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Server Time: 9/7/2008 8:20:35 PM PACIFIC |
 playing good, tron, 25. Apr 2003 19:30 | ||
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| I know that over the last 10years that i am a sure loser in poker. Now, I've learned the hard way coming up the poker ranks. I was wondering anybody out there a winning poker player throughout the years? Even beginning loser and coming back to cover the losses. And what does it take? tks for inputs | ||
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| Re: playing good, NiceFella, 25. Apr 2003 21:52 | ||
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| I'm not an expert, but I can beat the local low-limit game. Here's what I think separates me from the people I play with: 1. You must have patience. Poker is a very slow game. Be prepared to muck every hand for an hour and a half on a bad day. Be prepared for your flush draw to miss most of the time. Be prepared for AA to get cracked. Expect these things, and accept them with grace. 2. You must have absolute mastery of pot odds and ABC play style. You should be able to recognize in an instant whether you should be throwing chips in the pot or not. Know when to holdem and when to foldem. This comes from books, magazines, and this forum. Don't listen to weak players' superstitions, guesses, and rules of thumb. Understand the mathematically correct moves and trust them. Know when you have the best of it and when to muck it. Until you have mathematical command of the game, you can't expect to win. 3. You must have self control. You must not tilt. Ten minutes of tilt kills ten hours of profit. You must not become stubborn or emotionally involved. Don't get angry. 4. You must have confidence, energy, and ego. This is an intangible sense of being in command of the game, of being the best player at the table. This is the feeling that makes you aware of when a pot can be stolen. This is the presence that prevents weaker players from trying to put moves on you. It is the vibe that keeps you from getting pessimistic or sleepy. It works for me. 5. You must have patience. Did I cover this already? You must have an extremely long-term view of the game. Poker is a very long series of decisions, and you always choose the option with the greatest expectation. In the short term your results will bounce around, but see through the game to those expectations and keep edging your way up. If you've got all that, my other more trivial advice for struggling players is to never slow play without the absolute mortal nuts, always raise premium hands preflop, and try to call much less often and to raise and fold much more often. Hope this helps, NiceFella | ||
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| Re: playing good, tron, 25. Apr 2003 22:43 | ||
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| thanks for your insights. i appreciate very much. you are right with the math. i have not got that down yet. | ||
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| Re: playing good, flintsword, 26. Apr 2003 09:24 | ||
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| Great list NiceFella. I would add one important item to your list. 6) Observe and calculate, even when not in the hand. Observe what all other players play and how they play. Does Tom raise in MP with middle pairs? Does John limp with AA? Fred plays anything that moves? David MUST have gills to play 48o and 27o regularly. You get my drift here. Calculate the pot odds for your opponents with what hand you "think" they have, as an exercise to calculate pot odds. This behavior puts you "in the zone". | ||
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| Re: playing good, NiceFella, 28. Apr 2003 20:02 | ||
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| Excellent addition Flintsword. It is amazing to me how many mistakes are committed by other players, even players who seem generally solid or have played for many years. Watching your opponents and reverse engineering their choices and pot odds helps in so many ways: -- you learn ways to exploit your opponents. Why bet out when you can check-raise a habitual bettor? -- you get practice calculating pot odds quickly -- you get better at accurately putting players on a hand. -- you discover whether or not you are at a table full of gambling fish (good) or tricky champions (run away!) | ||
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| Re: playing good, 4 POKER, 25. Apr 2003 22:20 | ||
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| Hi Tron, I have been playing poker professionally now for over ten years and I'm making a decent living from it. Let me tell you how I first started... Before I ever considered playing for a living, I would drive down to Atlantic City one day a week. Knowing that I only had a short time to play, I would sit in a game, never leave the chair and play until I dropped! I would book tremendous wins but the majority of the time I would either give it all back or a big chunk of it at least. But I just didn't care, I was there to have fun, win or lose it didn't matter, as long as I was able to go back the following week. I loved poker! And I was a pretty darn good player too. I'm not bragging, at least I'm not trying to, I just had a natural feel for the game. Then why would I allow myself to win a bunch of money only to give it all back? I felt horrible everytime I did that and I said to myself, " It really doesn't matter how good you are, If you don't have the discipline to leave the game after so many hours and are not willing to understand that you should