Question for Dealers

[mxp2004]

I have a question for dealers... how much has being a dealer improved your play?

I'm looking for ways to improve my own play, and I feel like I've hit a plateau despite all the reading and on-line play that I do. There is a pretty experienced tournament player (actually, he was just on TV this week during ESPN's coverage of the US Poker Championship) who runs a bi-monthly tournament near where I live. I was thinking of calling him to ask if he could use another dealer for his games.

Is this wortwhile?

[Mason Hellmuth]

Dealers are usually terrible players.

[RR]

[ QUOTE ]
Dealers are usually terrible players.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is true, but I think mainly because most people are terrible players and the dealers are more visible. A lot of the dealers that aren't terrible players have a tendancy to start playing more and dealing less.

Back to the original question. I don't see dealing helping your game at all. Maybe it could help a little if you are a bad dealer, but a good dealer will be paying attention to things that are completely different than the players will be. Just as an example I normally don't look at what cards are on the board until the river.

[MediaPA]

Dealing can help in some aspects. You can work a bit on picking up tells and putting players on hand ranges. There are probably some other things as well. It wouldn't hurt to give it a shot, but don't think that this will revolutionize your game overnight or even a few months.

[mxp2004]

[ QUOTE ]
Dealers are usually terrible players.

[/ QUOTE ]

Really? This surprises me. There have been some pretty successful former dealers, like Scotty Nguyen, Scott Fischman, and Layne Flack, just to name a few. Maybe it's just the small sample size.

[BrunoThePug]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Dealers are usually terrible players.

[/ QUOTE ]

Really? This surprises me. There have been some pretty successful former dealers, like Scotty Nguyen, Scott Fischman, and Layne Flack, just to name a few. Maybe it's just the small sample size.

[/ QUOTE ]

Four or five guys out of how many dealers?

[tom10167]

Haha dealers are awful. I'm not astonishing but there are a ton of dealer home games and most of these people are completely awful.

[lowpockets]

[ QUOTE ]
There have been some pretty successful former dealers, like Scotty Nguyen, Scott Fischman, and Layne Flack, just to name a few.

[/ QUOTE ]

And there is a reason they are no longer dealers. Dealers don't make much money and if they are even remotely good at poker, they could easily keep the same working place and same hours but make a shitton more by just playing instead of dealing. You don't see this happen too often though because they usually suck.

Tom or others, do you guys get any type of health insurance benefits as dealers? I don't know how much health insurance is for an individual, but it couldn't be much more than a grand or two per month, which is a difference easily made up by playing poker instead.

[pfapfap]

Dealing can take a regular person and make him/her an action junkie. Think about it... most of poker is sitting around watching. A dealer spends eight hours sitting around watching, so feels hungry for action when it's time to play.

As RR said, dealers pay attention to different things, and also aren't watching the same game for very long. I think a benefit to dealing may be the opportunity to observe games bigger than your bankroll. If you're actually working to improve, you have the constant reminder of how much bad play can hurt you.

[Ray_bob]

Hey i have been a dealer for a while now. i was a player long before i started dealing. it is true that it can turn you in to an action junky if you deal for 30+ hours a week. however my game has improved tremedously. this is not because i watch all the players it is because as a dealer you will see who is leaving with the most money every night thus you will find who the best players are. if you just take a little time to either chat or just observe there play you can learn a great deal of things.