Tommy Angelo on Bankroll Management

Just thought that this might be worth reading for most poker players, especially those who would think that I take bankroll management too seriously or that I'm too conservative with my own.

http://www.tommyangelo.com/articles/...not_enough.htm

You can figure out the details on your own, but there's one part I want to quote here. After talking about how he always brings more logs [money] than he needs to the camp site, he writes the following:

You could say I've gone too far with this. You could say I'm too worried about running out of wood [money]. And you'd be wrong. I'm not the slightest bit worried.

Get to reading.

Here's my 2 cents:

Bankroll management is for players with just that - a bankroll. Players with $25, $50, heck $200 - that's not a bankroll. Don't get me wrong, everyone must start somewhere, but good grief. Depositing $50 into a site only to grind away at $.01/.02 for what seems like an eternity is just a big waste of time. Take a freakin' shot. If you can't afford to lose $50, then you shouldn't have gambled with it in the first place.

Putting a big brick wall around your tiny little deposit is just silly unless you're an absolute beginner. But then again, nothing will make you tighten up and learn the game more than losing your money.

Now I'm not saying go play $25NL at 100BB with a $50 bankroll, because that's just plain stupid. But like I said, take a shot. Go play $10NL and buy-in for the standard 50BB ($5.00) for example. That's 10 buy-ins, that's enough for this low level. Don't multi-table and get all crazy with it. Play smart, tight, and be observant. In other words, play your A-game but don't play like it's scared money. It's only $50, you can re-load if you must.

With that being said, when you start to build an actual bankroll, you should be more cautious with it the larger it gets. A big bankroll is worth protecting much more than a small one. That's why banks have safety deposit boxes and secure vaults. You don't need a vault to protect $50, just throw it in a drawer. Add buy-ins as you move up. For micro levels, start with 5-10 BI and increase that number as you move up in stakes.

Let the bashing begin! I'll be over here while you light your torches and load your guns.

My standards for bankroll management have been (and probably will continue to be) directly proportional with the magnitude of the worst cooler I've ever had.

Originally Posted by d0zer

My standards for bankroll management have been (and probably will continue to be) directly proportional with the magnitude of the worst cooler I've ever had.

LOL... care to elaborate?

Originally Posted by Mezza Morta

Originally Posted by d0zer

My standards for bankroll management have been (and probably will continue to be) directly proportional with the magnitude of the worst cooler I've ever had.

LOL... care to elaborate?

As my donk ass got smacked down harder and harder, I just naturally wanted a bigger and bigger cushion.

My downswings got worse as I went up the limits & this for example dissuaded me from taking a stab at 400NL with a 6k BR, something I in essence did when moving from 25NL to 50NL.

Understood. Getting smacked around ain't much fun.... and can't argue with needing a cushion with a $6K roll either. You're not high-rolling, but it's damn sure worth protecting.

Originally Posted by Mezza Morta

Depositing $50 into a site only to grind away at $.01/.02 for what seems like an eternity is just a big waste of time. Take a freakin' shot. If you can't afford to lose $50, then you shouldn't have gambled with it in the first place.

...


Now I'm not saying go play $25NL at 100BB with a $50 bankroll, because that's just plain stupid.

Your statements seem contradictory.

You say 'take a shot' and play 10NL with 5 BIs. That's risky and could well result in losing it all fairly quickly. Not quite as risky as playing 25NL with 2BI, but still risky.

If you're more than willing to accept losing $50, why is taking more of a risk 'just plain stupid', when you advocate taking slightly less of a risky plan. Many people would say that it's just plain stupid to play 10NL with $50.

I would say that neither is "just plain stupid" as long as you fully understand the risks involved, and are willing to accept the likely event of losing yer $50.

What is just plain stupid is having no BR management under the assumption that you're a poker god and could never go broke.

Originally Posted by d0zer

I would say that neither is "just plain stupid" as long as you fully understand the risks involved, and are willing to accept the likely event of losing yer $50.

Yeah, but I said half-stack it with 50BB which would theoretically give you 10 BI. Comparing 10 BI, even though they're half-stacks when you sit down, is a lot larger (and less riskier) than 2 full BI at $25NL. One is taking a shot with a low-to-average risk. The other is taking a shot with some serious risk.

Originally Posted by d0zer

What is just plain stupid is having no BR management under the assumption that you're a poker god and could never go broke.

Agreed, but anyone who thinks they're a poker god at the micros has another thing coming. Confidence doesn't equal poker god but it's mandatory to take a shot so you're not playing like it's scared money.

My point is just that it's a 'tolerance for risk' thing.

you've obviously found the point where you're comfortable with the risk, but many people would consider that foolishly reckless, just like you consider people with even more tolerance for risk foolish.