never give back your entire win, then you will not be a winning player, period". I used to get so mad at myself for not taking the win- leaving the game broke was very embarassing for me. I was a good player, others respected me in the game, but then I would go home with nothing half of the time. Well one day, I woke up. I don't know how it happened, but it happened. I was getting a little tired of my previous job and thought that if I can get control of this discipline thing, then maybe, just maybe, I could play poker for a living. I already was playing for three years, had a real good feel for the game and was willing to give it a shot. I would play poker three days a week while still working at my other job and eventually, after about one year, after keeping accurate records of my wins and losses I quit my day job and started playing poker for a living. I never looked back. I still play the same game but I don't play marathons any more, I don't have to! I can play poker anytime I want, any day of the week, so I don't feel the need to have to sit there and play tired and miserable. I book many more wins then I do losses, about 85% wins. My wins for the most part are never real big wins but my losses are always kept to a minimum as well. Sure I had huge wins before going "pro", but my losses were just as big and that was very unstableing for me. If I'm up a certain amount in a game and I feel that I'm the favorite, then I stay. But I never allow myself to give my whole win back, never. If I continue to keep winning, then I stay- as long as I'm not tired and I'm still making clear and level-headed decisions.If I lose a portion of it, I quit. Maybe other professionals do it differently, but that is what works for me. I also don't allow myself to get burried in any one game. There's always tomorrow. I'm also very choosey about my game selection, in fact, if I had to tell you what the best part of my game was, that would be it. I pride myself on my table selection skills. I could walk into the cardroom, scope out every game there, and then go home. Not many of us are willing to do that. I just know what games work for me and which ones do not. I have kept accurate records of the different types of games that I've played in, and after reviewing it over and over, I noticed a pattern of losses associated with certain types of games. (loose aggresive games vs. tight passive games,etc). I just play in games that work for me- ones that I feel comfortable in, not anyone else... just me. I responded to another persons post on "what does it take to play for a living?" There are a few things on that post that I didn't mention here so if you'd like, check it out. I think you will find it helpful. Best of luck to you, Dave. 4 POKER | ||
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| Re: playing good, tron, 25. Apr 2003 22:45 | ||
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| thanks for ur insights. Very helpful. I was trying to find ur post on the archives, do u know what date that was? again tks again. | ||
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| Re: playing good, 4 POKER, 25. Apr 2003 23:09 | ||
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| on 25. Apr 2003 22:45 tron wrote: > thanks for ur insights. Very helpful. > I was trying to find ur post on the archives, > do u know what date that was? > again tks again. Yes, if you're still there, It is on the home page right now. Otherwise the post is on page 2 under "what does it take to play for a living". 4 POKER > > | ||
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| Re: playing good, Big_Slick, 27. Apr 2003 19:05 | ||
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| I don't believe in money management for good poker players. If I was playing a slot machine and was lucky enough to get up a few hundred, I'd probably thank my lucky stars and quit. If I'm playing poker, I'm looking for more. Why? Because I know I can win at poker... a slot machine is unbeatable. If you are a good player, why would it matter if you left a table after an hour -- up $200 -- or played there all night down $200? All things being equal, your skill hasn't changed, right? The next time you sit down to play, all you are really doing is continuing where your last game left off. Lou Krieger talks about this in his book "Hold'em Excellence" and I think it is brilliant. Give it some thought... I would love to hear your ideas. | ||
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| Re: playing good, shorn, 28. Apr 2003 06:22 | ||
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| For me, I leave a table with significant positive expectation on when I am either tired, not playing well, have somewhere else to go, OR I am up so big an amount that the laws of "mean reversion" are bound to catch up with me. This may sound foolish, but I don't completely buy the "it's all one big game" theory. That would be true if every time you sat down, you played versus the same competition in the same time of game (passive, aggressive, etc.) which we all know is flase. So, psychologically, it can be great for your game to book a huge win every once in a while. I find that coming to the poker room with a good feeling about my game (which happens after a big win) goes a long way toward playing my best. | ||
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| Re: playing good, tron, 28. Apr 2003 22:15 | ||
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| thanks 4 poker. Another question for u. Now u have been doing this for quite a while and i value ur expertise. Do u go in with a set amount/goal and leave when u reach it. Or do u just put in the time at the poker table? Say ur goal was 200 dollars a day. u get there in 30mins or 3 hrs would u call it a day. When do u call it a day when u are losing? tks | ||
