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There is a certain amount of time that we use as a learning curve for anything we do.  After that the objective we want to reach, by learning and practicing, comes to us for a while and we prosper.  Poker works that way, players winnings pitch up and down like a bucking horse at first then even out with time.

Poker is an ongoing learning curve.  The object is to continue winning money in a fashion that allows the player to keep some of it.  Many people attribute success to good play and bank roll management.  Yes that’s a large percemtage of success but how important is constant concentration to the good play effort?  And how importtant is it to bankroll success.

Players hit what is known as the zone.  A period of high concentration and effort where it seems the cards never stop playing themselves.   Players that have enjoyed this comment on the feeling they have as a side effect of this ultra-concentration, calling it euphoric.

Extended concentration enjoys peaks and valleys as the player continues the game.  Finally the time and effort of this concentration bull ride wears the player out and money begins to leave the bankroll sometimes in great quantity.  The player then begins to chase and this is never good.

Stay in the moment. When the euphoria is leaving slow down.  Pacing is smart when the energy to concentrate is dropping.

Of late I have been preoccupied with the importance of hand ranges in my game.  Everyone hollers about how important they are but I admit my mental laziness is akin to Obama’s bowling prowess.  I didn’t even make it to the Stump Olympics.  I have decided that now is the time for action.  I intend to better this part of my game to the fullest and I want to invite you on the hunt…So you’ve got bottom set on a three-flush board and your opponent just check-raised you all-in. What do you do? Well, you put your opponent on a hand.

Hand reading is simultaneously the most important and the most difficult thing that a poker player does. Some of the best poker players in the world who ignore many (or all!) of those other “rules” in poker, have deadly-accurate hand reading skills, and make mountains of cash for their troubles. Other players are exquisitely good at all the fundamentals but stink at hand reading and therefore struggle to consistently come out on top.

I began reading on the subject and the first wonderful thought came from Eric “Rizen” Lynch.  I like this approach.

“Have you ever wondered what exactly someone could possibly be thinking about when it’s taking him seemingly forever to make a decision during a hand? As much as some of us pros would like you to believe we’re simply “looking into your souls,” what we’re really doing is quite simple and basic, even if it is just a little counterintuitive to how we’re used to thinking away from poker.

Rather than a top-down approach, when you’re dealing with key decisions in a poker hand, it’s very beneficial to think in a back-to-front manner. What I mean by that is that if you are faced with a tough decision, you need to reconstruct the hand and the action in your head from the beginning to the current point, using each street’s action as a chance to narrow down your opponent’s hand range. With a little practice and some thought, it’s quite spooky how good a hand reader you can become if you can simply adopt this way of thinking.

Not only is this thought process important for trying to figure out what your opponent has, but if you’re playing against a thinking opponent, you can often use it on your own hand in determining if a bluff might work.”  Eric Lynch

This point of backwards analyses is used by many pros and makes sense to our brains as we must account for everyones moves.  Ted (Professor Backward) Forrest enjoys its use and credits it with recent positive results in both tournaments and cash game play.

Been playing .25/.50 6-max again and need to start testing some of my thoughts about the average player.

For example, have noticed an increase in the number of players who will cold call a raise behind and lead the flop, turn and river on low boards. My thought is that the average player will not fire with nothing in his hand into two players on the flop and turn but I think I’ve got this wrong. In looking at hands I’ve folded on the river, villain won much of the time without showing his cards. 

Over the next week, if I’m raised and get a cold-caller and a blind call, I’m going to go to the river regardless and see how it plays out. The math on a few scenarios indicates calling down with hands that are likely to be better than their range is +EV.

For example, you raise post flop and get two callers, the board is low and one opponent leads the flop, both call. Turn is another rag and the bettor leads again, one fold, you call. You miss the river and bettor leads again, you call.

