Do you think you would be better off if you never discovered poker?

[RobbieBensonFan]

I don't think this is true. I bet a lot of nitty grinder pro poker players that play in a casino every day would have better quality of life if they never discovered poker.

This is a good point.

ANOTHER AWESOME POST. YOU WIN.

[ErickAA]

Interesting that arguably the most successful poker player on this forum is one of the ones who thinks he might have been better off without poker.

I have actually had a lot of conversations with live pros/grinders and many of them (although not all) seem to have regrets, although as I only play midstakes most of these guys are probably pulling in under 150k/year from poker, so my sample is biased. Ironically, many of the floormen/other casino employees are poker dropouts, and they seem to be more well-adjusted and happier, although you never know.

It seems like the key to "success" in poker is being able to leverage it into something better, which as easy as it seems in principle, is harder to implement in practice as you get sucked into the poker lifestyle.

[ShadyJ]

Overall, the answer is no.

The bad:

- I have gained 30 pounds. This might have happened without poker (as I gained no weight during my first 8 years in poker), but it also couldn't have helped.



- I have aged a lot. I used to look very young for my age, and was often thought to be in my mid-late 20s despite approaching my mid-30s. That's no longer the case. Now people believe me to be around my age (40). Again, this might have happened without poker, but I think the stress of the game has aged me. I look at people who have been actively around the game for more than 5 years, and I have noticed that almost all of them have aged a lot, too.

I respect you a lot Druff, but comeon, you really think poker has much to do with this?

The aging, maybe a bit due to stress etc, but what high paying job doesnt have a lot of stress? How about the stress you'd have with a new born and having some mutt job paying 50k a year?

And the weight is a total excuse. We have all the freedom in the world, you can get up and do 45 minutes of cardio o an empty stomach without having to be somewhere at 7 or 8am, you can take a 2 hour lunch to workout and eat without having to answer to a boss.
Do you really think you wouldn't have gained the weight if you stayed in your career? I've seen more burnt out, overweight, balding 40 year olds in the corporate world than i can remember. You've gained the weight because it's just not that important to you to lose it. Again, not a flame, because i can appreciate how doing this for a living can breed laziness, but at some point you just got to take responsibility for it.

I agree with Druff on the weight gain if your a true grinder. I would play 8-14 hrs every single day, and because of that you get lazy eat worse. I'm sure the stress has some bearing on it as well. That said if I could do it all over I would make eating right and working out more of a priority over really long draining sessions. I also dont compare 8hrs of playing poker multitabling 20+ tables on the level of an 8 hr office job its much more draining making so many decisions every minute.

[Corrigan]

Part of the appeal for poker for me was not having to grind 8 hour days. If I had to play 8hrs straight on a regular basis or pull 40 hr weeks I would get a real job.

i guess that's one reason why I always though cash game player > tourney player just for day-in day-out lifestyle.

[backdoorb]

I respect you a lot Druff, but comeon, you really think poker has much to do with this?

The aging, maybe a bit due to stress etc, but what high paying job doesnt have a lot of stress? How about the stress you'd have with a new born and having some mutt job paying 50k a year?

And the weight is a total excuse. We have all the freedom in the world, you can get up and do 45 minutes of cardio o an empty stomach without having to be somewhere at 7 or 8am, you can take a 2 hour lunch to workout and eat without having to answer to a boss.
Do you really think you wouldn't have gained the weight if you stayed in your career? I've seen more burnt out, overweight, balding 40 year olds in the corporate world than i can remember. You've gained the weight because it's just not that important to you to lose it. Again, not a flame, because i can appreciate how doing this for a living can breed laziness, but at some point you just got to take responsibility for it.

I agree with Druff on the weight gain if your a true grinder. I would play 8-14 hrs every single day, and because of that you get lazy eat worse. I'm sure the stress has some bearing on it as well. That said if I could do it all over I would make eating right and working out more of a priority over really long draining sessions. I also dont compare 8hrs of playing poker multitabling 20+ tables on the level of an 8 hr office job its much more draining making so many decisions every minute.

If youre playing 8-14hrs a day more power to you. I average 3-6 with 8-10 the absolute top of my range... My only point is if its important enough, you have the freedom to do something about it, poker doesnt cause it.

[Dan Druff]

Part of the appeal for poker for me was not having to grind 8 hour days. If I had to play 8hrs straight on a regular basis or pull 40 hr weeks I would get a real job.

i guess that's one reason why I always though cash game player > tourney player just for day-in day-out lifestyle.

