Why do Poker Players Lie so much about their earnings?

Last night I was playing my typical $.25 NL O8 on PokerStars. At one of the tables, I noticed this one guy verbally abusing every player that beat him in a hand. You know, the typical "what a donk" and "only donks play that crap" nonsense. Pretty common, but turns out that this guy was the by far the biggest donk at the table, playing 90% of the hands. Seeing this, I had to get into the fray and called the idiot out. After several minutes of going back and forth with him, I decided to ask him how much he had lost this week. Well, of couse he comes back saying that he gets weekly checks from PS for hundreds each. An obvious lie and I called him on it. He soon left the table.

I think anyone who even knows a little about poker knows that there is simply no way that someone who plays every pot is going to be profitable. Yes, they might get lucky in 1 session but over time they will lose a lot... simple math, right? I had enough hand history on this particular guy to know that he always played like this, so the chances of him actually being even a break-even player are pretty much nill.

This is not the only time I've encountered liars like this though. Many times I've seen people in chat claiming they've won modest to ridiculous amounts, yet in most cases, the stats I've accumulated on them tell a much different story. So, it's obvious that a good portion of these people are simply lying, and my question is... why? Are they just in denial about how poor of player they are? Are they trying to impress someone by throwing out gaudy numbers? Don't they realize that any semi-serious player is going to know they are lying just based on how poorly they are playing that game? It just baffles me. I'm by no means a great player, but I have always been straight forward with my gains and losses. I lost a few hundred while learning to play last year, and only within the last 2 months did I become marginally profitable. I just don't know what people think they have to gain by so obviously lying about this stuff.

I ran into the same type of player yesterday at $.25NL (maybe same person). After about 5 minutes of donk-this and donk-that, I simply typed...

"Note: We're all donks, which is why we're playing $.10/$.25"

Got a couple of LOL's, but Donk Sr didn't find it amusing

I think anyone who even knows a little about poker knows that you should never drive away the worst player at the table under any circumstances. You should know better.

I find the best way to deal with people like that is to block his chat and try to get everyone on the table to do it. They hate it when no one can read his (her) crap and alot of times they just leave.

Why do you want the worst player at the table to leave?

Excellent comment. We are at the tables to win (I think ;-), not to be the weekly highlight of the Chat Review Journal.

As to part of the OP's question - why do many fishermen land the 'biggest' (4") fish 'ever'? Or the hunters who hit their limit every year? It's just a part of human nature. Not limited to the poker tables.
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I once climbed an imaginary mountain.

Yea, I would just not say anything to the player, and try playing with him as much as possible.

When people start berating the table I sometimes (depends on my mood) will have them just direct it at me. One, I don't care what they are saying and two, I don't want them to run the others at the table who really are bad off. Also they are getting attention and will usually stay as well and I can take their money as well. Other than that I just turn chat off.

I always just remind them that its a game of luck, and the "donk" just got unlucky.

No doubt that this is very true... and in this case, I was egging the guy on just to get him to him to automatically call my all-ins. I don't think that I've ever run someone off a table with my super-witty comments I should clarify that the reason he left was because he busted out of his $25 stake for the 3rd time since I was at table (and who knows how many total). Indeed, you want to do as much as you can to suck as much $$$ as possible out of these maniacs before they bust out. My experience has been that usually, a few well contructed comments can get them going and so that they make even more irrational decisions (if that's even possible).

On a side note, I think the thing I hate the most in poker is sitting at a great table full of donks and maniacs, and just get continually crappy, unplayable hands. To see all that loose money flying around with no reasonable chance of getting any of it is pure torture

what's his username....lol j/k i was just trying to steal it so I could track him down to pay some bills

