Berating Weak Players At The Poker Table

[When2Holdem]

Picture this: You are sitting at a full ring game at your normal game at your normal limit. There is a player at your table who obviously doesn’t know what they are doing and continues to make bad play after bad play. Sometimes he sucks out but most of the time he donates to the pot. He is definitely a player I like to see at my table.

Then another player sits down, folds every hand 15 times and then finally raises a pot and plays a strong hand properly. That weak player at the table gambles with the new player, who will soon be our “offender”. Sure enough, the new player at the table who has only played one hand gets sucked out on and he starts to complain about what a weak play his opponent (the fish) made. The “fish” was probably proud of his play, probably proud of his win, and probably is not considering changing his style of play (good for us, right?) But when the new player at the table starts to go on about why the play was bad, the fish starts to tighten up to save future embarrassment and maybe even decides to read a few pages on the internet as to how to play “better” (bad for us, tight?) A few moments ago, he was thinking he was playing winning poker.

To not berate a bad play or player is fairly common advice. I have read it in numerous places, and I fully support the concept of encouraging a bad player to continue thinking that they are playing well. But the advice which I have read tends to suggest that as a good player, one should not berate weak players. I have seen nothing so far about how to deal with someone else at your table who is berating weak play. Unfortunately, it seems to me that this happens fairly regularily in online poker.

My question then, is how to educate the so-called offender of either a benefit or the many benefits of not committing this act of berating weak play and how to explain it in such a way that does neither compound the problem by confronting the issue of the play being weak nor does it instigate more steam into the already heated "offender".

I am very interested in any comments on this topic!
Thanks for reading.

[Dan Mezick]

There is nothing you can do except move on. The TA rock that berates the common player has issues. Poker is more than a game to him-- it's a venue for drama. So just leave. Just like the weak tights who are no longer having fun.

Online, you can "tag and release" via the notes feature in PT, and then search for the 'buddies' you like to play with. Do that. Automated tools make this very simple.

The socalled strong player that berates the fun-type players may be strong, but odor isnt everything. He stinketh.

I usually back the fish when this happens. By backing the fish, I mean getting the rock to start talking to me. Jump in and yell "POT ODDS!" or something. I don't want to leave, I just want to save the table. So maybe I insult the supertight guy a little bit. Talk about how he doesn't play postflop well and thats why he plays so few hands. Whatever it takes to get the fish feeling better and the rock on a little tilt.

[adios]

Normally I don't say anything. A few months ago some guy made a horrendous call on the flop and spiked some sort of outlandish runner-runner draw and took down a fairly big pot. The player who lost at the showdown was still berating him five hands later. I asked the player doing the berating did he want the calls or didn't he? He stated that he did but his problem was that he was a much better player than the live one and he thought the live one had somehow challenged that notion. I didn't really want to get into it that deeply. I was hoping that the berater would see that these calls were what he wanted and he had to pay the price of the occasional suckout. However, his comment revealed how he was feeling and it basically was what I've stated in the past as to why the beraters do what they do. So I thought what the heck I'll discuss it more. I pointed out that there was no evidence the live one thought he was better than him; the live one hadn't gloated at all and in fact hadn't said anything in taking the pot (the live one is taking this all in btw); and that his motivation was simply that he wanted to gambool and have fun which was different than the his, the beraters motivation. It went along with what I've written before is that berater takes the beat personally. These players seem to be for the most part inexperienced and have probably read a book or two and tend to play much tighter than their opponents and thus believe they are much better players. I don't think I'll do this again (I wouldn't recommend what I did) but it was one confirmation of what I've thought. These guys need to get a lot more experience with suckouts [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img].

[Tilt]

You can defend him and his play. Say "nice hand", and "don't mind him, nice play".

This also has the benefit of having others tag you as a fish.

[adios]

..............

Tell the offender to f off. No really, tell the person youll email support for bothering you, then tell the person that really doesnt know what they are doing to ignore the guy and praise him every time he sucks someone out.

[bernie]

[ QUOTE ]
My question then, is how to educate the so-called offender of either a benefit or the many benefits of not committing this act of berating weak play and how to explain it in such a way that does neither compound the problem by confronting the issue of the play being weak nor does it instigate more steam into the already heated "offender".


[/ QUOTE ]

You don't 'educate' the offender. Why teach him anything? This is a sign that the guy definitely isn't as good as he thinks he is. He's only stronger than the weakies because he can play strong hands and folds more than the average fish. yay.

Just take the side of the fish. All you have to really say is that the guy can play however he wants. Commend the fish that it's tough to put him on a hand.

If it gets real bad, you can always say how if everyone folded and didn't give the A-Hole any action, then everyone would have to hear about that too.

Another one I've used at times is to tell the nit to turn his hand face up if he doesn't want callers. Some morons actually do it. To them it's just about their hand holding up and winning pots. Nothing in between.

I actually get a little joy out of seeing those idiots twist and cry. What's really funny is when they pull a major suckout shortly after they just get done berating someone. Oh, but THEN it's perfectly ok...

b

[Xhad]

I'm too honest to even pretend that I think fishy play is correct, and I don't like saying things like "Let him be a fish; that's where the money comes from." At the table either. Just tell the TC that he's being a jackass, which he is.

To TC: "Did you buy his chips? No? Then why should you get to play his cards?"
To Fish: "Don't mind him, his girlfriend probably just broke up with him or something. Nice hand man, nice hand."

[bernie]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm too honest to even pretend that I think fishy play is correct,

[/ QUOTE ]

It is correct if he's just there to have fun isn't it?

b