Opponent will hit a pair on the flop 32.38% of the time, he’ll have air 67.62%. If neither of us have improved:

.6762(8.5BB) – .3238(2.5) = +4.94BB

If he checks the turn and then bets the river unimproved, a call is +3.58BB.

If the second opponent will call the turn because he improved, a river call is -0.78 but all you need is an 8% chance he is bluffing the river unimproved to break even.

It’s still read dependent but think I need to try the call down approach for at least a week and track what happens.

When to stay and play.
Being a winning player isn’t just about playing good cards…it’s really about making good decisions about when to play and when to call it a day…

And there is one important decision you face every time you sit down and play in a cash game:

When do I quit, or should I keep playing?

WHEN DO YOU KEEP ON PLAYING?

Many players are playing the short hours when they’re winning, and long sessions when they’re losing. It should be the other way around…

When you are winning, at least a few of the other players must be losing. So when the table has your opponents losing and you winning, they aren’t playing their best.

When you’re winning, other players fear you, and you have a great table image established that needs to be used fully. When you have a strong table image, you can get away with things that you can’t whenever you’re losing.

You can get away bluffing much more often, since you have a strong table image – one that’s to be feared.

Usually a losing player is scared to get involved with a winning player for fear of losing, so it’s much easier for you to pick up pots without the best hand. You have the ability to win without cards.

You can represent more hands than you actually have because your opponents believe you’re picking up strong hands.

The best time to quit is when you become tired, or when you begin to play poorly, or the table dynamics change against you (usually happens when new players arrive after a while).

WHEN SHOULD YOU LEAVE THE TABLE?

Many players just can’t seem to call it quits whenever they’re losing. You have to remember the poker game — continues live and online, that next game is just a few clicks away.

If you’ve lost more than 30 big blinds at a given table, it’s usually time to quit. If you’ve gone all-in in NL cash game and lost twice, it’s time to find another table that’s not looking at a losing player. Once you lose a few pots, the other players will be inspired to play against you.

When you’re losing, it’s much more difficult to be on your A game. Instead, you’re more likely to be on tilt (or at least fighting that tilt feeling inside), which has a tendency to cause players to loosen up and start gambling much more… which just worsens a losing streak. You start playing against the odds more.

When you’re satisfied with your winnings is another time to pocket those winnings and take a break while you’re ahead. This is one of the most difficult decisions to make, because it’s tough to leave the table when the situation favors you; however, if you stay long enough, you’ll either get tired or your image will go bad or both.

So, I’m a big believer that when you’ve won more than 4 to 5 times your starting stack size and you’re starting to see the tides turn or grow tired and start to lose focus – just stand up, stretch and stack up your chips and say “nice playing with ya’ll – good luck” and leave the table with their money!

Closing points:

So, in cash game play, the biggest decisions you’ll make are:

1. Recognizing the best table to play (online, look for tables with biggest average pot size, which often indicates a looser table)

2. Recognizing when you’re in a winning vs. losing position versus players at your table

3. Staying as long as possible when you’re winning (and protecting your winnings)

4. Leaving as soon as possible when you’re losing (to minimize the impacts to your bankroll).

5. Leaving when you’re winning after you’re up several times your buy-in and are beginning to tire or see the tides beginning to turn on you.

6. Recognizing when you’re at your best and you’re on your A game and avoiding the tables when you’re not.

What does a good player look like?
We see a good number of people that portray an image of being a good player.
Why do we see them as winners? What characteristics set them apart from other poker players?

1. They typically are watching the other players until it’s their turn to act. They are watching to see if the opponent gives off information about the quality of his hand.
2. They don’t make moves (tells) to give away information. Most seem to be stoic in their actions.
3. They have the ability to size up another player’s chip count without asking. When they talk to another player, they are not looking for the exact answer. They want to size up how confident the opponent is in his actions.
4. Their bets, normally, don’t gives away information on the hand strength. They will typically raise based on position, rather than card strength. They are not afraid to raise when an opponent appears weak.
5. They are confident in their game and are more willing to play post-flop than the typical amature player.
6. Most good players don’t put down a weak player. They don’t want the weak player to start paying attention and begin to play better.
7. Typically they will be very aggressive when taking action. They also know to change gears to keep the opponent off balance.
8. They will rarely school opponent to improve during the playing session. Don’t kill the goose that’s laying the gold on the table.