I'm of the opinion that beginners learning the game SHOULD be more conservative than your plan, at least following 20 BI rules playing fullstack which develops key skills that playing 50BBs deep won't.

But I wouldn't rag on anyone who's ok with the likely possibility of goin' broke more than a few times in the learning process, as long as it's not significant money to them.

There is no Risk taking. This is poker not gambling. You take as many buyins as you are comfortable with. Comfort comes form having one or more of several things

Existing money to replace your BR.
More buyins than you could ever lose at the stake you play.
A history of beating the game.

The one time you think about the money when calling or making a bet/raise, or look in your account at the balance, you are playing underrolled. There is no doubt about it. If you doubt what a larger bankroll can do for you, try dropping down 2 levels. If your struggling to get to $50NL play a 1000 hands at $5NL and try to destroy it. If your uncomfortable at $100NL go play some $25NL for a day and see what the other half lives like (The intentionally "overrolled") I say intentionally because playing overrolled on purpose is different than a BR nit who is afraid to move up. I just dropped 12 buyins at $100NL over the last two days, dicking around with some new software and trying to adjust my game at the same time. I still do not need to move down and can still play comfortable enough to remain aggressive and shove my stack when needed.

Can't this also come under trying to build a roll through grinding? I haven't invested a cent in online poker of my own money through free cash from a few sites and have built a roll of $35 into a roll of $55 over a few weeks. My goal is to be able to say that I built a roll without making any investment with my own money.

I'm happy playing 5nl with this roll because my investment was nothing, even though BR management would have me at 2nl until I hit $100.

Originally Posted by d0zer

As my donk ass got smacked down harder and harder, I just naturally wanted a bigger and bigger cushion.

moral of the story - bruised arses need comfortable seating???

had my first $400 pot yesterday, shame that i lost it... still planning 100nl until either $4200 (move down) or $10k (move up)

Originally Posted by jyms

There is no Risk taking. This is poker not gambling.

The smaller your roll is, the more likely it is that you'll bust (assuming you don't move down). That's the risk taking I'm talking about.

Any game that can result in a month long losing stretch for a player better than his opponents IS a game of chance and hence gambling.

It falls somewhere between roulette (pure chance) and chess (pure skill), but I dunno how you can say it's not gambling.

I think that colloquially, people use the word "gamble" to mean a wide variety of things.

One might consider gambling anything that involves any risk of losing money. I feel this definition is too wide because it includes activities like.. investing in mutual funds.

Another might consider gambling only the activities in which return is based entirely on luck.

Neither fits with an official webster definition, but unless we agree exactly on what a term means, it doesn't seem meaningful to say whether something is or is not an example of that term...

I'm talking about "Gambling" the verb, not "Gambling" the noun. Dozer, anytime you can be "better" than your opponent, gambling is not involved. Even if you can lose for a month. that's variance. When an opponent has an edge, ie; blackjack dealers, roulette tables, video machines, that would be gambling. Playing a game like poker against an opponent you are better than, but losing a bunch of buy ins doesn't mean you are gambling, if you have the cushion to absorb variance, inevitable variance.

C&P'd from answers.com

gam·ble (găm'bəl) pronunciation

v., -bled, -bling, -bles.

v.intr.

1.
1.To bet on an uncertain outcome, as of a contest.
2. To play a game of chance for stakes.
2. To take a risk in the hope of gaining an advantage or a benefit.
3. To engage in reckless or hazardous behavior: You are gambling with your health by continuing to smoke.

none of these apply to most of us and our poker game.

I will give you the benefit of the doubt that any single hand of poker may fit into one or more of these categories, but as a whole, either by session or longer term, none apply to most of us.

I know we poker players don't like to associate ourselves with typical gamblers because they're typically desperate thrill-addicts playing a game they can't beat, while we are actually playing the game, thinking it through, using skill & intuition to make +EV decisions etc...

I don't really feel like nitpicking semantics, but I think we still fall under the wing of that term, even though we 'players' gamble intelligently, while 'gambl0rz' gamble recklessly.

Responding to Mezza Morta

I don't really know you and haven't had any meaningful conversation with you, so I'm not going to jump in and make smartass remarks that might be interpreted as being an asshole when I mean them in a good nature. Instead, I'll just pick out some specific topics from your post and address them individually.

Players with $25, $50, heck $200 - that's not a bankroll.

This is just wrong. A bankroll is not a subjective observation. If someone has a bankroll set aside to play and learn poker from, they shouldn't throw good bankroll management out the window just because it's considered "small" by other members of the poker community.

Depositing $50 into a site only to grind away at $.01/.02 for what seems like an eternity is just a big waste of time.

