Brutal Honesty

[Al Schoonmaker]

Granny,
Untalented? Surely you jest. I feel privileged to be associated with them.
Lou is a VERY talented author with far more poker books to his name than I will ever have.
Max cracks me up.
Bob has written several excellent books (and I edited one of them).
Matt has written some great columns. In fact, Matt and I edit each other's work.
I'm not familiar with Mike's work, but some people rate it highly.
And Barb is a much better player than I am.
Tomorrow we get to play against The Hendon Mob, an exceptionally taleted bunch of British players. There will be large bounties on all our heads and on theirs.
It's the most fun I've had playing online.
Regards,
Al

[MaxPower]

Jason,

A few weeks I posted a hand where I had AQ and the pot ended up getting capped pre-flop among about 5 or 6 players. I bet on the flop and the turn even though I didn't improve.

You and a few other posters told me that I should be checking and folding on the flop. I think you and the others were wrong. I later PMed someone who is probably the most esteemed poster on the SS forum and he agreed with the way I played it.

I'm trying to make a couple of points. One is that you don't always get excellent advice from everyone here (including me). Another is that you definitely have some gaps in your knowledge, because your advice in that hand wasn't particularly good. Lastly, even though I think your reponse was wrong, it was well thought out and shows that you are thinking about the game. I read these boards for years and benefited from them, but participating is much more valuable that just lurking or getting involved in all the nonsense in the Zoo (no offense to the Zoo).

[GrannyMae]

It's the most fun I've had playing online

i'm sure it is. fish-frys are a blast !
(i hope you know that i was kidding... well at least about the shapiro part. maxey is the nutz. tell him Granny said hello)

[J.A.Sucker]

I suspect that Ulysses is correct in this assessment. There are many skills that being a good poker player have to posess. The most important one, in my experience, is the ability to disconnect yourself from your money. In other words, you CANNOT be afraid to pull the trigger when necessary, plus, you need to be able to deal with losing. It doesnt' seem fair when somebody hits a 1 out hand after all the money's in a NL game, or when you have dumped 10K in 4 days playing aggressive 40-80 games, but these things do happen; more than most people would like to admit.

We're all winners here on this board; at least that what people will tell you. Their own hubris allows them to feel good, but others' results (good or bad) have ZERO effect on you. You are either winning or not, and either enjoying yourself or not. There's a lot of penile size-comparing going on of late, and people are making lots of claims about how great they are. I could care less about their results. In fact, I could care less about my own results from day-to-day. The bottom line is that I have more money in my pocket at the end of the month (or 3 months, or 6, or whatever); what some dude at 2+2 claims makes no attempt to pay my bills.

You seem to internalize your results way too much. When bad things (or good things) happen, you should look at WHY they happened, but not dwell on them. Successful gamblers (and other risk-takers) are willing to accept the good with the bad, and the decisions are what matters, not the results. Perhaps the most amusing thing that I ever see is when people get all their money in the pot in NL and then start sweating the hand as they sit there waiting for the cards to come off. It's a little too late to worry at this point; you should have done that before you committed your money. It's the same thing in life. Make correct decisions and then let the chips fall where they may. Sometimes these decisions won't work out, but at least you'll never second-guess yourself.

The bottom line of my post is to tell you how successful gamblers think. If you're incapable of thinking in this fashion, don't bother. It won't matter how smart you are, or how well you can study the game. You either have it or you don't.

[jasonHoldEm]

Thanks again to everyone who replied. This has been a really good thinking thread for me, it has helped to confront some issues I needed to deal with and thanks to everyone's advice I've developed a gameplan for the next few months (basically a lot of work [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img] ). I'm going to be moving in with a friend this coming weekend and I think living on my own again is going to help me take "my job" much more seriously.

I haven't made any rigid plans at this point, but here is a rough idea of my gameplan....

I want to spend the next three months focusing on (in order of importance): <ul type="square">[*]Improving my work eithic [*]Improving my game[*]Improving my profits[/list]

Improving my work ethic

I think that moving in with my friend will help me in this area significantly. Living at home is great, but it makes things too easy on me. Yes, I do pay rent (and a fair one, not some cheapo "rent")...but let's face it, if I came up short mom and dad aren't going to kick my ass to the curb. Of course, my friend probably wouldn't either, but he would kick my ass.

I've undergone a pretty extreme transformation in the last week and I'm really looking forward to approaching poker in a more professional manner. I think this will affect more than just my poker game as well, I think it will improve my life overall, and make me a better person.

Improving my game

In the past my approach to improving my game was to read a book, absorb some of it, put the book on the shelf and go play. I never really studied the material. While you can improve by doing this you're not going to get very far, which is the hard lesson I've been learning recently.

