VP$IP and win rate

[nomdeplume]

Assume that one player has a VP$IP of 20%, and another a VP$IP of 15%. They're both decent players and play well after the flop. Also assume that the player with the higher VP$IP has a win rate of 2BB/100.

Is it possible to estimate the drop in winrate the other player would experience by playing fewer hands? Would it be significantly lower? Or would it be hardly noticeable?

Thanks

[nomdeplume]

I'm replying to my own thread here (is that the same thing as talking to yourself? - maybe I'm losing it). It just occured to me that since the other player is playing 25% fewer hands, would the winrate drop to 1.5BB/100? Or is that too simple?

There is no direct, predictable correlation between VPIP and winrate. Mike Caro wrote about this in Super System 2. He said that one pro could play twice as many hands as another, and they could still make the same amount of money because a lot of hands in poker are pretty much break even hands. In another words you don't win money over the long run playing these hands, but you don't lose anything either. Therefore one pro could double another pro's VPIP, but they would still make the same amount.

[nomdeplume]

[ QUOTE ]
There is no direct, predictable correlation between VPIP and winrate. Mike Caro wrote about this in Super System 2. He said that one pro could play twice as many hands as another, and they could still make the same amount of money because a lot of hands in poker are pretty much break even hands. In another words you don't win money over the long run playing these hands, but you don't lose anything either. Therefore one pro could double another pro's VPIP, but they would still make the same amount.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thank you for your reply, I've just read the relevant section in SS2. I understand that in the long run, since many of the hands have virtually zero ev, they'll make the same amount of money.

But this begs the question, in this case, why does anyone play these marginal hands? If they have almost no benefit in terms of your ev, why bother? Why bother playing small suited connectors for example?

[damaniac]

The winrate is unlikely to improve that much. The additional hands being played are probably very marginal winners at best. We're probably talking about hands that are worth .05 BB/hand or something along those lines, so your winrate is not going to increase by the same percent as the number of hands played increases.

However, you may see a slight increase in the value of your other hands. You may get slightly more action on your better hands being a 20% VPIPer instead of a 15% VPIPer, or hand readers will have a more difficult time putting you on a hand, etc. However, I don't think this jump in hands played is going to do very much of this, if at all. It's merely a possibility.