Aggressive betting style vs. conventional
Game after 6/12 game, I keep seeing the same individuals who play unconventionally win. Saturday night's game featured many players who couldn't get seats at the 15/30. In other words 8 of 10 were reasonably strong conventional players. The other 2 however, played 80% of the pots and raised at least 50% of the time before the flop. While they lost some of the time and everyone recognized their loose aggressive playing approach, time after time they raked in the chips. I've seen these two players separately in different games for weeks winning big. Part of what I'm seeing is better players loosening up against these players and in the face of continued raises, backing down. I certainly called on things I would never call on in a tighter game. I won about 40% of the time when I did this against just them. When better players were in the hand, playing styles became very unpredictable for everyone. My observation is that at some point, the pot odds in a loose game favor aggressive loose play over more conventional play. I'd be very interested in reading whether others have observed the same style consistently successfully used and any framework on how this radical change in playing style should be thought about. As an example, if you can't expect at least 4-way action every hand, don't try this style and here's how you should loosen up.
Thx ... Adam [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]
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