I usually feel sorry for these people if they continously put people down and berate other players. I think that their insignificant lives must be so miserable and lonely that only behind a compute screen can they act out their fantasy and aggression.
Last nite a real air bag got on my table and started pointing out other peoples play and soon got on me. I got him to where he wished he was playing live so he could beat me up. I told him he would really not like to get into that kind of conflict with me as I have many years of experiences handling violence. He then resorted to calling me a "homo" and that kind of nonsense.
I just felt sorry for him and thought how miserable this guys life must be. And I checked him out on Poker Rankings and saw he had a ROI of -100%. So it figured. But what really bothered me was that a couple of guys who thought they were funny would join the banter and egg him on. You know the cowardly types that like to see conflict yet would not want to be the main instigator. I guess this is what human nature can be. And I think why Benny Binion and Titanic Thompson had to become guys you did not want to mess with. Because there is all kinds of idiots that we have to meet with in this perfect and beautiful game that we love.

Generally, the more trash they talk, the worse they are. If you can't play what else you going to do? Let them talk.

Sometimes people don't lie about their ridiculous amounts...the just sit down with the whole enchillada...

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Im guessing his screen name is the truth . Talk about deep stack poker

Sometimes obnoxious players have a method to their madness. If they can irritate somebody, put them on tilt or engender a vengeance lust, they stand a good chance of profiting. Ever notice the ones who just bluffed you out of a pot, then just have to show you their 27? A player with poor emotional control will want to get back at them and be liable to fall into traps.

I've seen obnoxious players come along and just tilt the whole table in a sit'n'go. They end up winning, and I begrudgingly admit "Hey, that worked pretty well for them."

If YOU start taking it personally, then you're not going to play your best. But boastful players often hang themselves if you just keep your cool and let them. Your hope is to be the one who benefits by getting the big hand at the right time. But if you don't, you don't.

But definitely don't be chasing the bad players away. Just learn to be cool and take advantage of them.
Gary the Worden
PS- I just opened a PS account last week. Went from $25 to $383,594 in two days!

LOL @ Urindanger playing .25/.50 razz with such a huge stack! He's a well-known high-stakes player.

Well he'd better be. Even if you had that kind of money, don't know why a non-high-stakes-player would be putting that kind of money on a poker site lol.

probably more af an accumulation than a deposit.

I like to read one chapter or section a day of the book "Zen and the art of poker" and I read about how you should not be cocky or make it a competition, which at first I was like "that's what poker is!"........It explained that it should be a constant war, that being cocky is pointless. There was a lot more to it that made sense as I read and I realize now that even bragging about your winnings should not be done, that I should be on a grind and that If I worry about that than it shouldn't matter how much I won.

Also, it said something about others complaining about respect. For example a well known person at the end of a losing hand says I'm an 11 time wsop bracelet winner how could you call my bluff (that was obv).
The point is, no matter what someone has accomplished if you can make a good read and know they are making a play then do not hesitate or drop your hand just because they are a pro or famous.

My god, how many different user names does Vanquish have?

I'm the one who usually calms down the chat mouth and it usually works.They do seem to have alot of problems and I just sympathize with themand they seem to calm down,maybe not at the I'm on but i follow them to the next table and thier not chat smackin.

Hmmm... I am more than happy to give someone my sympathy... when they deserve it. A family who has lost thier father in military service, or a regular good person who loses all their belongings in a house fire. However, I will not waste my sympathy on those who do not deserve it. I don't care how hard you may have things, if you go around trying to make other people feel worse by verbally berating them, you deserve only the worst right back at you. These are the same kind of people that try to make themselves feel better by stepping on or taking advantage of others, and I'm sorry, that's just not right. As to those who may be trying to do this for a tactical advantage... I'm sure they're out there, but I haven't run into one yet. Almost without fail, the loud-mouth morons are typically among the worst players at any given table. The best 20-30% of the players simply don't need to engage in smack talk because thier game does all the talking for them.

I like to tell the smack talking chatters that they are pretty tough being able to put some one down over the internet. I like to go right back at them on occasion to get them even more worked up. It usually gets them even more worked up and causes them to do something even stupider.

i was at a 5NL table with this guy who claimed he was a poker pro, that he plays 8 tables at a time and has an hourly win rate of $20/hr. then kept telling people to check his other tables and would say how much he was up by. funny stuff