B&M Cash Game Recipe for Success = ?

Warning - This is a long post. I want to be a winning B&M player and will discuss my plan. All comments/questions/suggestions will be welcome. Thanks in advance.

I am a career minus player. However my game has come very far since I've begun. I believe now I can be a career plus player, and I have a plan in effect to attain the goal.

I would like some advise. So far we have this:

Stability + BRM + Rules/Limits + Play what you're good at + ? = Success?

1. Stability - First off, I have gambled out of neccessity before. To be honest, it worked out very poorly for me. I'd say I was a problem gambler. I learned that at the $1/3 NL game at my favorite casino (unfortunately forced buy-in of $80) - I could get MAD ACTION. Which worked out well, I got my money in with the best of it a lot, but ultimately I needed to leave plus - which meant when I was running bad I'd buy in over and over again, tilting me further, more poor decisions = more unpaid bills. I have a plan in effect - the new GI Bill for California will allow me a certain amount of money for rent, tuition, and books. With a roommate or two I'll have plenty left over to live on, and with my current deployment money, I'll have enough for a car and some extra expenses to float on, and a potential part time job if poker doesn't work out. I will not be gambling out of neccessity, as a matter of fact, I'll have a seperate account set up for my bankroll, which brings me to bankroll management.

2. BRM - Yup. Everybody swears by it. I recently set up two seperate bankroll accounts through my bank. The checking account will begin with $6000, and the savings account - with funds not to be touched for poker will be $600. This is all for live games, mind you. I find that online has it's pros and cons - pros - always action, can find a game any reasonable limit at any time. Can hit and run, find the fish and eat'em up, etc - But your funds are not liquid. If I run up my $6600 into $8000, I can't get a slice of the profits until the check reaches me, and then until that check reaches the bank, and the check clears. I will be focusing on live because the whole ordeal works in cold hard cash, and I don't trust an internet company deliberately outside the US Jurisdiction with several thousand dollars. When I'm up a certain amount, I'll set aside a certain amount of money, a discretionary percentage. I sit at a table, buy in once ($300), make a couple of buy-ins, get up, go to the gym, get something to eat. Put 30% into my profits account never to be touched for poker again. Which brings me to rules (or limits).

3. Rules/Limits - Setting aside a portion of my winnings - I decided my BR, whatever it is, should not be the sole place where I put my winnings. Some arbitrary amount should be set aside. Because I'm vulnerable to go on tilt. I've done it MANY times before, and don't want to lose everything, should I lose my whole BR. If I have rules set in place so that when I'm up X Buy-Ins and the table starts to dry out, cash out, go to the gym, go get something to eat, etc. Then come back and buy-in again should I feel so inclined. Only lose X Buy-ins in a session (3?). I'd consider a 3 Buy-In dump to be substantial, regardless of the limit, and would definitely put me on tilt. If I get up and walk, I get some time to cool off, analyse my mistakes, etc.

4. Play what I'm good at - I'm really good at NL Hold'em, especially at a B&M. I won't say I pick up a lot of tells, because that's - well, not entirely true. But I generally can figure a recreational player out pretty well, and a lot of regs. And in paper I can talk my way through hands, outloud. And I can do it while representing a hand better than my actual hand. EG - Board reads ATQ8 rainbow on the turn. I have QT, villian bets 8 on the turn. "Let's see. You check/called the flop, which says to me J9, which means you have the weak end of the straight, and you need me to pair my K to chop this pot, so I'll raise you all-in." It's worked before. And it has yet to sting me. It's a move I do very rarely, I guess I could call it a 'salesman bluff', but on occaison I do the same thing with a made hand.

I guess that's all I've got for now. If I focus on a game I can beat, like . . . taking tourists and recs money, I'm sure I can set aside a decent enough amount, and play some tournies on the side - no use being a one trick pony . . . a $40 buy-in tourney can save a lot of trauma to the BR when you're card dead. And as I have my sights set at the WSOP main event 2011 and 2012, some tournaments certainly wouldn't hurt my plans.

Summary - Sorry for the long posts, I have a habit of doing such things -
Basically I want to play poker indefinitely, and take enough out of it to have money to . . . make a car payment here and there, expand my BR, buy a set of drums, take a cute girl from class out and have something entertaining to talk about should she wonder how I live my life the way I do. So I need to be successful. I know this site has a lot of successful players, and I'm opening up for pointers, however small, to maybe achieve these goals.

Oh ya! A circle of my friends back home have a homegame every weekend. The level of play there is ussually a bit higher than the average B&M, and the stakes are smaller, so I can go there and have them pick apart my game. Also I plan on sitting with them at tables from time to time and discuss the sessions and various leaks in our games together (where as when i played out of need I was flying solo, and ussually on tilt).