If it seems like an eternity then you (not you personally, just any given player) don't have the patience needed for any higher stakes, so you should spend some time at $0.01/0.02 to develop that patience. It doesn't take very long to move up through the limits if you put in the time necessary to do so, even if you use somewhat conservative bankroll guidelines.

It's important for players to learn solid money and time management skills and discipline while they are at the lowest of the microstakes before they move up through the ranks and have a large sum of money that can be lost. I could name countless examples of individuals who didn't learn one or more of these things at lower stakes and blew off four or five figures or more because of it.

Take a freakin' shot. If you can't afford to lose $50, then you shouldn't have gambled with it in the first place.

This shows a lot different attitude towards poker than what we generally try to bring out of the new players, and is really the type of advice that shouldn't be given in a bankroll management thread.

But like I said, take a shot. Go play $10NL and buy-in for the standard 50BB ($5.00) for example. That's 10 buy-ins, that's enough for this low level.

The standard buy-in for online No-Limit Hold'em is 100 big blinds. Many players suggest that new players learn to play with 100 big blind stacks so that they can start to develop the skills needed to perform well at higher stakes of 100 big blind stack games. Suggesting "shortcuts up the ladder" so to speak by buying in short or playing with too few buy-ins (or any other "method") is outside the scope of this thread, and really should be kept elsewhere.

For micro levels, start with 5-10 BI and increase that number as you move up in stakes.

It goes along with everything I've said so far, but I'd just like to add that I really wish advice like this wouldn't be given in the Beginner's Forum of a poker site. While more experienced players who have been around for a while might understand what you're getting at with this, new players will not, and this type of conflicting information will really impede upon their ability to be successful at the game.



Responding to everyone else:

Poker is gambling no matter how long or short of a term you use. But so is getting in your car to go to work. If you use a million buy-in bankroll management rule and you beat all stakes for 10 ptbb/100 all the time, there is a non-zero chance that you will go broke if you play for long enough.


But back on topic, how many actually read the article?

Originally Posted by spoonitnow

I'm not going to jump in and make smartass remarks that might be interpreted as being an asshole when I mean them in a good nature.

Who stole spoony's FTR login and password?

Originally Posted by spoonitnow

But back on topic, how many actually read the article?

I read it before the op, and reread most of it. Patience is my biggest struggle, and getting less than 3k hands in 6 weeks (until last Friday) doesn't help grind much roll at any stakes. I'll get to 100nl, I'm confident of it. But I need solid br management and patience out the whazzoo to remember its hands played, not weeks at a level that matters. The roll is getting back to 25nl size again, and I'm learning a lot. But that grind, grind, grind attitude and discipline is key, and I have to relearn it like every month. Hell, every week.

Originally Posted by Robb

Originally Posted by spoonitnow

I'm not going to jump in and make smartass remarks that might be interpreted as being an asshole when I mean them in a good nature.

Who stole spoony's FTR login and password?

It goes along with everything I've said so far, but I'd just like to add that I really wish advice like this wouldn't be given in the Beginner's Forum of a poker site. While more experienced players who have been around for a while might understand what you're getting at with this, new players will not, and this type of conflicting information will really impede upon their ability to be successful at the game.

I actually did read the article, but just felt like ranting about BRM. I agree with you here though... true beginners really should not follow my advice simply because they need to put in the time to learn the game. At least it seems you kinda' understood where I was coming from and the reasoning behind it... but you just didn't like where I posted it. I can live with that.

But now that I've went back and read what I posted, I realize that maybe I shouldn't have ranted on about some things because it might discourage some of the real beginners that peruse this forum. But then again, if they can't take it with a grain of salt and move on, they're playing the wrong game.... so I guess we'll just call it a wash.

Originally Posted by Mezza Morta

It goes along with everything I've said so far, but I'd just like to add that I really wish advice like this wouldn't be given in the Beginner's Forum of a poker site. While more experienced players who have been around for a while might understand what you're getting at with this, new players will not, and this type of conflicting information will really impede upon their ability to be successful at the game.

I actually did read the article, but just felt like ranting about BRM. I agree with you here though... true beginners really should not follow my advice simply because they need to put in the time to learn the game. At least it seems you kinda' understood where I was coming from and the reasoning behind it... but you just didn't like where I posted it. I can live with that.

But now that I've went back and read what I posted, I realize that maybe I shouldn't have ranted on about some things because it might discourage some of the real beginners that peruse this forum. But then again, if they can't take it with a grain of salt and move on, they're playing the wrong game.... so I guess we'll just call it a wash.

I agree that it can be a good idea for a more experienced player to do some of the things you mentioned earlier because they have the knowledge of how things go to turn things around if they lose a couple buy-ins in a row by either moving down immediately or whatever. Also a higher skill edge would make these mini-swings less likely at microstakes, etc etc. We know what we mean.