Paul Phillips makes a good point...

[TheJackal]

Just because you go broke in one tournament, and as long as you have +EV when you do it, the gamble isn't over. There will be other times, and as long as you do what's profitable each time, you will win long term. The fear of losing shouldn't matter if what do you is correct. So maybe passing on an edge in the event of a better edge later is flawed thinking.
Babe Ruth was the home run king, but he also had the most strike outs. Does anyone think of Babe Ruth as a loser? If we equated poker to baseball, Babe Ruth would probably be someone like Layne Flack or Phil Ivey, while a good hitter like Ted Williams or Ichiro would be Phil Hellmuth. Or maybe I'm trying to make an analogy for two seperate things.
What is my point? Some play to win and some play not to lose.

[ceczar]

i hope you didn't just use ichiro and ted williams in the same sentence

[TheJackal]

They are both good hitters. I got nothin...

[Trainwreck]

Being primarily a tourney player, I had to face the facts, I will lose A TON and often...

It's simply a #'s game and being well above average at tournament play, plain and simple is what keeps me in....

>TW<

[Mason Malmuth]

Hi Jackal:

I think you're a little bit off here.

Playing not to lose is not good poker strategy whether tournament or otherwise. It's just not the nature of the game.

If you read the Hellmuth articles, he's now clearly playing not to lose. Making key laydowns can be very good strategy as long as you know that your opponents are not likely to be putting you to the test.

I just spent the past weekend with Dan Harrington and Bill Robertie finishing up the manuscript for Harrington on Hold 'em, Volume I. During a break, one of the things that Dan told me was that he use to tell as many opponents as he could that they better not bluff him because if he was in the pot he was paying off. Hellmuth is now telling as many people as possible, that he will and does lay those hands down.

Best wishes,
Mason

[TheJackal]

[ QUOTE ]
Hellmuth is now telling as many people as possible, that he will and does lay those hands down.

[/ QUOTE ]

You know if Hellmuth didn't make a production out of his laydowns, people would probably give him more respect. He asks people to take pots away from him and bluff him out. I don't think that is good tournament strategy either, and I do think he is a great player. But he needs to be willing to be wrong from time to time, even at a cost of busting out of a tournament.


[ QUOTE ]
Playing not to lose is not good poker strategy whether tournament or otherwise. It's just not the nature of the game.

[/ QUOTE ]

That was what I was trying to say in my post, but I probably didn't convey that very well. I've tried to get my head around winning tournaments online. I still have not won a MTT and the best I've placed is 2nd. I still make the money quite often and I'm not really sure what exactly I'm doing wrong. It occurred to me that I have being giving up a lot by folding hands that I should being willing to go broke with. Not only that, I think most of the people who win the MTTs usually play a lot more hands than I do (I usually play anywhere between 15-25% of my hands). I could be wrong about that as well, maybe I have the illusion that I play too conservative and it's something else (like not being as good as I think I am). But it seems that people who are willing to lose in order to win are the people who usually win the tournaments, while tight players like myself cash and don't make nearly as much.

[Rasputin]

If Ted Williams is Phil Hellmuth then Ichiro is Daniel Negreanu's mother.

[M2d]

[ QUOTE ]
I still make the money quite often and I'm not really sure what exactly I'm doing wrong.

[/ QUOTE ]

after reviewing extensive notes on all the tournaments I've ever played, I've found that, when I fall short of the top spot, invariably, I've failed to win the last hand I played.
hope this helps. [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

[berya]

LOL!