won big tournaments, crushed cash games, and even appeared on “High Stakes Poker.” What have they done to their bankrolls? Some have thrown away most of their winnings on sports and casino games. Others have decided to test their skills at high-stakes play against other great players, often in games where they have a big disadvantage. Being a great online pot-limit Omaha player does not make you an above average live limit mixed-game player. Chinese poker is really a card arrangement game. It is great action, but it lacks most of the elements of traditional poker. The current craze for open-faced Chinese and a very volatile variation called Fantasyland makes these specialized games extremely dangerous for inexperienced players. It is always sad to be approached by one of these famous guys who is now looking to borrow money or be backed in a tournament. I have written a little about bankroll management, but some points need to be repeated. For example, if you do make a big score, don’t suddenly escalate the stakes at which you play. ♠

Steve ‘Zee’ Zolotow, aka The Bald Eagle, is a successful gamesplayer. He has been a full-time gambler for over 35 years. With 2 WSOP bracelets and few million in tournament cashes, he is easing into retirement. He currently devotes most of his time to poker. He can be found at some major tournaments and playing in cash games in Vegas. When escaping from poker, he hangs out in his bars on Avenue A in New York City -The Library near Houston and Doc Holliday’s on 9th St. are his favorites.