brantford players always look miserable... especially the ex 20/40 pros who are now grinding away at 10/20. can't be a fun life.

I get the feeling that a lot of hawaiian gardens players are playing with their entire paycheck and losing their family's grocery money for the month. The players tend to hide it fairly well but it is impossible to not feel bad when you know you are taking a family's grocery money.

yaa same experience for me, that old guy keeps re buy in every 30 min, he lost about 1000 that session, the thing is he never folds , A high he calls u down all the way , so u can imagine what happens if he hit some thing, even bottom pair, so u can never bluff him.

I've felt bad for obviously good players on obvious coolers. And in one of my early forays into 15-30 LHE I pretty much destroyed another player who was also playing over his head. I just wanted his money; I wasn't out to soulcrush him -- but crush his soul I did. I felt like two cents afterwards.

Never feel bad about taking a sucker's money when they willingly play the game.

“When we play, we must realize, before anything else, that we are out to make money.”
David Sklansky

”Poker is a microcosm of all we admire and disdain about capitalism and democracy. It can be rough-hewn or polished, warm or cold, charitable and caring, or hard and impersonal, fickle and elusive, but ultimately it is fair, and right, and just.”
Lou Krieger

I feel bad for players when they get rivered.
They really don't deserve it.

I was once told by one of my friends that i "have no emotions".

ex-gf right?

its only grocery money if it gets spent on groceries...

wtf are these emotions you speak of?

If I were the other guy, I'd just go home and cry. I don't think I've ever seen someone hit a cooler like that 4 times in a row.


Everyone who isn't a sociopath will feel empathy for someone at some point. That being said, how many Mayfair players back in the day felt bad for some kid who was homeless and ran errands for money to play with. Worked out pretty well for that guy in the end.

Feeling empathy for someone isn't a bad thing. However, they made their decision and have to live with it, good or bad. Another poster said if you really feel bad for the guy, take him out for a beer after the game. I think thats the best advice you can take from this. If you think someone has a problem, the right thing to do is address it. If you are in the middle of a game though, soft playing him isn't going to get him out of his problem. Yes you will save him a few bucks (at your expense) right now, but that isn't going to help in the long run.

when i see someone get bad beated a couple times in a row i feel bad.

I hate to see someone trying to play a solid game get screwed over and over by a couple jags hitting some bull**** hands.

Tell him he's a drunk degenerate gambler. Sure it'll go over well.

If you feel bad for the guy spend the $100 you won from him on a hooker.

When I look up stats and see players consistently losing hundreds or thousands of dollars per month I feel bad for them. These are the same players that give me bad beats.
Since I realise that I am always nice to them even if they bust me some stupid way.

Probably somewhere in the back of my mind I feel bad if a dog or a kid or so loses as well.

I feel bad for players I beat, but then don't pay. We both know they are entering a world of hurt.

You just have compassion, which isn't exactly a bad quality to have in everyday life, but at the poker tables compassion needs to be left at the door in regards to the game.

I feel bad for Gus Hansen, Ivey, DN, Mike the Mouth and the majority of pros who will never get married or at least have a marriage that lasts and have children, they will wake up one day and wonder where the hell all the time has gone.

If you are a real poker player, you will not care one bit.

This is a good post. I dont usually like monks but you are ok in my books.

I don't think you should preach about what makes other people's lives fullfilling, especially since you don't know what you're talking about - Ivey and Negreanu have both been married and there are plenty of poker players with children.

On HSP, Matusow was tilting so bad the other players paid him to stay.

Your guy works for his money. It may not be the kind of work you or I would do, but he does it so he has money to play poker with. There is nothing wrong with compassion until it turns into pity and manifests into soft playing or dumping which just encourages and enables him to continue the cycle.

There is an old joke....

"You can't hurt a poker player's feelings"
"Why not?"
"Because they don't have any!!"

On the latest HSP when Ivey stacks Mercier. Jason had asked to run it twice and when Ivey said no he seemed so sad lol. I felt bad for him.

Kinda and by one of my best mates.