If I had to only play NL cash for hours on end, I would have kept my job.

Always found NL cash so boring.

I can play limit cash for over 20 hours straight and not be bored, but I feel like I'm going crazy after an hour of NL.

[Cokehead]

Part of the appeal for poker for me was not having to grind 8 hour days. If I had to play 8hrs straight on a regular basis or pull 40 hr weeks I would get a real job.

i guess that's one reason why I always though cash game player > tourney player just for day-in day-out lifestyle.

If I had to only play NL cash for hours on end, I would have kept my job.

Always found NL cash so boring.

I can play limit cash for over 20 hours straight and not be bored, but I feel like I'm going crazy after an hour of NL.

Fuck no, other way around.

Limit is just bet bet bet raise call call call, oh your first pair beats my second pair.



Only NL was ever to really get my blood pumping.

[Corrigan]

Part of the appeal for poker for me was not having to grind 8 hour days. If I had to play 8hrs straight on a regular basis or pull 40 hr weeks I would get a real job.

i guess that's one reason why I always though cash game player > tourney player just for day-in day-out lifestyle.

If I had to only play NL cash for hours on end, I would have kept my job.

Always found NL cash so boring.

I can play limit cash for over 20 hours straight and not be bored, but I feel like I'm going crazy after an hour of NL.

Yeah limit holdem does have the very action side of raising very thin for value on every street and in that way is exciting. But I like the creativity of deep NL cash poker, and the ability to make a huge bluff/huge laydown on the river if you can deduce an opponents hand near exactly.

[Corrigan]

also - i feel like you can play much looser pre in NL ring games than limit ring games esp with 6+ ppl, as you can make up for it with the right amount of skill postflop

[SpewArtist]

Do you think you would be better off if you never discovered poker?

Fuck no.

I'd be broke and working some 9-5 slave job until the day I finally decided to off myself.

[ShadyJ]

Part of the appeal for poker for me was not having to grind 8 hour days. If I had to play 8hrs straight on a regular basis or pull 40 hr weeks I would get a real job.

i guess that's one reason why I always though cash game player > tourney player just for day-in day-out lifestyle.

I loved playing that much I know alot of guys play just for the money, but I'd rather play 40 hrs a week playing poker then work any job assuming the money is the same. I agree with your 2nd point on days when you just dont feel like playing and you know your firing up tourneys for the next 8-10 hours sucks sometimes where as cash you can stop at any time. I hope us Americans get another chance to make a decent living doing what we love to do again.

[ShadyJ]

also - i feel like you can play much looser pre in NL ring games than limit ring games esp with 6+ ppl, as you can make up for it with the right amount of skill postflop

Its crazy when I played 24 cash and a few tourneys on the side I'd play like 12/10 in fr nl, but now playing like 4 tables on Merge I'm like 35/30 nl 6max.

[ShadyJ]

Part of the appeal for poker for me was not having to grind 8 hour days. If I had to play 8hrs straight on a regular basis or pull 40 hr weeks I would get a real job.

i guess that's one reason why I always though cash game player > tourney player just for day-in day-out lifestyle.

If I had to only play NL cash for hours on end, I would have kept my job.

Always found NL cash so boring.

I can play limit cash for over 20 hours straight and not be bored, but I feel like I'm going crazy after an hour of NL.

I cant wrap my brain around this. Stacking someone for 300bbs is so much more exciting then playing limit (holdem) which to me is just a garbage game.

[JUSTIFIEDhomicide]

I do not think there are many Jewdonks, Micons, Neverheebs and Neverwins walking around whose lives turned from promising into total fails because they watched too much Jersey Shore

Do you think any of the above people would be happy working a 9-5 with a house in the suburbs? They would find something to provide excitement for them. If poker wasn't there it would need to be something else imo

[backdoorb]

Overall, the answer is no.



The bad:

- I have gained 30 pounds. This might have happened without poker (as I gained no weight during my first 8 years in poker), but it also couldn't have helped.

).

[SrslySirius]

Getting very off-topic here, but I think those profanity-ridden images are really dumb and obnoxious. When you overuse "fuck" and "shit" it waters the whole thing down. This one's a little better, but still comes off very juvenile:

[backdoorb]

You should know, you are the "CLO" afterall.