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| Re: playing good, 4 POKER, 29. Apr 2003 13:03 | ||
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| on 28. Apr 2003 22:15 tron wrote: > thanks 4 poker. > > Another question for u. Now u have been doing this for > quite a while and i value ur expertise. Do u go in with > a set amount/goal and leave when u reach it. Or do > u just put in the time at the poker table? Say ur goal > was 200 dollars a day. u get there in 30mins or 3 hrs would > u call it a day. When do u call it a day when u are losing? > > tks > Hey Tron, To answer your question... No, I do not go in with a set amount of how much I want to win. What I do is this... There are two casinos that offer poker on a regular basis, the taj mahal and the tropicana. First, I phone both casinos to see what games they're spreading and I make my first decision on where to play based on the availability of games that each card room has to offer. I play all the games and the limits that I play vary depending on the game itself. When I arrive at that cardroom, I scope out all the games first, then I decide whether I want to play hold-em, Omaha8, or stud8. Sometimes they offer a two-way game that consists of a half/hour of Omaha and a half/hour of stud8. Once I have chosen a game to play in, I will play in that game for as long as I'm playing my best game and feeling sharp. Once I get tired or bored of playing, I leave. Because I play poker so often, It sometimes bores me after a short period of time, in which that case I will leave the game, take a break and decide whether I want to put in another session. Because My limit choices vary so much, it would be difficult for me to even give you an average win, but what I simply do is this- regardless of how much I may be winning, I just keep playing, but I don't allow myself to give back a decent win. I do a lot of hit and run sessions, and I'll take several breaks just to clear my mind and to scope out some new games that might be going on. And sometimes I'll play for 8 hours but I will never play a marathon, I've done too many of them in my earlier days and they don't work for me; they just screw up my next day and my whole sleep schedule gets totally off balanced. (remember, it's so important that we get the proper amount of sleep, for it really effects our moods and are well-being). I might be playing in a 5-10 hold-em game, up $200, and consider that to be a good win based on the game itself, the amount of hours that I have already been playing, or maybe I was getting too tired to continue and I would just take the $200 win. Or I might be playing in a 30-60 Omaha game, up $1,200 and apply the same principles. So you see my win for one day might be $200, where on the very next day it could be $1,200-- but I understand what a GOOD win is based on the game itself regardless of how much it may be. As far as my losses go, I can be playing for one hour, lose a certain amount, even if it's a small loss and just quit. The same applies to my winning sessions; everything for me is based on my mental state of mind and if I'm really playing my best that day. We can't always have a perfect day and sometimes there are other elements that can effect us from playing our absolute best game of poker, so you see, everything that I do, all my actions and reactions are based on ALL the surrounding factors at hand. I guess my real strategy/discipline is more based on the losing sessions as opposed to the winning ones because I just don't allow myself to lose too much in any one session; it's just not good for me mentally and I'm a firm believer of protecting your bankroll. 4 POKER | ||
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| Re: playing good/partner yourself, Nathaniel Brous, 29. Apr 2003 13:41 | ||
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| Damm fine post. Can't really add much to it. I can repeat how important your mental state is to the equation for consistent success. Each player is different and will have different strengths and weaknesses. Catalog your own on paper (or at least mentally) and come up with something that is tailor made for you, not an artificial limitation you read some where. That being said...(lol) some people starting out have this NEED to follow a concrete rule on when to leave. Howard Lederer has apparently espoused the idea of not getting stuck more than 30BBs when starting out. This seems reasonable because it is relatively easy to overcome this kind of deficit in a single session. But in the long run, you need to be a willing partner with yourself. A lot of players sort of float about without really analyzing their play/habits. That is a recipe for stagnation. - Nathaniel Brous | ||
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| Re: playing good, tron, 30. Apr 2003 17:09 | ||
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| wow, thanks very much for the well though advice. I appreciate everyone's inputs.. | ||
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| Re: playing good, stdioh, 28. Apr 2003 10:40 | ||
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| Play in games that you can beat - consistently. Read - a lot. Don't tilt. Do what the professionals say you should do and make sure you play with people who are worse than you - not better. Then in the long run, you'll do just fine. | ||
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