About two months ago I wrote an article titled Getting Up, where I focused on why players should leave games. Something happened today that reinforced my views on the subject.
I was sitting at the same table as my friend Les, in a $2-$5 no-limit hold 'em game. There were four players in the ten-handed game who were donating their money to the rest of the participants. In one hand, Les called a pre-flop raise to $25 from the button. The raiser made a $40 continuation bet on a board of 9d-10s-Js, Les raised to $150, his opponent went all-in for $650, and Les called with Ks-Qs. Sadly, I was not a beneficiary of our opponents' largesse, but Les certainly was. In five hours he grew his $500 into $3,025.
Les walked up to me as I took a break from the game. "I want to take the experience of my last trip to Vegas and permanently put it in the trash can."
Some people believe that as long as a player has an edge over his opposition he should remain in the game. Expected value is everything, they believe. I think that's hogwash.
There's a huge psychological advantage in locking up a big win, especially after having had a big loss. On Les' previous trip to Las Vegas, he had played several sessions of $5-$10 no-limit hold 'em. Les lost almost every coin flip and he got every close decision wrong. In total, he lost nearly $4,400 on that trip. Booking a $2,525 win would go along way toward excising the bad memory of his prior trip.
I believe that many authors make a mistake by focusing solely on the mathematics of this situation. Sure, if I'm a 5-to-4 favorite on a hand, I'm going to win the majority of the time. Yet much of the time I'm not going to win the hand. Unlike chess, poker is not a game resolved by strict rules. Instead, the luck of the cards decides who wins each hand. In the short-term, luck can prevail over skill.
A few hands after Les left the game there was a huge pot. Al, who moved into Les' seat, flopped top set on a board of 8d-7d-2h. Mick had Jd-10d and moved all in for $1,000. Al called. He had Mick covered. The turn was a blank but the river Ad gave the $2,000 pot to Mick.
There's no way to know whether or not this hand would have gone down in a similar manner if Les had been at the table. Perhaps Les would have played scared and not gotten his money in with top set. More likely, the cards would have been different. But I think you'd agree that it would have been damaging to Les' psyche if he had called Mick's all in bet as a 66 percent favorite only to lose.
I believe in stop losses, and in locking up wins. If you've won $2,000 there's nothing wrong with mentally putting $1,000 or $1,500 aside as a guaranteed win. I also believe that the moment you start changing your game just because you have money locked up is the time you need to get up from the game. That usually means you're not playing optimally; if you're not playing optimally you will either be winning less or losing more than you should be. You want to be the recipient of gifts at the poker table, not the giver.
Russell Fox is the co-author of "Mastering No-Limit Hold'em," "Why You Lose at Poker," and "Winning Strategies for No-Limit Hold'em." He's a federally licensed tax preparer specializing in gambling, with a blog at taxabletalk.com. E-mail Russ at rcfox@claytontax.com
