Is soft play OK?

There are those who defend "soft play" as a moral exercise but as a legitimate poker strategy it does not come up so clean.

It was quite interesting to read what Daniel Negreanu, the 2004 Card Player Magazine and World Poker Tour Player of the Year, had to say in a recent article regarding what he terms as "soft playing". According to Negreanu if you are 'soft playing', you are a cheat. He goes on to explain that mostly players do this when they are playing with a friend and the friend is losing quite heavily, the player then does not raise his friend in order to minimise the friend's losses. But is there an even more sinister agenda, i.e are the 'partners' teaming up to take the pot. When is it innocent and when is it not. Negreanu says innocent or not it is cheating.

Just to show how this "innocent" strategy can affect the game negatively, he goes on to explain that soft playing gives the buddies a distinct advantage over the other players. The buddies will in all likelihood be the remaining players in the pot and thus share the pot between them. It could not get more unethical than that. Even if at the starting point the soft play was for pure altruistic purposes, the outcome is anything but moral. If you cannot play hard against your best friend then maybe you should not be at the same poker table. Consider also that at most casinos soft play is considered illegal and you get the picture. Anyone suspected of this type of play will be called out by the floor manager and reprimanded if not summarily sent out. During a tournament, soft play will result in the immediate disqualification of both the perpetrator and his friend.

Negreanu points out that poker is decidedly not a team sport, this game demands that every man plays for himself. To that end you need to play equally hard against all other players. There are some proponents of soft play who say that it is quite ethical, notably Dr Alan Schoonmaker, writer of best selling book, "The Psychology of Poker ". One does wonder though, how would the doctor feel if his opponents soft played against him and he loses as a result of this ethical behaviour. Next time you think to take it easy on your friend in a poker hand, think again, it is strictly speaking considered cheating.