BR management. The Mike Caro Guide

While this is somewhat sparked both by Auhfel's post, and the 100k pissing contest that FTR's regs, and that Spoon got into. I found some very interesting information in my newest top 3 favorite poker books:

Caro's Most profitable Hold'em Advice.

To break down the arguments that eventually ran in circles.

terribad small stakes player: Hi! I just won a tiny tournament, and I want to be like Chris Moneymaker! Help me luckbox a tournament

Good high stakes players: No, don't do it! take the money and play within your BR. BR management is the most important aspect of a player, ever.

Terribad player: But I make a lot of money, and I don't mind spending this money, besides if I lose it, I can just re-load, I make 50k a year at work.

Good players: BR MANAGEMENT NOOB!

Terribad: but I wanna play

Good Players: You're retarded, I give up, good luck.

Terribad: FU FORKMAN!

Good Players: You're still retarded

Terribad: I'm going to pocket 5's! Watch out for me when I'm a winnar

Good players: Can't miss you till you're gone.
etc etc etc.

Anyways, onto the meat and potatoes. Mike Caro's BR management section is probably the most interesting take I've ever seen. It seems from poker pro's there are two very definitive camps.

Camp 1: Your bankroll is your lifeline, You must always play within it, never lose more than 5-10% of your BR at any time, and manage it well. Without proper bankroll management you're simply gambling and we don't condone gambling as poker players.

Camp 2: I really don't care about money. I have a lot of it, and as long as I have enough to enter this tourney, score some hookers and blow... I'm good. Foods nice too.

Then along comes Mike Caro. Interestingly enough, he talks about this:

"It's up to you to determine how much risk you can tolerate, and how much security you require."

"Notably, the Kelly Criterion -- which determines a percentage of your bankroll you should risk variantly multiplied by your advantage -- is not very applicable to poker."

"Common mathematical formulae don't take into account that small bankrolls are easily replaced, and are not worth protecting in the same way large BR's are"

"The minimum mathematicaly proper BR that you should play at is 1 Buy in, but as your BR grows, you should be less and less wreckless."

The most important aspect of Mike Caro's "Bankroll chart" is that the larger it grows, the more you should seek to protect it.

The chart goes on to argue that for all Bankrolls 1-299 dollars, the highest limit you can play is 1-2 limit. You should be willing to have 1-buy in. Or 40 bucks.

Yes that's right, at the lowest levels, you should be willing to go out, have a good time, and just eff around.

But the moment that you get to a $300 dollar bank roll, something that's not easily replaced next paycheck, you should have about 15bi's for the game you're playing and you should be willing to protect it.

What's interesting is that we're seeing that While the new player who just wanted to goof around and see how he would do in a LOLDONKAMENT, was wrong about proper BR management, he certainly wasn't wrong in his arguments that he wanted help for the tournament and not for BR management.

Then again, Spoon is very right about proper BR managemnet in the argument: Hey, if you can't protect it now, what makes you think you can protect it later? When your BR is WORTH protecting. Practice like you play... retard!

*note, then there was this giant wall of text from our terribad player, and it hurt my head*

The problem that everyone seemed to miss; and that I think is what was most frustrating to everyone involved, was that: The $11 dollar loss represented a 30 second re-load via his debit card. Because it represented no pain to our terribad player in question. Which is another fundament flaw of bankroll management-- to play at a level that keeps the game interesting, and the player engaged. Even with $25 bucks online, it's very hard to stay engaged at .5/.10 limit, or 2 NL.

I guess what I'm getting at is that both guys in this grudgematch may have been right. Although I'm erring to the side that spoon *errr FORKMAN* was more right.

Right.

I'll keep that in mind. (that being what was said in smitt's satellite thread)

I'll stick with my 2$ 2-table SNG's, with my small BR of 80$.

and just to make sure that I "got" the thread, It's saying that I should stick to low price games because my BR can't support that much. Although it says that smaller BR's are easier to replace, and therefore you can be more wreckless with them than the higher BR's because they're not so easy to replace. Although it mentioned that, I think it's still better not to be wreckless even with small BR's.

Correct me if I'm wrong, it's pretty easy to be wrong at this time of morning.

This is a great read and something people need to look at. I'm a terrible bankroll management nit. I HAVE taken "shots" but that's few and far between. However my reasoning for being such a nit is that I want to earn my poker money and I can't reload (not even for 2c-4c). However for me, the mental idea of sitting down and losing x,000 in one hand just doesn't bother me as long as my BR can support the loss.

Some people are over rolled because they can't cope with losing money amounts. Some people are under rolled because there's no pain threshold in place. We don't need to get into e-dick waving wars just because someone has some attitude towards BR management that we don't agree with.

I agree with Mike Caro that if someone just wants to piss away money it should be small in proportion to how much money they can come up with overall.

I would have agreed with this whole post except we are seeing ever increasing instances of difficulty getting money on and off sites for Noobs. It's not just a "click Neteller and reload" world anymore. If you have more money to put on the site or are not afraid of reloading then by all means go ahead. It was mentioned in the other thread that your poker BR is the combination of all your money online and everything your willing to deposit. IF you can deposit.


BR is very important in another way other than just protection from bust, but it's also a gauge of ability and winrate. Anyone who is good enough will not have a$80BR for more than a week anyway. You can go from $2NL to $100NL in about 3 or 4 months if you have the skills. but sitting on a $80 BR for months at a time and taking risk to move up and redpositing when necessary is evidence of the need to stay within that tiny BR until a significant winrate is achieved.


Now that we have beat the BR debate to death, I declare Aug to be the month of "Should I move up where they respect my raises".

Originally Posted by Auhfel

Right.

