Learning to play after you understand the cards

[VeMan]

Ok, I've been playing Hold-em consistently for about 2 months almost every day. Some days are up, some are down. After doing a lot of poker study from various books, and attempting to put many of these concepts into practice I'm starting to notice some problems.

1) Playing the suggested cards means playing tight- If I wait until I get premium or playable marginal hands, I'm usually playing really tight, and of course I become really easy to read.
2) Loosening up my play, especially on small stakes tables where the action is already loose, often gets me into trouble throwing away 1 or 2 small bets and hoping for a good flop. This is what eats away at my bankroll and keeps me breaking even against whatever wins I happen to get.
3) Keeping track of ALL the complex intangibles like pot odds, implied odds, opponent characteristics, # of outs, reaading opponents hands, if a raise, call or fold is appropriate, and a myriad of other aspects I can't think of, is near to impossible in the few seconds I have to make a decision.
Now I figure there HAS to be a way to organize one's thoughts at the table during play- some kind of order of consideration- that better players use to deal with certain aspects of a hand before others without the process becoming completely chaotic.
I realize that it eventually becomes second-nature as the brain learns to assimilate lots of bits of info into a momentary strategy, but how does one approach learning this?
I'm doing the best I can as it is, but eventually it becomes too much to think about and my play gets affected. Suddenly I'm throwing in money preflop and hoping for the best, and I really don't want to play thay way.
Any help from you pros out there? Or anybody else?

VeMan

[Nottom]

1) Start by playing tight. Most low-limit players are brain dead and won't put you on a big hand even if you haven't played in the last hour and a half. You can raise preflop and have the flop come AKQ and still get called down by 44, and Q6. Don't worry too much if at all about mixing up your play at the low limits.

2) Loosening up a bit in a loose game is fine as long as you are adding the right hands. Playing Axs or small pairs from EP is fine, playing QTo is a problem. Also if there are often preflop raises, you need to tighten back up even if half the table is seeing the flop.

3) This part comes with practice, the more you play the easier it gets.

[Paul Talbot]

A loose-tight question here with no mention of position?

How are you loosening up your starting requirements as position increases (early to late)? At low limit not too many people will actually track your starters by position so when you open up a lot late you show down a bunch of "mediocre" hands that help to hide your tight early play.

It may be that you are not loosening up correctly by position or that you are but your still playing raised pots.

Paul

[VeMan]

Actually, I do take position into consideration, although I also tend to play raised pots with marginal hands. The reason is because the games are usually so loose that often 2 or 3 players are in every hand with rags. By a marginal hand I mean, say a J9s, 87s, KTo, and often low to middle pairs just to see if I can get a set. If those hands are re-raised before me I usually fold, but I'll stay in if the pot odds are good.
I think one of my biggest problems is not figuring out my opponents outs. Twice yesterday I got beat on the river, thinking "Hard luck!!". But when I though about it, I realized that even though I had the best hand up to the river, my opponent had a lot more outs, either a flush draw or an open-end straight, so that's not really a luck situation when he simply had more cards that would help him.
I also have this tendency to see the showdown for the extra bet. I lose bets that way, even when I'm convinced that my opponent probably got the hand, but I guess opponents know that I'm not easily bluffed. Not sure if that's much of a trade-off. Occasionally I have caught someone on a bluff and taken the hand but usually they got the goods.
Anyway, the hardest thing for me is to assimmilate all the information I'm getting. I realize that having good cards with good flops wins the large majority of hands, but depending on that just makes poker a game of luck, which I know it really isn't.

Thanks for your feedback though

VeMan

[crockpot]

you need to understand that there is a huge difference between a hand like 87s or a medium pair, and a hand like KTo. with the former hands, you are looking to hit a straight, flush or set. all of these are extremely likely to beat the types of hands a player will be raising with, like AK or a big pair. KTo, however, hates both raised pots and multiway pots. in a multiway pot, a bigger hand is needed to win, so you do not want to be building top pair with a weak kicker. and you definitely do not want to play the hand against AK, KQ, KJ, AT and the like, which will frequently be in the hands of raisers and callers.

i don't even play KTo in an unraised pot in late position, if that gives you any idea of what i think of it.

[Nottom]

[ QUOTE ]
By a marginal hand I mean, say a J9s, 87s, KTo, and often low to middle pairs just to see if I can get a set.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is bad. If you never cold-called a pre-flop raise you wouldn't be making much of a mistake. Fixing this leak is more than enough to turn a moderately loosing player into a break-even or slightly winning player. Just because you opponents are bad, doesn't mean you get to play bad as well.

The major advantage a good player has in low-limit games is playing better hands preflop, if you take away that advantage then you need to play very well post-flop to make up for it. As a beginner, that really isn't an option for you.

If you find yourself craving action, sometimes a playing a second table will help since the inevitable card drought should be much shorter and less common since you have twice as many hands to play.