Bankroll Management – Part I: Cash Games

While poker is a game, the financial aspect of the game has lead to many people treating poker as a business. There are countless people that use poker as their sole means of income. If you’re a successful player with regular positive results, you can easily find a game at virtually any stake, and parlay your buy in investment into a positive or negative return. But it’s the individuals who treat poker as a business that are the ones that can play this game professionally.

The single most important aspect of playing regular poker, either live or online, is managing your bankroll. Knowing how much money to invest in your buy in, and when to walk away are key elements to the survival of a poker player. Because poker is a game of variance, you will both positive and negative returns on your investment from different sessions. Sometimes, that change takes place over the course of just a couple of minutes. But it becomes much easier to look at this game from a successful/unsuccessful venture if you employ a few easy bankroll management rules to abide by.

First, your bankroll must begin with a number that you are ok with losing. If that number is zero, then you should probably be playing poker either in play money tournaments or freerolls only. If you’re playing over your head, your play style will change. Scared poker players become broke poker players. You have to be comfortable with losing in order to fully embrace the result of winning.

Once you have an established number that you’re willing to invest in poker, you need to manage that figure by playing at stakes that will allow you increase your bankroll, and not bankrupt you because of regular variance. Because there are natural ebbs and flows to the game of poker, and having to be willing to accept the losses with the wins, you need to buy into games that will not cripple your bankroll.

For cash games, it is best to invest not more than 5% of your bankroll in a single session for your buy int. What this means for a $100 bankroll, is that you should buy into ring games where the buy in is $5 or less. Most sites have “Micro Stakes” where you can buy into a game at $5, and the stakes are blinds of $.02 for the small blind, and $.05 for the Big Blind. Here, you are risking very little of your bankroll each time you make a rotation around the table. But be mindful of how much money you’re investing at the table. If you go bust, then you should only re-load your chip stack to $4.75, as this will be the new amount of 5% of your new bankroll ($95).

Also, I would advise leaving the table at anytime the amount that you have on the table, is at, or exceeds 10% of your total bankroll. So let’s say that you’ve had a great run, and you’ve been able to double your stack and then some to $13. Well, the $13 in front of you accounts more than 12% of your new total bankroll (you’re new bankroll is $108 – the $95 in your pocket PLUS the $13 on your table). If you get your money all in, and lose, you drop more than 12% of your money on a single hand. That’s too risky. In this scenario, its is best to walk from the table if you’ve reached $10.55, and then find a new game at $5, or at no more than $5.28, which would be 5% of your new bankroll.

Related posts:

1. Bankroll Management – Part II: SnG and MTT’s
2. Why is Discipline Important in Bankroll Management?