A newbie's salutations.

I have looked through many forums, and I decided to join up with you guys. Where others forums get off on bashing players new to the game of poker and making each other feel better with tales of bad beats and how internet poker is rigged, you guys and gals seem to have a vast amount of helpful information and a great attitude to go with it.

This is the only forum I want to be apart of.

With that I'd like some insight on a poker blog of mine, on my website.

I have been playing online poker for nearly a year, I have been playing 10 years in real life though.

With all the internet software out there, it's hard not to be put under the microscope by other players.

You may have a horrible ROI (return on investment) or you could
have a very decent one, The point is although you can gain insight on a
decent number of players. However sometimes it is a horrible way to
gauge your poker skill or chances on becoming a internet Pro.

I know players who have a very very good ROI, 50% through 10% got lucky in
some big online tournaments and used that money to play some one tabl,e
high buy in sit and gos won a few of those on a hot streak and turned the horrible ROI around but were still very weak players. Now if you
look at their ROI you would think he is some kind of a poker god.
However even though they are somewhat a solid average players there is something
the ROI doesn't tell you, or tell themselves. That he is a losing PLAYER.
His overall sit and go record was horrible. He got lucky in a few
tournaments and won some high priced sit and go and has a huge profit now, but before that he just wasn't a winning player at
all. They are just the type of players that kinda ignore math completely and play off
instinct, and have never ever read a poker book of any kind. Everyone
loses many more sit and gos than you win, but looking deeper they only won around 15% of sit and gos.

If you were too look at my ROI average, you would see that I have
a -30% ROI (also played around 1,000 more sit and gos and them).
However that is very deceptive as one of my internet pro buddies
pointed out. He told me if I wanted to really know my skill I'd have to
count all my top 3 sit and Go finishes, count 1st, 2nd and 3rd place
finishes and go through every sit and go and find out what my overall
record is.

I asked him why that is so important, it is then he told me
bankroll management is why my ROI average is so horrible. I'd win a the
lower stakes, build up a bankroll go up to the higher sit and gos win
for a few, hit a bad streak and not have the bankroll to handle those lovely swings.
So really ROI isn't a good way to gauge how good I am. So
I looked into it and I advise you do the same with yours.

My overall sit and go record was 334- 683, I counted how many
times I came in first, second, and third. Those are wins. Now that
record doesn't look all that impressive as I told my friend. He then
told me, to keep the buy in the same, and start low, 3.50 +80, each
time. What he meant was make all of my wins, wins for that buy in for
first second and 3rd.

I did that and I was simply amazed what good bankroll management
would have done, I would have lost a grand total of 2,595.40 dollars,
and won 3,468.15, at that lower level had I stayed on it and was
mentally focused I would have made profit, to the tune of 872.75
dollars. So my skill isn't reflected in the ROI, my ROI is telling me,
I need to commit completely to bankroll management. I was playing 160+9
sit and gos on full tilt poker, I won one of them for 720 dollars, and
finished second 3 times in a row, then the normal losing streak hit
where good cards didn't hold up and I was down to nothing again. If I
had would practiced bankroll management never would have Happened! I
would have worked up to that point, and made long term profits, but I
went up there, with only about 30 buy in's and that isn't enough with
the overall luck swings of the game, especially if you do not move
down.

How important is bankroll management, everyone knows you will go
broke, however nobody says you are robbing from yourself if you are a
winning player, it messes with you head, in fact you could be even better than Phil
Ivey skill wise and fail ever to reach success with bad bankroll management, not taking
a deeper look at your stats.

Making the buy in 160+9 adding my wins I would have made
140,120,00 dollars! In the time it took me to play those games which
was 6 months! I have had some people tell me the reality is, it doesn't
work for the higher limits because your win rate goes down because the
level of players. That is where they are wrong.

All of those games were super turbos, I have played all the way up
to 160+9, and there really isn't much difference, it's all in poker
until you get a chip stack, you go in with top cards, know when to
steal. The math shows if you do that, you will win, it is a fast form
of poker, where everyone starts with 300 chips. So if you are a weak
player (which I'm not) you will never get out played post flop, because
it's all in poker.
I have been told it isn't poker, but tell that to, Raul Paez and
Andy Black (who finished 5th in the 2005 world series of poker main
event). They play those tournaments, I have knocked them out and they
have done the same to me. They also know these tourney's are a gold
mine in the form of how many of them you can do. So that blows any
opinion out of the water that no real poker player, plays those and
they "aren't poker" they are a "crap shoot".