I'll keep that in mind. (that being what was said in smitt's satellite thread)

I'll stick with my 2$ 2-table SNG's, with my small BR of 80$.

and just to make sure that I "got" the thread, It's saying that I should stick to low price games because my BR can't support that much. Although it says that smaller BR's are easier to replace, and therefore you can be more wreckless with them than the higher BR's because they're not so easy to replace. Although it mentioned that, I think it's still better not to be wreckless even with small BR's.

Correct me if I'm wrong, it's pretty easy to be wrong at this time of morning.

Yeah you got the thread.

To be honest, I think you're very borderline. They say that 50 BI's is solid for MTT's but then again, its your thresh-hold for pain that should dictate how you manage your BR. If you're feeling comfortable, then you've got BR management down, if not... well get more money in your account.

You have a large sum of money in comparison to to the cost of the game you play, and that's good, because it helps dissuade variance over the long run if you're a winning player.

Me? I've only ever put like 200 dollars online, and I want to keep it that way. So I play within my BR for the most part. I did take a shot with 20 BI's for 25nl and got whomped by Spenda, Trip, Bjaust and their Ilk. But I still felt comfortable in the game. I got money money in good once, and got my money in bad once. I walked away when I lost 10% of my roll and learned something about the game. Good BR management IMO.

So I do use BR managemnt for the most part, and encourage most people to.

Jyms has a hell of a point with his thread as to why everyone should.

Bjaust pointed something out to me which is quite simple but I think throws Carlo's argument out of the water.

I mentioned that I couldn't get motivated for $5 pots so was going to play outside my bankroll until I have more money. Which is essentially what Carlo's saying it's ok to do above, if you can afford to just reload.

Bjaust said - don't play outside your BR if the pots aren't enough instead deposit more so you can play the higher stakes you want within your new BR.

This makes perfect sense. The natural extension is that if you can't afford to deposit more, you can't afford to be playing outside of your bankroll in the first place - so should stick within the bankroll at the smaller stakes. If you can just 'reload' when you lose it, as Carlo advocates, then reload now and just start playing higher stakes right away.

It's kind of simple when you look at it like that.

Originally Posted by LuckySlevin

Bjaust pointed something out to me which is quite simple but I think throws Carlo's argument out of the water.

I mentioned that I couldn't get motivated for $5 pots so was going to play outside my bankroll until I have more money. Which is essentially what Carlo's saying it's ok to do above, if you can afford to just reload.

Bjaust said - don't play outside your BR if the pots aren't enough instead deposit more so you can play the higher stakes you want within your new BR.

This makes perfect sense. The natural extension is that if you can't afford to deposit more, you can't afford to be playing outside of your bankroll in the first place - so should stick within the bankroll at the smaller stakes. If you can just 'reload' when you lose it, as Carlo advocates, then reload now and just start playing higher stakes right away.

It's kind of simple when you look at it like that.

Your post loses all credibility because you obviously don't know who Mike Carlo is.

It's very dangerous to take what those above us say for granted Ragnar. Only by applying your own logic and reasoning will you ever become more than the sum of parts. Of course he's quoted out of context but on the face of the post Mike ' Caro's ' argument doesn't hold up as far as I'm concerned, giving what I've stated I think most people would be hard pushed to say otherwise, if you have some logical argument as to why it still makes sense, I'd love to hear it, (genuinely).

If you can re load then the amount in your current BR is not your total BR.

Anyone who told you 50 BIs was 'solid' for MTTs is not someone you should go to for BR advice.

yes that's effectively what I just said

The natural extension is that if you can't afford to deposit more, you can't afford to be playing outside of your bankroll in the first place - so should stick within the bankroll at the smaller stakes. If you can just 'reload' when you lose it, as Carlo advocates, then reload now and just start playing higher stakes right away.

Originally Posted by drmcboy

If you can re load then the amount in your current BR is not your total BR.

Anyone who told you 50 BIs was 'solid' for MTTs is not someone you should go to for BR advice.

could have sworn I found that informatino here.. but I can't find it. What do you reccommend as "solid" for an MTT?

100 buyins is the generally recommended MTT BR.

Look, theres arguments either way.

As drmcboy mentions, if you make a post saying "My BR is $50 and I'm playing 10NL", then when people tell you to drop down you get angry and say "$50 is nothing, if I lose it I'll just replace it, I have a job man!", then your BR isnt $50 at all. Thats merely the amount you have online atm. If you're prepared to spend $250 "learning poker" and if you lose all that you'll stop reloading, then your BR is $250. Personally as I told LuckySlevin, if you want to play as if you have a $250 BR because thats how much you want to deposit, then just go ahead and deposit it as one lump sum and treat it like a proper BR.

I took a different approach when I started. I gave myself a budget of $50 per month. I was prepared to deposit that for 12 months running to "learn poker". This was slightly more than I was spending on online gaming at the time (MMORPG subs) so I was basically spending the same on entertainment with a little extra to allow for the possibility of breaking even over that time, or even making profit. Just how I saw it. What I did however, was always treat my online BR as my true BR. I felt I should learn the discipline and practise from day 1. Month 1 I blew almost my whole BR (but it lasted the month unlike if I played out of it), month 2 I broke even for the month (so around $60 at the end), month 3 I won enough to break even of the 3 months ($150 at the end). After that I stopped depositing and have just built that $150 up from there.

I think I benefited from learning good BR management from day 1. Others may find it different. I never intended (and still dont) poker to be a particularly serious part of my income, but I still want to make the most of it with the time and effort I'm prepared to put into it, and that means winning $'s, which means following a BRM plan which protects my roll.


I dunno, just some random thoughts on where I'm coming from. I think you need to find what works for you.