Can you read ITH and SSH same time?

[cowboyzfan]

[quote It assumes you have a good foundation and knowledge of the game and gives you a certain playing style against certain types of oppenents.
I like SSH a lot, but if you don't have a good foundation already, SSH can be a dangerous book.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree that SSH is probably not the best first book for a begginer. I have always recommended other books such as WLLH or ITH, then SSH. However, I have this to say about what seems like daily posts about the danger of SSH or how SSH only applies to certain game types and certain opponnents (many implying that it is wrong for the internet).

I would like to see a sticky or something where Ed and other NPA's discuss whether SSH is a "style of play" or "the right way to play". From what I have seen, it is the right way to play in the majority of situations.

People say SSH can be "dangerous", but I am not so sure this is fair either. The basic points of SSH are play tight pre flop, play tight in small pots, and play aggressively in large pots. How is that dangerous?

The average poker player, online or in a card room, is loose/passive. So how can it be so dangerous to play tight/aggressive against them? The average fish cold calls pre-flop raises like they are going out of style, but SSH says very rarely cold call pre-flop raises. What is dangerous about that?

I don't claim to be an authority at all on poker. I just want to learn. But we keep seeing over and over in this forum threads saying why SSH does not apply in this situation, or the other. But what we don't see is an explanation of WHY IT DOES NOT APPLY.

Everyone says that the internet is much tighter than what SSH assumes. But is the internet play much better? Maybe there are fewer players pre flop, but are they not still playing crap hands, and playing them poorly?

If SSH does not apply to tighter games, the internet, or whatever variant you wish, then what does? And do I have to give back the money? [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

Where is Ed to respond to this constant barrage of SSH criticisms? I am not saying the poster i am responding to is criticizing the book. I am talking about a myriad of recent posts that have served to diminish or marginalize SSH over the last few months on this forum. If we took all these "facts" about SSH to be true, Ed's book would apply so rarely, it would be not much more than a novelty item, certainly not a foundation for limit hold'em play.

Maybe the critics are right, but where is the proof? That is all I am asking for. Things said over and over, without being challenged, become common knowledge fairly quickly.

one final point, SSH was not my first book, so maybe it can be "dangerous", but i just don't see how. Sure anything is dangerous if misapplied. The other issue is, of course you have to adjust your play according to game conditions and SSH does not cover every possible game condition. But what can we ask from one book? Sometimes you have to learn to apply your own knowledge and experience to what the book says.

For example, SSH does not necessarily cover tight games, with very skilled opponents, that is true. But I seem to remember SSH does say it is best to avoid these games, so in a way, it is covered. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]