Daytona poker room, a couple of years ago and a drunk in the middle of the day is incoherent, saying non word slurred gibberish in answers to questions. Someone says to dealer that the drunk needs to go. Dealer calls floor and floor eventually bans him for the day. Drunk grabs his keys out of his pocket and a couple of us offered to give him a ride home. He declined. The table offered to pay for a Uber ride for him, he said no and not nicely.

I told the floor if he allowed the guy to drive away, the room was probably legally responsible. The guy couldn't walk a straight line or speak a coherent sentence, so there was no way he could drive. The floor made excuses and said he couldn't stop the guy. The floor refused to call the cops.

Every time I've thought of that event, I think I was in the wrong not to call the cops.

WWYD?


Same room another time, it was an old guy having a diabetic event (we think) of some sort, passing out and mildly coming to, falling over on the player next to him. They banned him for the day, got him something to eat and drink, made him sit away from the table, offered to call an ambulance. None of us there knew what to do for the guy. I offered to drive him home but he declined. Someone at the table offered to pay for Uber. No go. That guy rested up for a half our and drove himself home. He seemed rational, awake, and aware when he walked out.

Lots of gray area here.

While I would never directly tell someone "You shouldn't play because you are too drunk." the reason is because it is counterproductive. A drunk isn't going to be open to someone telling them what to do. That said, often if you have a relationship with the person (even if you just met that evening but were talking at the table) you can sometimes make suggestions if they are worded in a non-assertive way. Maybe say something like "Hey buddy, it looks like you are having a bad night. Why not get some sleep and come back tomorrow and win your money back?" Or some such.

People take words differently depending upon how they are framed. Also, I would never get pushy. If "suggest" something and it is ignored or declined, then I accept it and keep my mouth shut after that.

As to the ethics of playing against bad drunk players. I am a big believer in being a good human being and trying to help out someone who I think seems to need help. However, if that help is declined then I move on. I am not going to judge them and I am not responsible for them. They are adults. If they continue to play I will continue to try and take their money.

Everyone who has played for any length of time has seen an instance where a bad/drunk/whatever player get lucky and suck out. No one is going to force the drunk to give back the money he gets lucky and wins, so I will not give back the money I win from him. Nor softplay nor take any pity on him. He is taking his chances so I will take mine.

This just came up for me recently.

I was out with a poker playing friend. We were out watching a local sporting event. I wasn't expecting to go to a casino so I didn't have much money with me. After the game ended, he wanted to go to the local casino. I told him I didn't have any money so we would have to go to my house to get some. Since my house was 30 minutes out of the way he offers to loan me some money instead. Even though we are very good friends and he knows I am good for it, I hate borrowing money from people. So I ask if he can lend me 4 buy-ins without cramping him up. He says it is no problem.

So I sit at a table and buy in. Within 5 hands I lose a buy in set over set against a terrible reg. 20 minutes later I turn a straight and despite shoving, I cannot push out a flush draw that calls the overbet and he hits on the river. Down two buy ins. I rebuy.

I play for a few hours slowly getting ground down because I cannot hit a flop. I steal where I can, but it is not enough.

Eventually this really drunk guy sits down and starts doing shots and playing crazy. I top up where I can, but I keep getting ground down because I cannot hit anything. Eventually I top up with my last money.

Drunk guy is at the point where he is occasionally going all in blind. On my big blind he decides to go all in before the cards are dealt. It doesn't matter that he is in the cutoff. The dealer handles it perfectly and tells the early players they can limp,fold, or raise. They all fold, the drunk guy's all in stays when the action gets to him. Everyone else folds. In the big blind I look down at AQ offsuit. Of course I call.

Wanting to encourage the behavior I quickly show my hand and tell him he can wait to show if he wants. The dealer runs out the board, I miss. The drunk guy then flips over one card, the 5d which missed, then he turns over the 3c which perfectly matches the 3s that was the middle flop card.

Drunk guy wins and I am busto.

I don't mean this as a bad beat story. I mean it to show that I could have easily gone to the floor and said this guy was too drunk to play (it wasn't the first time he went all on blind out of turn). I accepted his action. He played bad, but got lucky. I didn't get my money back, so I don't feel bad taking bad/drunk peoples money.

You pay your money and you take your chances.