Phew. Thoughts/suggestions/questions? Thans in advance for all comments (again).

WG

Also, I'll be tracking my ups and downs in an excel spreadsheet, and keeping a short post-session journal on interesting hands and things I picked up from regs. And reviewing it, possibly blogging about it, posting bits here and there for dissection, etc.

Sounds like you got a plan going. I just hope you don't get to caught up in the poker dream and make bad financial mistakes.

I don't think you should be relying on poker to live on just yet. You should keep up the job hunt so you can have a stable income. Put poker on the side for now and after a year or so, you can look back at your stats, then you decide to make poker you full time job.

@JEP, I agree. With a year long deployment to Iraq, as well as bonuses owed to be by the Army, and the post-9/11 GI Bill, all of this will be non-essential funds.

A discretionary extra income if things go well. By no means required or vital to my lifestyle.

Have to say, if you're a losing player at the moment, polish your game more at mircos online till you're a winning player. If your B&M games are like the ones here then 25NL will have you with the skillset to hold your own readily. Also, you sound a bit like you have pokerstars in your eyes about things. Talking about picking up 2 buy ins per session as if this will be the most common occurence. If that were the case I'd be taking your classes, along with Phil Ivey and Doyle (unless you're just short stacking, then we wouldn't want to, and you're probably looking at CRAAAAAAAAAAAAAZY variance, like mindblowing soul rending style). Remember you will get AA AIPF v KK and lose, and you will get in far fewer hands in which to make that up playing one table at live H/hr rates. The games are softer, but its still way fewer hands.

My recommendation is that you get a part time job that leaves you free during the softest hours at your casino, probably 5-12PM or so, and keep that up while playing your game. Get a friend who will go with you daily, if you can, and talk about your sessions with them every time. The more people the better. Having that job will keep you hungry to work at your poker, instead of not having it making you desperate to work on your poker. Also, it'll insulate you at first while you're getting the kinks out to make sure you're a winning player.

As to not being a one trick pony, be one. There is something to be said for having the poker versatility to be able to go wherever the fish are and take their money, but the lower buy in NL games will always have all the fish you need, and it sounds like you're miles from mastery of NL (not meant to be an insult, just a fact based on your own admission). Do one thing and do it untill you own the shit out of it, then think about expanding.

Personally, I despise the concept of stop loss/gain systems. They have utility if you can't see when you're off your A-game and correct your course or get out based on that, but you are far better served by being concious of your own game and that of your oppoenents and leaving on the basis of analysis of those factors.

And I hope your complaint is that you're forced to buy in with ONLY 80 at your 1-3, because you should be sitting there with a solid 300, you're even rolled for it kinda. Don't be a short stacker. At a live game, unless you're table hopping, you're looking buying in as a shorty, then doubling up and playing awkward stack sizes in order to generate any winnings.

Finally, just be cautious about the whole thinking you're going in to smash it thing. It will be swingy, and brutal at first if you're not a winner at the moment. I wish you the best of luck, but just keep my cautions in mind. Remember that with awful players comes gut wrenching variance. And I'm sure you'll get more precautionary warnings from more experienced people than myself.

@I'veGotOuts - Thanks. Your input is valued. I think I came off as over ambitious. I know pros look for BB/100, or BB/hour as their method of measuring their success over the long haul. Basically at the live game I'll be set mining and drawing to big hands, and trying to take down small pots in between.

It would be unreasonable to expect to buy in for $300 and leave with $900, I'd be shooting for about half a buy-in, and leaving up about $140 if I don't see any hands for a couple of orbits. Everybody knows you can flop a nut straight with a 2-suited board and get called for all your money by somebody who's open-ended with a flush draw. And you're only going to hold up X% of the time, chop when you pair/two pair, or get called by a set and get crushed when the board pairs.

Since a lot of fishies buy in for that game @$100, I'd need them to stack off 3 times to get one buy-in. And if I'm getting my money in every time I'm 70% to win on the flop, welll, I'm going to lose one of the three.

I could see why you'd think I have pokerstars in the eyes though, and I'll take it as the precautionary warning that it is.

Thanks for posting.

live 1/2 nl 300 max is not like online poker cash games. How will you handle 1/2/20 which is how most 1/2 games go once the table is familiar with each other.
I busted 2 player with shades and ipods last night who thought that super agro works live. I made 600 off of them

live small buy in tournaments 35.00-120.00 are not worth the time when you can play the 27.50 on pokerstars and have a chance to win7k+ not to mention the 109.00. Unless you are going to play some 350.00 + buy ins with a guarantee. I would play online mtt.

Bank roll 6k may sound like alot but even playing 1/2 300 max thats only 18-20 buy ins. So better play uber tight.

gl though, it can be done. I have not worked in over a year.