Learn Texas Holdem

Question:

Hello,
before I begin I just want to commend you on a great site. It has so much good information I've hardly been able to scratch the surface. My question is more psychological than theoretical.

Im 28 years old and live in Los Angeles. Ive been playing 1/2 NL at the commerce casino and doing fairly well for the past 2 months. I play very solid poker and like to play a wide variety of hands preferably in position. This usually wins me between 100 to 300 a session. I've had a few losing sessions but I'd say my winning percentage is between 80% - 90%.

However, yesterday something happened that has shook my poker confidence a bit. I got there at 3pm and by 8pm was close to 300, from my initial 40 that I bought in w/ when this drunk guy sat down. There was a big tourney starting there and lots of drunk guys who were busting out started sitting down to play. I thought "this is great" look at all this action, I'll stay for a few more hours and make more money.

Even though in the back of my mind I was completely satisfied with what I already had in front of me. I would categorize myself as a grinder, I like to set a tempo that I play at and stick with it and so far its worked.

However, this drunk guy started raising every pot to 20, keep in mind the blinds are 1/2. So naturally everyone is folding every hand. He is doing it so often that of course after the 3rd time the table realizes he has no hand so people start to call him down. He loses and rebuys, etc etc.

Long story short I lost my entire 300 dollar stack, at times to him at times in other situations that I would not have gotten involved in had he not been sitting there. Im not sure if I am looking for any advice here but perhaps more perspective because you seem to talk about poker in a very intuitive and perceptive way.

This whole thing gave me a headache this morning and I've not wanted anything do with poker all day. Rare for me. Everyone at the table gave me a healthy respect all day and knew I was solid and then to lose what I worked for for 5 hours in about an hour and a half still stings me as I write this to you. My temperament is very good, as I never get rattled at the table, but inside my own mind after wards I've been replaying the last 2 hours of that session endlessly.

My own analysis is that I let someone else force me to play at a different pace and in effect let them affect me in an obviously negative way. Where do I go from here. Has this happened to you? On a side note, assuming I go back and continue to play, what sort of bankroll would you recommend a player to have to play in the 5/10 game.

The buy in at the Commerce for this game is 400 btw. I want to keep moving up and eventually play in the really big games but I dont want to strech myself thin. Sorry if this went a little long but I wanted to try and be as accurate as possible to get an appropriate response. Hope to hear from you soon.

keep up the great work,
Ray

Answer:

Hi Ray, and thanks for your kind words about the site.

The opportunity to play against opponents such as the one you describe should not be wasted. You are probably not used to play the kind of big pots that are inevitable when someone raises ten times the big blind all the time, but this does not mean that you should stay away from such games.

My advice is to keep playing solid poker and not get carried away by the fact that there are a couple of fish at the table. Wait for good cards, and then make strong plays. The swings you will experience will of course be significantly bigger, but if you can control your emotions I strongly recommend you to keeping playing in these games.

The bankroll advice I can give is to stick with the old 3,000 times the big blind rule which is a very good one. So, if you plan on playing $5 - $10 the bankroll should be at least $30,000. This rule if designed for professional players though. If going broke wont be a disaster you can settle for a smaller roll.