Hi everyone. Most of you will not want to read this entry, so I will put the video at the start. If you like it, then you will want to read on. Otherwise you may want to scroll down to the previous entries (flight of the conchords) which are worth reading, send me hate mail outlining where this blog goes wrong, or go to google & search for porn.
Today I want to talk about poker and is it a good or bad thing to be good? I ask this because I'm a brilliant player (yes I'm a humble person and I'm still saying this so I must be better than brilliant). Whenever I play online and actually pay attention to the game, I can tell the good players from the bad pretty quickly. The bad players are 'fish,' and if you can't spot at least 2 or 3 fish within the first 5-10 mins of playing, then you're a fish yourself.
Most fish usually are willing to bet all their chips with top pair, any flush draws and outside straight draws. Betting to get them out is not going to work so what do you do? You bet above the pot odds for what they could be drawing to make sure in the long run they will lose more than they earn (and you earn more than you lose). Fish with top pair generally bet the pot or more than the pot thinking they have the nuts, no matter what kicker they have.
So what do you do when you hold a pocket pair, flop trips, bet 3/4 of the pot and get raised all-in by a fish? If you think you're ahead (usually determined by how they bet pre-flop) you will call. They show a straight draw and hit it on the river and you're screwed for the rest of the tournament (if you're not knocked out). Of course you get a bad beat like this only about 1/3 of the time, but with so many fish in mtt's it feels like you're getting them all the time...
This is not complaining about bad beats, it's more about is it worth being good at poker where you get frustrated by dumb players so often? Or is it better just being average and not knowing too much about how to play? Phil Hellmuth shows just how frustrating it can be when you're a pro against a heap of fish...
Sorry for the bad quality, it's not my video.
5 comments:
And now we have perhaps the second most controversial blog entry since the inception of this fantastic blog...
I agree...you are a brilliant player...but brilliance is a relative thing...it is one thing being brilliant relative to fish...or being brillaint relative to the "big fish" (aka Bramble, Vidic)...but often, brilliance and a little bit of luck from the dealer go hand-in-hand...
Without wanting to make this a bragging contest...I will explain a few things...
I think you have a false measure of your ability because you have a good heads-up record against me...I will be the first to acknowledge that I have made mistakes, but later on in the game, when blinds are big and players are close to the edge (and it is late at night), luck does play an even bigger role...So I think a better indiction of a players ability is in the middle 2 1/4s...Of course the end, and ulitmately the winner is all that matters, but an indiction of style and how big a fish you are can be seen in the middle phase of the game...and I think history bears reference to the fact that you struggle in that phase of the game, even against the "not so big" fish...
It also depends on what you define as "brillaince"...the present Arsenal team plays the 2nd most brillaint football in England, but they have been no where near as successful in recent times when compared to the "beast-like, robotic" style of Chelsea...
What count? Style or results?
The above example isn't very good because a team like Manchester United has both in abundance...
I also think you under-estimate the value of maximising your return...a priceless skill in poker is actually determining when you can maximise your return with a "winnable" hand...
But thats just my 2cents worth...
yes, putting as many chips in as you can and get called when you hold the best hand, putting the minimum amount of chips in with the worst hand, and putting enough chips in to not get called when you hold a worse hand are the 3 important skills in poker.
Luck plays a huge part in poker, but it is more to do with probabilities. When you take a bad beat, you have to remember it has to happen long term. Bullets against any random hand has a 80% chance of winning (or a little bit higher). You will lose 2/10 times. That is what I have to learn. Learning to bet a proper amount is very important. And learning to throw them away when 2K's come up on the flop is important.
A lot of the skills you mentioned depend of the type of player you are playing against, and more so how that type of player is going in that game...
It's particualrly risky when you are trying bluff a fishy type of player because they might go all the way...
You have to take probabilities into account when playing poker, but you must also consider the nature of your oponents...I think the very best players do both...
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