forget about just changing gears during a sit'n'go or a tournament, i have discovered that changing mindsets and strategies for each separate game that i play is even more crucial and possibly more difficult and costly.
if you read this blog, then you know i work for a non-profit and if you know what that means then you also know that i don't make a lot of money. i also live in atlanta where there are no casinos and buying into games is technically illegal.
put all of this together and it means that i play a lot of free poker, only cash games if and when i can afford them( i know, if i were good enough i would be able to continually stake myself with cash game winnings, but the cards just don't fall like that sometimes).
however, even free poker is not just free poker, there is internet play and live tournament play....here i will discuss the 3 mindsets and the trouble that exists when i am living in all 3 of them at the same time.
internet free poker: i have started playing on espn.com at their single table tournament site which is infinitely preferrable to the come and go melee of the other free sites. even in this format though, one encounters the neverending line of "all-in" players who usually go out by the second or third hand. once this has run its course and you have folded even the pocket rockets you were dealt because someone will chase a flush or straight to the river no matter what you bet, my real single-table tourney internet strategy begins: i will limp in and call almost anything before the flop and will chase almost anything else. of course there are exceptions to this rule as there are every other, obvious folds and even more obvious bets can be seen for what they are when a flop comes off. there is still some "reading" of other players involved but when it comes down to it free is free and you can only really start playing real cash-game style poker when you get to heads-up action. following my earlier statement, there are caveats to this also, but fewer. i have had some success with this "style" but am hesitant to improve my game because ... what is the point of becoming a really good free poker player? except maybe trying to win a satellite to get into another satellite to get into an .... ad nauseam, at which point i would probably suck it up and pay $60 to get myself a few rungs up the ladder.
look for me: i play under the name chazbeaner.
live free poker: to the untrained eye and the guys who scoff at the thought of lowering theselves to this point, the style of game play at these events is not the same as it is on the internet. you cannot call everything before the flop and you most definitely cannot chase everything to the river. i'm not sure why the mindset is different, especially since most of the same people that play online play at the local watering holes, but it is. here you have to play super-tight from the get go and when you do come into a hand you have to come in strong and come in with the nuts, or else. there are chasers out there and they will suck out on you sometimes, but when most people playing are there just trying to outlast their buddy at the next table for bragging rights, they will fold and give you the pot. this is not to say that this is surefire and at live games, there is a lot more reading happening, but if you can pull those people out of the sea of strangers you can take their free poker money. unfortunately for me, i usually get sucked out on by someone who has no friends in the room....or is just a better free poker player than i am. this will segue into the same question i asked in the previous section .... what is the point of becoming a really good free poker player? apart from winning the $50 bar tab at the end of the night, which i guess is some incentive.
live not-free poker: this is what i would play every day if i could. the rush, the adrenaline, the anticipation of pitting yourself against someone else for actual monetary stakes....that's what it is all about. style, reading opponents, everything i put in quotation marks earlier actually counts in this game. i'm still learning to apply and use odds, but i don't have a left brain so math and probability are not my fortes while a hand is running its course. however, i crave the psychological aspect of these live cash games....watching, reading, noting moves, movement, raise strategy, calling strategy, folding strategy... knowing just what it takes and how much of a raise or bet it will take to get someone to lay down their hand. the money winning plays a small part, but the competition and mindset is just addictive for me. i've been told that i have a "tight-aggressive" style, but i'm not sure what that means... i just tend to go a lot on feeling and what my gut instinct is telling me about a hand. sometimes my gut lets me down, but like i said i'm working on tempering that instinct with math. i just love it, every second of it ... unless it is 2am and my alarm is set to go off 5 minutes later, in which case i will forego the 4-way battle to the death and just divvy up the money ... i'm also a realist.
so anyway, i've said all of that to say this: changing mindset and strategy is extremely important to me and has actually helped me prepare for changing gears within a tournament style cash game. however, it can be costly if i don't do it.
take this 4 day stretch for example:
Saturday night: played a single table cash game and won $50 (i know small potatoes, but whatever...it's $50 more than i had when i started). felt good, played relatively well, not any embarassing suck outs on my part to keep myself in the game.
Monday night: sat down at my friend's computer to play a single table espn tourney. started playing immediately like it was a cash game, took me too long to remember to adjust and i went out 4th....i was raising with a decent hand trying to push people out and getting called and sucked out on, also bluffing and then getting called and just straight up beat. started a new table, adjusted my mindset and strategy, and won the table.
Tuesday night: went to play a live free game at a local bar, sat down and started playing free internet poker.... i was calling and chasing and getting my ass beat like a delinquent child. i tightened up and started coming correct, but by that time my stack had dwindled and i ended up all in a little while later with Kh8h and going down hard to pocket Q's. frustrated i paid for my bar tab with my own money and went home.
i play free poker because it is what i can afford, but give me a cash game and one mindset to live with anyday.
espn.com has part I of a Phil Gordon column about mastering the fundamentals of poker: position and dominated hands. good read and a great reminder that poker is not always trickeration and check-raises.
and since i started writing this post they have put up a Steve Rosenbloom article about cracking aces, changing table strategy, and tournaments with quick blind levels.
you see, the changing table strategy part is in there, i should definitely be writing for ESPN.
don't even wonder....there is still no word on the laptop i may or may not have once owned....yarr. |
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