Two Plus Two Older Archives  

Go Back   Two Plus Two Older Archives > General Poker Discussion > Poker Theory

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #1  
Old 08-20-2005, 05:01 AM
Shandrax Shandrax is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 141
Default How much information about poker strategy is really available?

While browsing through old articles I found the following statement by Daniel Negreanu:

[ QUOTE ]
So, what were the hands? I don’t remember. OK, I do remember, but I don’t want to share this one. I believe I share a lot about my approach to the game and am comfortable with the information I give out. However, in this case, since my opponent was Johnny Chan and it was such a crucial hand, I don’t want to “show it.”

[/ QUOTE ]

Why can you only read stuff from Negreanu when he busted someone with suited connectors?

This reminds me of something that has always bothered me. How much information is really available? I give you an example from chess. There are thousands of books on the market on how to play chess, but do they really contain any trade secrets? Being rather qualified to judge the literature in chess, I'd say 99.9% of them don't. For example it is known that both Capablanca and Botvinnik had a move search algorithm, but they took their knowledge into the grave. Both have written a couple of books, but none of them went into detail about this particular aspect of their game.

Now compare this to poker. The mathematical players remain silent. Why is it that everything you can read from Chris Ferguson or Andy Bloch doesn't contain any information beyond beginner level whatsoever? Has Gus Hansen ever written anything about his decision making? Ok, there is lots of information available from 2+2, but why aren't David and Mason playing the 4000-8000 game if they really know it all so well? Is there something they don't know?

Do you think that some sort of basic playing formula exists? Maybe something with variables that the good player can adjust to the situation? Do you think the top players have a script they go through? With this I mean do they have a certain way to determine the "correct" play. The next step would be to identify the "right" moment when it is correct to deviate from the "correct" play because of game theory or psychology.

Basically in a nutshell my question is: Do we have all pieces of the puzzle available, so it is up to each individual to put them all together, or are we missing an important piece to complete the picture?
Reply With Quote
  #2  
Old 08-20-2005, 06:45 AM
benkahuna benkahuna is offline
Junior Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Posts: 4
Default Re: How much information about poker strategy is really available?

Interesting post. You sound sort of paranoid.

I think one of the problems relates to very strong players and their attentiveness.

Players may look (on purpose or otherwise) a certain way when engaging in particular types of plays. When they perform a certain type of play
(say a probe bet slow play with a really strong hand, for instance), they don't want to give away what cards they have if they don't have to. If they do, it will make it easy
for the top players (who are all super attentive to details) to play against them.

That's one problem.

Another one is that they don't wish to share trade secrets. Many of the best books that have come out were so groundbreaking
because they shared some of these trade secrets. TOP is a perfect example of this sort of book. I think HoH, especially the second volume is another example, particularly from the buzz I've heard about it. I've read both volumes and did find information in there I'd never previously encountered, not that there's a lot out there on NL tournament poker.

I get the sense that most of the information is out there if you keep reading and seeking it out. The ability to successfully apply that information
is something else entirely. That's where experience comes in.

As for Gus, he's hinted in the past that he uses combinations to determine how to act in a certain hand. He also says he has a book in the works to explain his play to people that just think he's simply a maniac.

If you keep searching, I thin you can find new concepts and plays. I just (a bit to my surprise) came across the action bluff recently in 2+2 magazine. I'd never heard of it, but it makes perfect sense.

Another part of this is that Daniel is pretty secretive in general and relies on his trickier to perform well against top opponents. His small bet against Freddy Deeb which looked like he was only trying to extract a few more chips and his poor reraise against Erick Lindgren (which worked well because Erick assumed he wouldn't do a play that foolish) are two examples that jump immediately to mind. Those plays are mentioned in the recent New Yorker article about poker.

I'm very interested to hear what other people say on this topic.
Reply With Quote
  #3  
Old 08-20-2005, 07:44 AM
Shandrax Shandrax is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 141
Default Re: How much information about poker strategy is really available?

[ QUOTE ]
You sound sort of paranoid.

[/ QUOTE ]

I have heard that line before [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

My idea is this: Imagine you do everything very similar to the way others do it, you will usually run into someone who does it better. It is tough to get to the top by simply copying what others are doing. Successful newcomers usually deviate from the norm. Best example is high jumping and the Fosbury Flop. In chess Fischer played 1.e4 when almost all experts and champions played 1.d4 at the time. Didn't Stu Ungar play a "different" style also?

Imagine you found something new and brilliant, would you share it with the public so that everyone could catch up with you and someone could even do it better? If I remember correctly then Eric Seidel refused to show his hole cards when they first came up with the idea of recording them with cameras. I can't blame him! Since poker is a zero-sum game, it is absolutely logical to keep stuff secret. For Thorpe it didn't matter if everyone could win at blackjack, but in poker if you don't keep your method secret then others will win the money you should have won and in the worst case you could even end up broke. Just think of Fosbury. The guy would finish last in every modern contest.

Actually I am really surprised that 2+2 books contain so much information. If I was a successful poker pro, I would tell people that my secret was playing "Phil's Top 10 Hands", so I could be sure that I would keep my edge for a long time to come!
Reply With Quote
  #4  
Old 08-20-2005, 08:20 AM
benkahuna benkahuna is offline
Junior Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Posts: 4
Default Re: How much information about poker strategy is really available?

You took my line about paranoia how I was a hoping you would. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

I know what you're saying and I agree to some extent. I think a lot of what makes the top pros great comes from experience. They usually have extremely good judgement. And their experience often includes being very skilled at reading people. They've mastered many elements of the game allowing them to play attention to other things that others cannot.