Very good players look for two things when they look at a hand:
(a) First, should I fold because I won’t get paid off (opponent is good player or doesn’t have any chips).
(b) Second, this hand has potential (1) I could make a big hand & (2) if I make something, I can take a big pot.

How do you handle a bad beat when playing poker? Most people don’t handle them well. They complain. They call the opponent all kinds of names. They try to educate the opponent on why his play was a bad one. They even say things like “If it wasn’t for luck, I would never lose”. Anyone remember who said that?

Take enough bad beats in one session and most people will compound their losses by tilting away more money.

I used to be one of these kinds of players.

I knew I was playing well, but the outdraws were getting to me mentally as I played each session. I would sit back after the session was over and think, “If that guy didn’t get so lucky in that one hand, I would’ve won $400 instead of $100”. You get the idea. People think this same way, I used to.

I decided to start calculating the “Equity” of all of the hands that I either called an all in, or I put the opponent all in with cards still to come. After all, you can’t get outdrawn if the cards are all out.

I figured that after doing this for a while, I would be able to see if the odds really do work out in the long run (and exactly how long is “long run”). If I could get my money in, as a big favorite the majority of the time, then I would have to win right?

I wanted to be the big favorite as close to 80% of the time as possible. By big favorite, I don’t mean I have vs and we get all in preflop. I’m talking about hands like this: I have . The opponent has . The board shows . I’m a 4-1 favorite here.

After about 70 or so of these hands, my Equity in these hands and my actual results of the hands were close to the same number.

Let me give you another hand example to drive this point home. When you get all in pre-flop for $100 with vs ‘X’ and you win $100 you think “I deserve that $100″. When you lose all in preflop vs ‘X’ and lose you think: I lost $100. ”

But when you win the $100, you don’t actually deserve $100. You deserve about $76. Your Equity is about $76 depending on suits. So you actually won more than you should. You are a 4-1 favorite here, so you are “supposed” to lose 1 out of 5 of those. It really does work out in the end.

When you lose a monster pot like this you always here people say “you want him to call in that spot because you were way ahead”. I used to think to myself “great, but he still took my money and will just lose it to someone else.”

The fact of the matter is when I get all in preflop vs ‘X’ for $100. I win $76 no matter what the outcome of the hand. It won’t show up as $76 in my bankroll right now, but it is $76 none the less. Since I play alot, I will play many, many of these type hands and it WILL work out in the long run that I win $76 on these hands.

I’ve worked this out (done my homework), a sense of confidence and calmness has come over me. I still don’t like seeing the chips in ‘X’s” stack, but it doesn’t bother me as much.

I concentrate on hitting my equity goals and let the poker gods sort the rest out.

Patient Poker

One area of my game cost me money, when I started playing no-limit holdem, was my willingness to play almost any hand that looked good. I didn’t understand position or hand strength or the value of the player’s hand when he raised from out of position. I didn’t know the value of the hands held by players that called from behind. What does this all sound like to you? Yes, I was a losing player. This all boils down to my wanting to get in there and play poker. Not winning poker, I just wanted to play poker. I was not patient enough to (a) learn to play position, (b) learn to play better starting hands, and (c) to tighten up my playing requirements when I faced a raise.

In tournaments, you sometimes are forced to play less than very good cards and position. Your stack dwindles and the blinds and antes are continually going up. That requires you to gamble more and look for situations to gamble with good pot odds.