I am going to take a much more practical approach to improving my game, really getting into the nuts and bolts of poker and getting my hands dirty. I really liked max's post about how he wants the other posters to rip into him and tell him he's playing the hand horribly...I want to develop this attitude as well...I want to be challenged to defend my play (which makes me examine it more closely and might uncover some things I didn't see before). I hope you will all ride my ass whenever I make a post.

I'm not sure exactly how things will end up working out, but I invision spending a couple hours each day working on improving my game. Reviewing my own play will be the cornerstone of this time. I will then build upon what I find by posting trouble hands, asking questions, replying to other people's hands, etc.

I also want to start studying all those books I have on the shelf. I'm not going to read them anymore, I'm going to use them as they should be...by looking up problem areas, studying the material, thinking about how the concepts are applied and then applying them.

I'm not really sure how to set a goal for this area, but I'll know when I get there.

Improving my profits

This area is result of the first two...it's not something you can set out to improve on it's own. I made $XXXX during the first three months of 2004 and I hope that with my renewed focus and determination I will make $YYYY during the second quarter (where $YYYY &gt; $XXXX). I think it's likely this will happen, but I'm not going to set a magic number to try and reach (why limit myself, right?).

I'll bump this post with a progress report on (or around) 5/15. It's the half way point and will be a good time to have a check-up and get some more advice. If anyone would like to comment on my gameplan I'd really appreciate it.

Peace and thanks,
Jason

[Dick in Phoenix]

For those people playing in B&amp;M casinos, there is a real problem with working your way up through the limits, and that is the rake. I spent the last 4-5 years in the Arizona casinos, trying to beat 3-6 and 4-8 hold'em. Now I am as steady and tilt-free as you could find, and I spent a great deal of time studying the low-limit HE game in particular. You can see my "education" in my sequential posts on my web site, http://www.annabelles-treasures.com/poker. Especially, see "Fixing the Leaks in My Hold'em Game."

After about 1200 hours after my last strategy adjustment, I was dead even, with my bankroll record showing violent ups and downs of as much as $2,000. Needless to say, this was very disapointing, and except for my non-winning record, I felt ready in every other way to move up.

Just for the record, at Casino Arizona, the rake/jackpot is as follows: out of the blinds, $1 is dropped immediately for jackpot. At pot size $10, a $2 drop is taken. At pot size $30, another $2 is dropped. Add $1 dealer toke and most pots cost $6 to the house. This is a full 1 BB in a 3-6 game.

Now here comes the professional opinion: One of my poker friends is a very well respected poster who is a full-time pro in LV. He was visiting Casino Arizona, and he sat down in a 6-12 game (raked as described above), while waiting for his 20-40 seat. He came up to me and said, "Dick! I can't believe the rake! What are they doing to you?" I just said, yeah, tell me about it. I then took the opportunity to show him my 1200-hour record and asked him if, considering the rake, I could consider myself as having beaten this game, and ready to move up. He said YES, absolutely.

So ... in all of your game selection, watch out for the rake !!

Dick in Phoenix ... now lives in DC.

[Al_Capone_Junior]

you can't have the dot at the end of the link

here's the link:

http://www.annabelles-treasures.com/poker/

I have always liked this site, and not just because I have stuff on there.

The essays "the slot in the table is your enemy" and "the effect of the rake &amp; time charge on your bottom line" adds to what Dick is saying here about the rake.

al

[Lou Krieger]

[ QUOTE ]
In the past my approach to improving my game was to read a book, absorb some of it, put the book on the shelf and go play. I never really studied the material. While you can improve by doing this you're not going to get very far, which is the hard lesson I've been learning recently.

[/ QUOTE ]

Reading and studying is not enough. What really helps is to read and study, then play and think about the poker theory you've read in terms of your experiences in real games. You also need to recall your real game experiences when you are reading and studying. If you can meld the two, and not see a big disconnect between theory and reality, you're well on your way to improving.

______

[turnipmonster]

[ QUOTE ]

It all simply comes down to 180-200 hand/hr (or 250-300 short) v. 30-35.

[/ QUOTE ]

and 3 people paying you off on the river every single hand. I've been playing the party 3/6 a lot, and an ABC player can murder that game.

--turnipmonster

[Al Schoonmaker]

Dick,
When we met here and you told me about your rake, I had the same reaction. I doubt that ANYONE can significantly beat that rake.
When he was first starting, Barry Tanenbaum had the same reaction to the rake in the tiny games in San Jose, CA. You've done well to break even.
Regards,
Al