Remember when you had to think about how you're supposed to play certain starting hands? I assume the considerations I make at the table they know by heart so they can act on a more advanced level and pay attention to more things. As an example, Dan Harrington is known to usually have a count on each player how many hands they've played per orbit and how often they raise, call, etc. and from what position. When I'm playing live, I can't do that because I haven't practiced it. I go with my sense of what's going on, but that sense is far less accurate.

I'm not clear that anyone is really playing at the next level. Phil Hellmuth thinks he and the other top 100 players are eagles and are playing at the next level, but I think what a lot of people think about Phil.

As for Stu, Layne Flack and Gus Hansen are reputed to play the most like he does and are still successful.

I'd love to know how Greenstein thinks in cash games since the only time I've ever heard him tooting his own horn was talking about playing all the big players in Vegas and "frankly, beat[ing] them all." This was in the poker Beyond the Glory on FoxSportsNet. I'd also love to know how Ivey plays 7 card stud, and Farha plays omaha, and Negreanu does touranments, etc., etc. I'm sure they know moves and think about things of which you and I are unware. There are probably some secrets there.
Reply With Quote
  #5  
Old 08-20-2005, 12:17 PM
AaronBrown AaronBrown is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2005
Location: New York
Posts: 505
Default Re: How much information about poker strategy is really available?

One of my favorite Poker writers is Jack King, who had something to say about this:

"At the risk of sounding very dull, let's face the fact that you can't actually teach anybody to play poker. You can call their attention to certain basic principles which if observed will be of some value, but you can't come up with a series of instructions that will result in the proper playing of a hand. . .

Some guys who write this stuff make it sound like a fourth grade arithmetic textbook. . . . Other poker oracles give you sample hands. . .based on hypothetical situations so contrary to hard core poker you begin to think the author got his experience in some finishing school for young ladies. . . .

I ought to know. I've written a couple books on the subject."

I don't think he's saying there's nothing worthwhile in the books (especially his) but that most of the important stuff can't be reduced to print. People who try to make it simple end up looking silly.

A related point is that the best players may not be the best teachers. Most of the best sports coaches were indifferent players, some never played at all. There are some exceptions, of course.

One final consideration is whether the author even knows how to play poker well. Jack King also wrote:

"Some characters aren't satisfied with being standouts in their own particular racket, they also want to make a big splash somewhere else so maybe they get in the Hall of Fame on two counts. People who already have a reputation for being pretty good at something or other, such as bridge or exposing crooked gambling [he didn't name names, but this is obviously Oswald Jacoby and John Scarne respectively] are ready to tell you in print how you should play. If you search them down you wonder how they got a license to teach poker, which you really get hep to only by daily playing year in and year out in all sorts of company, and even then you're never sure."

From another field, I offer an old example I used to use in finance class, I'm sure you could update it. If you pick your stocks at random, you would do better than the market 50% of the time. There were approximately 1,024 (I cheated a little) open-end public mutual funds in the 1980s that invested in stocks. By chance, you would expect 1 to beat the market 10 out of 10 years. None did. 10 should have beaten the market 9 out of 10 years. None did. 45 should have beaten the market 8 out of 10 years, 3 did, and all three managers wrote books about how smart they were.
Reply With Quote
  #6  
Old 08-20-2005, 09:20 PM
benkahuna benkahuna is offline
Junior Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Posts: 4
Default Re: How much information about poker strategy is really available?

So, you think the information is out there, but the authors generally sometimes don't know how to play themselves and it's hard to teach poker through a book?
Reply With Quote
  #7  
Old 08-21-2005, 09:47 AM
AaronBrown AaronBrown is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: May 2005
Location: New York
Posts: 505
Default Re: How much information about poker strategy is really available?

"Sometimes," yes, "generally," no. The books I have found most helpful have not been from the most successful tournament players.

I also have great respect for good simulator programs. Anyone can write words about poker, but it takes some discipline to write a computer program that can play even halfway decently. The programmers may not be the best players, but whatever they do know has been reduced to clear rules and thoroughly tested.
Reply With Quote
  #8  
Old 08-21-2005, 03:24 PM
h11 h11 is offline
Junior Member
 
Join Date: Nov 2004
Posts: 22
Default Re: How much information about poker strategy is really available?

I disagree, for low level games at least. I was always a terrible poker player, in casual games, almost always lost, but read a couple books and then won on the internet, at low levels. Concepts such as "probability" never occurred to me as relevant before. I read Ed Miller's book on Small Stakes, changed how I played, and won at a faster clip.

Also, if stocks are priced efficiently, then we should expect managers, with transaction costs, to do worse than chance calculated without those costs.

I love reading anything Aaron Brown writes. He has a wonderfully clean mind which cuts through the underbrush to get right at the heart of issues.
Reply With Quote
  #9  
Old 08-21-2005, 03:43 PM
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Default Re: How much information about poker strategy is really available?

The basics are layed out.. As stated above, when I first played I didn't even consider all the basics to even have a chance at winning..

Honestly, I think some things are innate and can't be learned.. like reading players and memorization, you really need to train your brain

For the rest, the elements are out there, but since poker isn't a 1-dimensional step-by-step game.. it has ever changing variables and different styles, so all the information will never be available from all the top players
Reply With Quote
  #10  
Old 08-21-2005, 04:07 PM
magiluke magiluke is offline
Member
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Posts: 96
Default Re: How much information about poker strategy is really available?

The secret of making money playing poker is to write a book about it. That's where all the real money is.

But really, I do agree with what you say, and see your point of view...
Reply With Quote
Reply

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -4. The time now is 06:40 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.11
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions Inc.