They don't know it but maybe they are on too something.

[flair1239]

When I played at my B&M room the other day, I got to thinking of something. I was at the 2/4 holdem table, it was about 8:00am. I was doing a early session.

There was this nice socialable gentleman of about 65-70 sitting next too me. Whenever he would lose a couple hands in a row, he would request a deck change.

He was nice so this did not annoy me. The game was laid back so nobody else was uptight either. We had been chatting and around 11:30 agreed to go get lunch together.

So at lunch I broached the subject of the deck changes. Pointing out that the cards were random and that deck changes were superstitious. He looked at me and (it was almost a moment out of a Kenny Rogers song) he said (I am paraphrasing) "I know it does not make a difference... but it makes me play better."

What I think is this: People do seemingly superstitious things; but they are not stupid, they know those things in and of themselves make no difference. BUT, they make those people play better, by putting them in the correct frame of mind. Kind of like a person with an obsessive compulsive disorder, they know that the alarm clock is set, but they still check it 10 times because it makes thme sleep better. So If a person requests a deck change, knowing that it does not make a difference (rationally), but it puts them in a better frame of mind... can you blame them for doing it???