Building the bankroll

I’ve seen the statistics before and I just reread an article by ESPN’s Jay Lovinger about poker players who turn a profit, and he states that the “research” shows that fewer than 15% of American poker players make money. Granted the research has to be a little tainted given the fact that when dealing with American poker players, the bulk are involved in an illegal activity, but that is a number to start with.

*I’m guessing when I say “the bulk” because there is a lot of legal poker playing going on, but all the on line players are technically criminals. Right?

After rereading his article I’m thinking, “Okay, am I part of the 15 percent or part of the 85 percent?”

Wow…..85% is a lot! Even if you’re not a numbers person you know that 85 percent is a huge amount and that 15% is a tiny amount. So it’s time to evaluate and be brutally honest. Am I making money at this hobby, or losing money?

The count is in and last year I made approximately $500 profit playing poker. I’ve tried my best to account for all the home tourneys, brick & mortar play here in Indiana, and my trip to Vegas in addition to live play online. I think I have been brutally honest and even very conservative when recalling exactly how much I made at some home games.

I keep fairly close tabs on my online play and so I know that on the whole I have cashed out more money from my four accounts than I have put into them. The only one that carries a total deficit is PartyPoker, but the money I’ve cashed out from UltimateBet more than make up for that.

So I’ve very confident that I am in the 15 percent. Cool.

So I felt pretty good last night playing two tables at a time. This is a true brain exercise. For almost two hours I played a table of Omaha 8 on PokerStars while simultaneously playing a game of Crazy Pineapple (high only) on UltimateBet.

I had the seeding meeting for our wrestling sectional at 7 o’clock so I only had time to play from 4 to 6 after school.

Two different games, one with a hi/lo and one without really keeps you on your toes! In my PokerStars account, I am ONLY playing O8b to see what happens with my bankroll and whether or not I can climb limits, but I play a variety of games on other sites. But when playing these two different games, I played very ABC, great starting hands only.

The results were pretty good: up 8 big bets in O8b and up a whooping 14 big bets in CP!

Apparently solid play pays off…..go figure :-)

Crazy Pineapple never ceases to amaze me. The big bet was only $.50 and I took down a $10 pot!!!

Thanks for reading.