playing "the" hand vs. playing the "million" hands

I'm interested to know what/how good players think about this: playing the actual hand (and session) you're in (including odds, other players' styles and history, tells if any, psychology, etc.) vs. playing the hand "correctly," that is, how that TYPE of hand "should" be played to come up a winner over time.


I'm not just some fish asking a simplistic question; on the other hand, neither am I implying a (brick stupid) lack of respect for, say, Malmuth and Sklansky (to whom I owe a god-awful lot of knowledge).


But I've noticed--at least, I THINK I've noticed--that quite a few players suffer from pressure to play "correctly" for the long term instead of what I would consider correct for the actual hand they're in. And--this is the interesting part--I also think I see them losing more than they should because of it.


I'd appreciate anybody's serious thoughts on this. Thanks.

Several years ago most hand analyses on this Forum, somewhere in the litany of globbledy-gook math and theory, used the expression "it depends". This covered all situations where the "book" play had to be rethought to account for "at the moment" situations. I've noticed that many of the luminaries have tried to stay away from the "it depends" school of hand analysis but i assure you, during any particular hand you play the right play does indeed depend on all the variables you mention. The best players size up the situation and then make the correct play for that situation. And if their analysis proved correct they will be winners, in the long run.