Relative poker ability

[Guruman]

"I'm a better poker player than that guy every day of the week and twice on Sunday." "He's not nearly as good as he thinks he is" "I keep getting my ass kicked because everyone at this table is better than me."

It's an undisputable fact that poker is a game of skill. Consequently it must be concluded that every player is either better or worse than every other player at his table at the game.

The question is: how do we determine our skill relative to our opponents quickly enough to determine our chances of making money at any given table?

The amount of money won and lost is an unreliable barometer for a single session, but I believe that there are other ways to tell whether or not you've outclassed your opponents at the end of a session.

Sklansky's fundamental theorem of poker says that you've gained when you made the play you would have made if you knew your opponents cards and you've lost when you make any other play.

I'd suggest that given this definition of good poker play that there are a few independant skill factors that make up any individual's poker game:

A)ability to count outs and determine the probability of hitting those outs
B)ability to accurately put opponents on a narrow range of hands
C)ability to disguise one's hand from his opponents
D)ability to psychologically manipulate the opposition by putting them on tilt, making them your buddies, and otherwise confusing and decieving them.

At any given poker game the player who is the most superior at the most of these traits will be the favorite to win the most money.

As an ex:
Say we rank each of the poker skills on a scale from 0 to 100. In a five handed table the players are ranked as follows -

Player 1: Math)80 HandReading)80 Deception)50 Psychology)45
Player 2: Math)20 HandReading)60 Deception)60 Psychology)50
Player 3: Math)20 HandReading)20 Deception)30 Psychology)10
Player 4: Math)70 HandReading)70 Deception)55 Psychology)25
Player 5: Math)10 HandReading)30 Deception)10 Psychology)75

Player 1 is the clear favorite to win money since he understands the math in the game, is a pretty far superior hand reader, and doesn't get beat horribly in deception or psychology by others.

Player 3 is probably the worst player at the table, and is the most likely to lose all of his money quickly.

I'd argue that when we are first introduced to the game of poker that our relative skill level in each of these categories (with the exception of D:Psychology) is at or around zero.

The first skill most people learn is math or hand-reading, and I'd argue that these two are the easiest to measure relative to your opponents.

You can tell when a person doesn't understand the number of outs available and will fold a 15-outer for one bet or call a 2-outer for 3. This example doesn't have to be so extreme in order for it to be an effective barometer. If you can detect even the occasional bad call or fold that was made for a mistaken math concept then you can rest assured you're at least that much better in that one skill than your opponent.

One's ability to read and disguise a hand can't be ascertained as well from the rail, though you should try. Once you're in this can be the first thing to watch when assesing your play relative to your opponents. Be honest with yourself about how close you came when putting your opponents on a hand, and also pay attention to how well your opponents are doing. If you're not getting action with your monsters and are facing a ton of aggression with your mediocre holdings, you may not be disguising well enough.

Determining your relative ability in the first three skills should often be enough to tell whether you're playing better than your opponents as opposed to whether you're running hotter than them IMHO.

The first three skills are difficult enough before adding psychology to the mix, and I consider this factor to only be an edge if the other fundamentals are comprable. I'd argue that a player like player 5 in the example is also a particularly poor poker player - just not as bad as player 3. I'd also argue that player 4 is almost as good as player 1, but suffers loses his edge due to the psychology factor.

to sum up:

1)There are several distinct channels of poker play, each of which any player can be better or worse than his opposition at

2)To determine how tough a table is, look for mathematical cognizance from the players, and see how well you can read their hands from the rail.

3)To determine whether you outplayed your opponents, rate your games according to the four skills as opposed to counting money.

Thoughts? Suggestions?