Playing Winning Poker
WHAT'S IMPORTANT IN WINNING POKER - Part 2
by: Lou Krieger©
Last issue we talked about the importance of creating a foundation
or structure to support your poker knowledge. We also discussed
the importance of organizing knowledge. Without organizing knowledge
into some coherent whole - where each building block can support
ideas and concepts that come after it - that information is difficult
to find and use when needed.
But is knowledge alone sufficient to make you - or anyone, for
that matter - a winning poker player? Some people think so, but
I don't. While you certainly need a strong knowledge base to play
winning poker, I don't believe that knowledge alone is enough to
do much more than make you a little dangerous - and that usually
spells trouble.
Are Winning Strategies Enough?
Strategy, by itself, is not enough. All the strategic knowledge
in the world will not guarantee success to any poker player. Personal
characteristics are equally important. Success demands a certain
quality of character in addition to strategic know-how. Players
lacking self discipline, for example, will have a hard time ever
winning consistently regardless of how strategically sophisticated
they might be. If one doesn't have the discipline to throw away
poor starting hands all the knowledge in the world won't overcome
this flaw.
Knowledge without discipline is wasted, and talent without knowledge
is merely unrealized potential. They are just seeds, not a harvest.
But almost anyone who chooses to work at it can become a good poker
player, even if he lacks innate card sense.
There are some poker players, and it's no more than a handful,
who really do have a genius for the game - an inexplicable, Picasso
like talent that isn't easily defined and usually has to be seen
to be believed. But even in the absence of genius - and the vast
majority of winning players are certainly not poker savants - poker
is an eminently learnable skill. Inherent ability helps, and while
you need some talent, you really don't need all that much. After
all, you don't have to be Van Cliburn to play the piano, Picasso
to paint, or Michael Jordan to play basketball.
This world is full of professional musicians who will never be
Cliburn, scads of artists who are not Picasso, and millions of kids
playing basketball who won't ever be like Mike. But many of those
same journeyman musicians earn a nice living, and the same holds
true for commercial artists. And while those kids playing basketball
are not yet out there earning a buck, some will. Others might coach,
or perhaps they'll just reminisce about the good old days when they
could take it to the hoop with the best of them. And poker, like
any latent talent, can be learned, enhanced, developed, and polished
to a high, glossy sheen.
In fact, if you can learn to play poker at a level akin to that
of a journeyman musician, a work-a-day commercial artist, or even
that kid playing high school basketball, you've got it made. Do
that and you are good enough to win consistently. You don't have
to be Doyle Brunson, Johnny Chan, or Tom McEvoy to earn money playing
poker. The skills of a good journeyman poker player will allow you
to supplement your income, or - better yet - earn your entire livelihood
at the game.
Of course you'd prefer to be the best of the best. Who wouldn't?
But you don't have to reach that exalted plateau to make money at
the table. If I were a golfer I'd want to be Jack Nicklaus in his
prime, and I'm not alone either. So would every player on the PGA
tour. But remember, that teaching pro at the local country club
also earns his living playing golf. Although he's certainly not
making as much, he is doing what he loves and getting paid for it
- which certainly beats punching a clock.
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Poker and the Information Explosion
The information explosion is everywhere. You can hardly pick up
a magazine without reading about it. Whether the slant is toward
business, computers, sports, fashion, photography, or current events,
no publication seems complete without at least one article dealing
with the information explosion. Every field, every discipline, has
been touched by an avalanche of knowledge. Gathering knowledge is
no longer difficult. Anyone can do it. What's tough is sorting and
sifting to find those pieces that fit your specific requirements.
Poker is no different. More has been written about poker since 1980
than had previously been written in the entire history of the game,
and the explosion of interest in online poker as well as an incredibly
high viewership for TV programs like The World Poker Tour on the
Travel Channel and the World Series of Poker on ESPN have also spread
the word that poker is here to stay, and in the process these TV
shows have helped educate an entirely new audience about America's
favorite game.
Some of this information is good, some mediocre, and some may be
well intentioned, but off-the-mark. Once you've made a commitment
to reach for the stars, you have to decide where to begin. If you
aspire to poker excellence, the first - and probably the most important
step - is to develop a perspective that helps you put each piece
of information, each drop of data, each factlet, into a hierarchical
structure. After all, some things are just a lot more important
than others, and you might as well concentrate your efforts where
they'll do the most good.
Why Some Things Are Important in Poker and Others Aren't
Suppose I could teach you a terrific tactical ploy that would require
some real study and practice to perfect - but once learned, could
be used to earn an extra bet from an opponent. Suppose I also promised
you that this ploy was absolutely foolproof; it would work perfectly
every time you used it. Have I piqued your interest?
But what if I also told you that this tactic works only in very
special circumstances, and that those particular circumstances occur
about once a year. Do you still want to invest the time required
to learn it? Probably not. While your ability to execute this particularly
slick maneuver might brand you as a tough player in the eyes of
your opponents, the fact that you might use it only once a year
renders it meaningless. In the course of a year's worth of playing,
one extra bet doesn't amount to a hill of beans. It doesn't even
amount to a can of beans.
Lots of poker theorists, however, love stuff like this. Because
complex ideas can be very interesting, some poker writers devote
a substantial amount of ink to writing about esoteric - but essentially
inconsequential concepts. Should you ever bother learning them?
Of course, but only after learning an entire raft of information
that's much more important.
That's true about most fields, not just poker. There are other
fields where this phenomenon is even more pronounced. Pick up any
computer or photography magazine if you have any doubts. You'll
find article after article about really arcane technological features
that won't make the average reader any more computer literate or
a better photographer. But these articles do appeal to hard core
hardware junkies, and they help sell products.
We can count our lucky stars that poker is not yet a technology-driven
field. It's still played with human dealers, plastic cards, clay
chips - and that's it. Just think of all the information you'd have
to sort through if Card Player contained articles about automated
dealers, chips infused with artificial intelligence that advised
you how to play a hand. The possibilities for worthless articles
appealing only to poker techies and gadget wonks would be nearly
infinite.
The next article in this series examines the kinds of decisions
that are important because they come up frequently, as well as those
that are important because they can be very costly when they do
occur - even if they don't come up all the time.
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