This whole thread reminded me of a player where I used to work. He would come and stay at the hotel for a few days, maybe a long weekend. He would allocate a few thousand dollars for play each day. Each day he would take his few thousand dollars down to the casino and get blackout drunk. He would continue to play until he lost everything he brought down. It didn't matter how much he was ever up, he would continue to gamble until he lost it all.

Inevitably his evening ended where he had literally no money in his pocket and a security guard was escorting his drunk ass up to his room. There were stories of him getting so drunk he was pissing himself or he couldn't even stand up.

It got to the point where before he left his room each night he would put $100 on the floor of his room just inside the door so it would be there when the security guard returned him to his room and he could tip the security guard for taking care of him.

Many times various people from the casino would try and stop him from gambling, but he would get belligerent. He would also make it clear when he was sober that he wanted to be able to continue to gamble until he was broke. He didn't care how drunk he was. He never complained the next day about his losses and was actually very grateful to the casino for taking care of him and giving him what he wanted.

He was happy to go on a bender each night and lose a few thousand. He literally wanted that, he would say so even sober.

There is a legendary story of him going on a heater of all heaters at a blackjack table and being up over $200,000 on a $2,000 buy in. The floor wasn't worried that he won all of that money, the floor was more worried that he would drink himself into a coma before ever losing it all back. He wasn't going to quit until he was broke so would his body's ability to handle alcohol exceed his luck?

Anyway, he rarely played poker and mostly played table games, but on the rare occasion he did make his way to the poker room it was a spectacle. All of the games were $1/$2 with a $300 buy in. He usually only came to the poker room if he was up from the pits. So $300 was nothing to him. He was going to dump many buy-ins before it was all over.

On the rare occasion he showed up in the poker room, every dealer would immediately sign the EO (early out) list. They all wanted to get out so they could play with him. Every reg in the room would immediately ask to be moved to his table (the list became absurd).

Anyway, the best part of all of this is more often than not, some player at a poker table would go to a floor and mention that the player was too drunk to play. There was an email that went out to all floor people specifically about this player. They were told to tell players that it was ok if he was drunk. He knew what he was doing. The only words the floor person should be on the lookout for was slow play. If a customer complained he was slowing the game down then they could push the player to play faster.

This usually resulted in him going in blind (it was faster).

Anyway, on the rare occasion I got to deal to him it did refresh my outlook on humanity. I was always surprised at how many other players felt sorry for him and either soft played him or tried to look out for him.

200k off a 2k buyin, they raised the table limits for him or something?

>young kid
>late 20s

LOL. Thanks for that.

A couple of weeks ago, I semibluffed some draw which got there so I had to show. The "young kid" I was up against assumed I was the usual OMC so he didn't put me anywhere close what I was actually betting.

As I was raking in a big pot, he said something like, "wow, Pops got game".

While I'm thinking, WTF. POPS!?! That was a first for me.

I used his chips to console my battered and bruised ego.

I don't know for certain, but I am sure.

A player like thus is not thinking in terms of bankroll management where they should only bet a certain percentage of what they have. Once he got up over $10,000 and started betting more per hand, I am sure they were willing to allow him to bet whatever he wanted to.

They absolutely knew he was going to lose it all, it was just a matter of whether or not he was going to kill himself with alcohol first.

90% chance drunkard gets offended or misunderstands your intention.

100% chance I made up that stat.

Probably best to tell the floor discretely and let them handle it.

—-

On a side note it brings up the moral dilemma of when to help strangers.

I think you're right to tell a player that they are too drunk if it is a matter of their personal safety, but wrong to tell them that they are bad at poker. I have told players that they are drunk enough that the floor is likely to kick them out soon and let them decide if they wanted to play until that happened, sit out for a bit and sober up, or leave. I didn't tell them what to do, I just made sure they could make an informed decision.

Similar situation a few years back at Commerce in a 3/6 where a guy who didn't know how to play and didn't speak English burned $300 in just a few minutes. He was picked up by the floor and after a 20 minute conversation he sat back down and bought another $300 in chips.

He play was every hand, random bets or raises that made no sense, not acting when it was his turn because he didn't know when it was his turn. Really made the game stressful except everyone was taking his money. He seemed normal otherwise, not drunk but kind of out of it.

Also arrived at the casino in Vancouver just as a NL game broke up. Player was all-in every hand preflop. Casino opened a new 2/5 game and everyone rushed to get into it.