In ring games, the blinds and antes (if antes are being used) never increase. When you buy-in for the correct amount, you don’t have to play out of position or poor starting hands. You can play patient poker. When your read indicates you are beat, you can fold if you aren’t getting good pot odds to make the attempt to draw out. You never have to play a weak hand or weak poker in a ring game. When the cards don’t come, it cost you little or nothing to fold. When you play and focus on playing correctly against the opposition, you are patient and can win, win, win.

Basics for playing PLO:

1. Play hands where all your cards work together.

2. Play most of your hands in position (specially, speculative hands).

3. Always be aware of the effective stacks you are playing for. If you have the shorter stack in a hand, the effective stack is your amount. If your opponent has the shorter stack, his amount is the effective stack size. These need to be considered when computing implied odds for playing drawing hands.

4. Everyone is drawing pre-flop, on the flop and on the turn. PLO is mostly a drawing game.

5. If you are playing a multi-way pot and hold the nuts (typically a str8 or low set), but have no re-draws to improve; you should play cautiously. If one of your opponents has the same str8, and has a flush or full house draw; they have a free roll versus you nut str8. This is typically the worst situation you can be in PLO. You can’t win the whole pot; but you can go broke if there is a lot of action.

6. A small set is usually only good for picking off bluffs. Bottom set will set you up to lose your stack. If a player is holding two high pair and the board pairs then you usually lose because he will have the better full house. Bottom set is a very trapy hand.

7. So many players play “2 pair” connected hands (like 7788, JJTT, etc.) because they have multiple ways to flop big hands. A two pair hand has a 23.75% chance of flopping a set and it can also flop str8 draws, and flush draws (when suited) for the re-draws. They are easy to play in position. You get in cheap and only play when you hit a strong hand or multi-way draw.

8. AAxx type hands can be hard to play when you miss the flop. When the board comes coordinated (suited &/or connected), the AAxx hands could be drawing near dead.

9. In Holdem you can be sure in some cases that your hand is a substantial favorite pre-flop and on the flop. In PLO, you are rarely better than 60:40 favorite, even versus a random hand pre-flop. Reading your strength on the flop is extremely important and that’s why position is so important.

10. Other hands that can multiple ways to flop big are the connected and suited hands. Sometimes even hands with one gap (if you play a gapped hand, it’s better to have the gap on the lower ranks of your hand) ex: 7,5,4,3 is much worse than 7,6,5,3. Multi-gapped hands are rarely playable.

11. Since PLO is a drawing game, the value of your hand has the prospect of a significant decrease in value from street to street. The more players involved, the greater the chance that you will be outdrawn.

Short & sweet method

Study the game and how you play. Make corrections based on you reviews. You must do your homework away from the game.

1. Try to play most games for around 5% of your roll or less.
2. Keep your poker bank roll dedicated to poker.
3. Only move up when two conditions are met. a. Your bank roll has increased to the 5% rule. b. You are comfortable with the increased skill level at the higher game.
4. If you take a shot at the higher buy-in games, don’t be to proud to move back down if things don’t work out. You should move down and re-build the bank roll and try again, later.
5. That also goes for the buy-in level where you start. If you start above your skill level or have a bad run (it happens to the best), find some lower buy-in games to re-build.
6. Play games that fit your playing style: a. game types; b. buy-in levels; c. bet structures – limit, pot limit, or no limit; d. game speed: normal, turbo, extreme; e. game structures: SnG (quick starts and small fields), MTT (many tables and large numbers of players) or ring games (cash games); f. table structures: heads up, short handed (usually 5 or 6 player tables); full ring (seven to ten player tables).

Note: playing short handed or heads up involves more action. You’ll need good aggressive skills, hand reading, and ability to laydown hands when you are probably beat. To some degree, playing full ring gives you more time to wait on some better situations and opportunities to play pot odds situations.

Last note: When you play above your BR, you put to much pressure on yourself. That’s not a +EV poker situation. Most players don’t play their ‘A’ game with the extra pressure of going broke (having to re-load or stop playing).