Bullied

I've never mentioned them before, but here are my three rules of thumb for picking a table to join:

1. it should currently have 6 players
2. the majority of the players should have stacks above the table maximum
3. the chip leader shouldn't have 3 or more times the amount of chips of the nearest competitor

To be honest, I only formulated rule 3 tonight. Here's the rationale behind the 3 rules:

1. with less than 6 other players, there aren't enough chips in play to make it worth my while
2. without most of the players being above the table maximum, there aren't enough chips in play to make it worth my while
3. if the chip leader has significantly more chips than the rest of the table, he/she can bully the whole table. This is a losing proposition.

Here's how the bullying works -- the bully can force the lesser chip stacks to go all in if they want to stay in the hand. The bully doesn't have to have premium hands to do this. As long as any of the underlings bet anything, that plays right into the bully's hands -- he/she just bets the pot when it comes to his/her turn. Even if no underling bets, the bully can still bet the pot; it just gets bigger faster if underlings are also betting.

When I joined the table, three of the players had roughly 2K, and the chip leader had 7K. I should have stayed away! The bully's stack kept growing, topping out at 16K the last I remember. The bully actually did have premium hands most of the time an underling dared to call. I fairly quickly got to a point where I was just north of crippled. My last hand of the night, I was dealt pocket rockets and ending up going all in. I lost to a straight (not the bully's).

Please understand that I'm not being pejorative calling this player a bully; that's exactly the right way to play having an "overstack". I've never really been in that position, since I tend to end my night when I've doubled my initial stake.

Last Friday night, after my two losing sessions, I watched "Poker After Dark" on TV. Gabe Kaplan, of "Welcome Back, Kotter" fame, won $120,000. It was a winner take all format. Great going, Gabe!

delta: -$2,000
balance: $263,897