So now I am saving up for a bankroll of 8,000 to 10,000 dollars
and I am strictly going to play those for a living, and that doesn't
even count MTT wins, or cash games. Even standard sit and gos. If I was
just to play those(the super turbos) I would make at worst 280,240
dollars a year Minimum for every 1,000 +games played I would be around
the 140,120,00 mark.

I am not saying ROI, isn't a great way to find weak players, even
rate yourself. I am saying sometimes you need to read between the lines
and realize with a few outside adjustments, like bankroll management
you will find the your ROI, even though very poor is not a reflection
on skill for some people or yourself, the way you management your money is the problem.
L.T.S.G.R (or as to call Long term sit and go record over 1,000 +
games) is the best way to tell, if you are a lucky player had some big
wins taking a shot, a bad player, or a winning grinder. So try it for
yourself.... the more games you have played the less luck has anything
to do with it. Just add your level of buy in, with your wins and
subtract your losses, That is your hidden L.T.S.G.R dollars! (I could
be really lame and call them C-bucks,in fact I will cause it is easier
to remember).
So do the math and I hope you are rolling in C bucks!

Hiya EL Donko

All I can say is WOW!!!!!!!!! I'm going to have check out this info on my self. BM has always been my weakest part of the game. Unlike you however I play on-line more than live tourneys. Only played in 2 live events and finish ITM both times, bit there is not hardly any live games around where I live. Like you thou I get a good bankroll going someplace and move up in buy-in amounts looking for the bigger payouts and although I win a few I usually end up losing my bankroll and having to start over. I've never have figured the BM thing out, but for some reason after reading your post the light bulb has come on. LOL I am making myself the commitment right now to stay at the games where I am winning the most and staying away from the higher buy-ins. I will not be lured in to the bigger payout again. Thank you so much for your post. Time to go practice my new BM skils.Hope to see you at the tables soon and WELCOME to the forum. Sounds like you are going to make a great addition.

Thanks for your input, means a lot! I'm glad to see, that I could put my loss to good use for someone so they won't have to suffer the same fate. So if I help at all I'm glad Yeah it is easy to mix up your limits for sit and gos, have a bad week, bad month, take some shots above your limit. I realize while a shot once in awhile is okay, and by once in awhile I mean make them far and few between. If you stick with whatever level you play, high or low the math says you are a winner if you are a above average player. Yeah bankroll management was never my strong suit, after coming up with this, I will never stay from bankroll management again. No matter how bad the losing streak is.

Thanks again for your input means a lot! Another thing is if you are sitting there broke, and the math comes out in your favor, it helps you realize you are not a bad player. Your confidence is high, you don't doubt yourself when you play. Because we all know if your confidence is gone your days as a winning poker player are most likely over.

wow, it would take me three days to do that much typing. hope you have enough energy left to play tonight's tourny. nice seeing you in the chat room hope the info i gave you today will help build your bankroll. look forward to playing with you at tomorrows tourny, with your screen name i'm sure i will remember you.

Welcum, it would take me 3 days to type all that well it was nice to meet u today in the chat room,im sure ill c more of you good luck at the tables!!!

Lucky I have no life so typing a lot does not hurt anything, great chat and thanks for the welcome in chat. You guys are really cool. Bodog freeroll ran well, but somebody called my huge raise with AK, they had 10 7 offsuit and shot me down. I noticed some sites are worse than others, but the damn donkey mine fields almost always get me! Well now on to the pokerworld 1,000 dollar freeroll hopefully it works out a bit better. it's OMGpinkpants time!

well welcome
nice read and my fingers would blister up if i type that much glad u chose to be part of the forum and gl on the felts.

thehogster65 wrote:Hiya EL Donko

All I can say is WOW!!!!!!!!! I'm going to have check out this info on my self. BM has always been my weakest part of the game. Unlike you however I play on-line more than live tourneys. Only played in 2 live events and finish ITM both times, bit there is not hardly any live games around where I live. Like you thou I get a good bankroll going someplace and move up in buy-in amounts looking for the bigger payouts and although I win a few I usually end up losing my bankroll and having to start over. I've never have figured the BM thing out, but for some reason after reading your post the light bulb has come on. LOL I am making myself the commitment right now to stay at the games where I am winning the most and staying away from the higher buy-ins. I will not be lured in to the bigger payout again. Thank you so much for your post. Time to go practice my new BM skils.Hope to see you at the tables soon and WELCOME to the forum. Sounds like you are going to make a great addition.

heres another way for some of us just starting out hogster .

