Champion of Poker

I have a naturally cautious outlook towards money and I hate putting it at risk. I think that this stems from my earlier life when I was seriously struggling financially. It is something that I have never been able to properly shrug off. It has gradually worn down over the years as I have become more and more acclimatised to it but it is still there to a certain extent.

This brings up a serious point about poker and once again it just shows how many areas of the game are down to each specific individual. Irrespective of what you learn or from who, you are never going to be able to emulate another human beings attitude towards money and risk.

This is something that many poker players never ever get to master, they are great theoreticians and they know a vast amount of things but putting money and sometimes sizeable money on the line does not come easy. Even if you do it then can you do it and still feel comfortable about it without it affecting your poker game….few can.

If the money is affecting you then you are not playing optimal poker and if you are not playing optimal poker then the gap (if there is one) between you and your opponents just got a whole lot narrower. If you sense that an opponent has bet just trying to pick the pot up and you fold instead of re-raising because you are afraid to put money at risk with no hand then the money is affecting you.

The top poker players in the world are NOT the most knowledgeable about the game, but they have one very important thing in common……they don’t blink when it comes to risking vast amounts of money. But these players are totally different animals to me, they thrive and get off on playing with large amounts of money and the greater the amount the more the kick.

There must be some chemical reaction taking place in their brain because I have played poker for a long time but I have never come close to this type of mindset. These players have become immune to playing for massive amounts of money but that does not necessarily make them great players in my book. If you put most of them into a tough $30-$60 Limit Hold’em game full of working pro’s then they would lose.

Yet make the game $2000-$4000 Limit and they suddenly come alive and the adrenalin is flowing like rocket fuel. This is why it is sheer madness that many players try and emulate them. They are trying to emulate something that they cannot possibly touch and that is their own psychological and physiological make up. You are what you are, sure you can improve your game and be better than 99.99% of the players out there but changing your character and personality is a completely different thing.

Many players who play in these “nosebleed” games are addicted gamblers who also wager huge sums of money on other sports which they have no expertise in whatsoever. They crave action like a junkie craves a fix and because they have big money they are able to play for huge stakes. It is fortunate that some of them are very good poker players because they need to be because of their bad habits.

I have heard many people say that their dream is to play in the world series or to play in Las Vegas or to play on television. If they manage one of these then they think that they have made it in poker. I know players who have managed all three and are still broke. Playing in the World Series is not an achievement, all you have to do is get yourself over there with a bit of money and you are in.

Success in poker is measured by TWO things, money won and time played. Anybody who tells me that have picked up $20,000 coming second in an online poker tournament is not going to impress me if they have only been playing for a year. You are still in the short-term after twelve months. Likewise if some dude says that they have been playing poker for thirty years….so what! How much money have they won in that thirty years is what I want to know.

So what I am trying to say here is to be very careful and do not jump in regardless of what hype you happen to hear because that is what it is….hype. The people who are at the top in poker need fresh novices coming in at the bottom so they can earn their seven figure salaries. They know that these people at the bottom need heroes and something to believe otherwise they will pack it in.

I make money from poker but I do it and have done it on MY terms and my schedule and not because of some rubbish that I have heard or read.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson