What's the REAL reason(s) so many "top" players are busto?

[Mondogarage]

Balloon payments on adjustable rate mortgages.

[Bryan15]

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Balloon payments on adjustable rate mortgages.

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lol...time to refi

[UncleKraut]

Boris Becker

[warrantofice]

I should really write this as some sort of a seperate post cause its so genius but i guess i'll write it here first as my trial run sort of deal.

The short of it is that poker is a game of investing money or gambling depending on how you play. But if we assume that we are playing under the pretense to invest our money intellegently than the same principles of investing in the stock market apply, however the stock market trades at a much larger level. The reason the tops pro's are broke is because they have reached the poker ceiling, its similar to the investment ceiling which goes by some name that i don't know. if you talk to really good investment bankers, the top ones, they will tell that they can basically make the same average returns year after year with work but not to to much...however, when their portfolio reaches around 500 million dollars then it becomes much more difficult to keep there high return rate. So i would propose that this is what has occured to the current breed of poker players. Because the poker economy is much small than the us stock market the ceiling is much lower.
So i would conclude that investing your money with poker it a good choice but only until say your reach 3 or so million to give an arbitary number. After that point it becomes much better to invest your money in a the stock market.

that'll be 2 cents

[markksman]

Warrant that is a good insight. In my business, I can get returns from 400% to .0001% on my money. The problem is finding more opportunities towards the 400% end of the scale. At times I find myself just sitting on money because the work required to get the 20% return is just not worth it. Seems stupid but it is true.

There is a sweetspot for ROI for each player, but I think real poker players probably can't live with that so they tend to push themselves to higher levels and higher stakes. Some swim, some sink. Some sink, sink, sink and eventually swim. My guess is very few players manage to play at their optimum level for extended periods of times. Mostly because they might be a grind, and less challenging than taking on other games, moving up, taking a shot and the rest.

So while Bankroll management is a significant part of poker, I would say on average poker players are horrible at managing money. Mostly because nobody stays at their maximum ROI/versus time invested/versus income level desired. I suspect some of the characteristics that make people good poker players are the reasons why they can't really manage their money well.

Money management goes beyond having enough backing to play at your odds, or sitting down with a big enough buy-ins. You have to limit spending money on things that are notoriously bad investments. Some of the prop betting, playing games you are unfamiliar with, playing other forms of gambling, backing other players. All these things likely suck money out. Add to that to the average every day money holes people face outside of poker... and it can be a mess.

What are the odds someone finds a sweetspot that lets them work/play 20 hours a week, make 150k a year and they stay there. Same level, same games, nothing new, nothing challenging, just the same old thing. Most poker players would never do that. There are exceptions to every rule, but I would say the typical profile of a poker player from the top pros to the brand new wannabe is pretty similar in terms of basic characteristics.

[0524432]

[ QUOTE ]
I should really write this as some sort of a seperate post cause its so genius but i guess i'll write it here first as my trial run sort of deal.

The short of it is that poker is a game of investing money or gambling depending on how you play. But if we assume that we are playing under the pretense to invest our money intellegently than the same principles of investing in the stock market apply, however the stock market trades at a much larger level. The reason the tops pro's are broke is because they have reached the poker ceiling, its similar to the investment ceiling which goes by some name that i don't know. if you talk to really good investment bankers, the top ones, they will tell that they can basically make the same average returns year after year with work but not to to much...however, when their portfolio reaches around 500 million dollars then it becomes much more difficult to keep there high return rate. So i would propose that this is what has occured to the current breed of poker players. Because the poker economy is much small than the us stock market the ceiling is much lower.
So i would conclude that investing your money with poker it a good choice but only until say your reach 3 or so million to give an arbitary number. After that point it becomes much better to invest your money in a the stock market.

that'll be 2 cents

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interesting perspective, the relatively small/elite field as the highest of HSNL/PLO is at too high a level of skill to beat for a large enough winrate to overcome the inevitable blinds (god forbid antes DS), variance, tilt, etc?

[PJS]

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What about Nikki Jedlicka specifically?

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He said that he has tilt issues. Someone posted a link earlier and he said that even when he was winning, he would still tilt through boredom.

As for the other pros...it's all very good being "one of the best in the world", but when you're constantly in games with the few players who are better... [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

[andy099]

full tilt- oh look this kai buxxe has played high stakes for a couple of weeks, lets sign him up.

It's hardly like he's had good results for a couple of years i.e aba, PA, Durrr

I guess a lot of poker players lose sight of the real value of money and just piss it away thinking they can win it back

[ArmenH]

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full tilt- oh look this kai buxxe has played high stakes for a couple of weeks, lets sign him up.

It's hardly like he's had good results for a couple of years i.e aba, PA, Durrr

I guess a lot of poker players lose sight of the real value of money and just piss it away thinking they can win it back

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Fulltilt has offered PA sponsorships numerous times. He declined all. He is affiliated with Martin De Kniff European site.

[ben wb]

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What about Nikki Jedlicka specifically? I think a number of 2p2ers have a lot of respect for his game, and I KNOW Phil Ivey does. From what I've read it was a $1.1m downswing (rumored to be since he signed with FTP) that busted his online BR and has him saying he isn't planning on redepositing anytime soon. Was he just playing too high the whole time (during his $2m+ upswing AND $1m downswing? What is it with so many HS players (DB comes to mind) living the high life one day, and seemingly crippled the next?

[/ QUOTE ]Kai's upswing was more like $4 million, went from being down $1/2 million at high stakes PLO to up $3.5 million. I think he is actually a long term winner at $200/$400 (losing players don't tend to have 100 buyin upswings even in PLO) he has just lost some confidence after his first monster downswing.