Bankroll management seems to be an issue a lot of people struggle with and want to know more about. The thing is, it's easy to learn the rules of bankroll management, but it's hard to have the discipline to stay within the rules. So I'm going to lay out my simple rules for bankroll management for micro-stakes players, and I promise if you follow these rules you should never have to deposit money again! The rules are different for those who like cash games and those who play tournaments. Both sets of rules are easy to follow and are not too strict or conservative. Some will even say they are not conservative enough! Also, as you move up in stakes you will likely find a level of play where you really struggle or where the play just gets much better. At those points I would highly recommend tightening your bankroll requirements even further to give yourself a little breathing room.

For cash game players, the minimum you should have in your bankroll is 20 buy-ins for the level you want to play. If you get to 15 buy-ins or less, you need to move back down to the previous level until you get back over 100 buy-ins. One buy-in is considered 100 big blinds. For instance, at .01/.02, a buy-in is $2 (100 x .02 = $2) and that is why .01/.02 is called $2NL. So, for a specific example, let's say you deposit $50 and plan to use good bankroll management, moving up and moving down as needed. You must then start out playing $2NL until you can work your way up to $100. When you get to $100 you can then start playing $5NL. If things aren't going well at $5NL and your bankroll gets back down to $75 (15 buy-ins), then you must drop back down to $2NL and grind your way back up. Moving back down is one of the hardest things to do, but for proper bankroll management it's probably the most important thing. Just remember that even the best players need to move down occasionally and the only people that never move down are the ones that eventually go broke.

A lot of people start their poker careers playing Sit & Go tournaments (SNG). Most people have seen poker tournaments on television so that is where they start. I also think there is a misconception that SNGs are an easy way to grind up a bankroll. In fact, tournaments in general have more variance then cash games. Not that SNGs aren't a good option for the micro player, but with the variance in mind, you should have a larger bankroll to absorb the swings. I think a minimum of 40 buy-ins is sufficient, so if you start with $50 again, you should be playing $1 buy-in SNGs until you get up to at least $80, then move up to the $2 tournies. Again, be sure to move back down if you are having trouble, but definitely if you get down to 30 buy-ins.

Multi-table tournaments (MTTs) are going to be the hardest games to grind a bankroll with for a couple of reasons. First, the variance can be brutal, often going a very long time between big cashes. Second, there just aren't that many MTTs at the micro level, so trying to grind up with a small bankroll can seem impossible. However, there are options. There are often satellite tournaments that the micro player can enter with very low buy-ins. These will pay out tournament tickets instead of cash, but the tickets can be just as good as a big cash score. One word of caution if you choose to play satellites though. You will sometimes be tempted to use your ticket to play in the big tournament. Proper bankroll management says no! Take the tournament money and use it to play more games within your bankroll.

Another tournament topic to touch on is re-buy tournaments. Keep in mind that you should price in a minimum of 1 re-buy and 1 add-on so the actual buy-in should be multiplied by 3. For instance, to play the $3 re-buy on stars you should have a minimum $900 bankroll ($3 x 3 x 100 = $900). In reality you will often use more than 3x your buy-in so, again, this is a minimum.

Proper bankroll management doesn't have to be difficult or constrict your growth as a poker player. In fact, it will surely only help your game as you grind from one level to the next. All of these guidelines should be seen as minimums really, although I think they're adequate for most micro-stakes players. However, once you start getting to more aggressive games and you begin to lose your edge, you should really become more conservative with your bankroll management. Although, by the time you get to those games, bankroll management will probably seem like second nature and you will likely naturally get tighter with your roll.

Three final things to keep in mind: don't act on the temptation to move up too soon, don't worry about what level other people are playing, and remember there's no shame in moving down.

The absolute poker freeroll was a lot of fun, finished 8th when my AQ got shot down by A 10, it was really worth the time because it was alot of fun. I look forward to playing with all of you in the future, and I hope you did better than myself. I know phill and jim couldn't do it. I was CHRISTHESITH on there.

Thank you for all your comments as well.