Poker Pro Explains Why Poker Tournaments Suck
August 5, 2013 4:11 pmUS poker pro Allen Bari has certainly shown he has the skills to pay the bills having amassed $2,820,715 playing live tournaments, including winning a bracelet at the 2011 WSOP $5k No Limit Hold’em event for $874,116. In addition, the 29 year-old has notched-up a further $581,519 playing tournaments online pre-Black Friday under the screen name “Albari”.
Therefore, it was interesting listening to the reasons why one of the most talented, as well as outspoken, personalities in the game decided to retire from full-time poker in August 2012 and now instead plays cash games mostly of between $75/$150 and $300/$600 just once a week at Parx Casino in Philadelphia. At the heart of Bari’s decision to quit full-time poker, apparently, was his increasing frustration with the nature of poker tournaments themselves, describing the variance associated with them as “absurd”.
According to Bari, When someone plays cash games they are happier because if they are any good they will win around 80% of the time but with poker tournaments that figure drops to losing the majority of the time. Elaborating further, Allen Bari said;
“I think no-limit hold’em tournaments are really tough and the style people play has increased the variance. I think I am probably one of the top 10 cash-game players in the world but it doesn’t really matter in tournaments. Now, you have to run good. Playing good poker can only get you so far; you need luck.”
Consequently, Allen Bari said that he eventually found poker tournaments to be too stressful an endeavour and that the only way he could handle the variance associated with them was by quitting playing them altogether. Bari even went on to explain that luck was such a factor in tournaments that some players could experience even 10 years of great results and still not be any good.
“The game is just really stressful. There is just too much variance in tournament poker. When you play you go home and just think, ‘oh gosh, this sucks,’ unless you win the tournament. So then you just end up being unhappy like 99.99% of the time. And for the most part I don’t like the average poker player.”
Expressing his frustrations with the game further, Allen Bari says that he now intends to quit playing poker altogether in the next year and hopes to open his own food-related business in Hoboken, New Jersey by early 2014.
To see a video of Allen Baris’ unusual interview with QuadJacks, click here.