JV'S POKER ROOM

BY: John Vorhaus

One of my favorite pieces of advice is: Steal wisdom. You don't have to be all that smart at anything if you can draw upon and learn from smart sources. Nor should one feel at all sheepish about this; after all, everyone who teaches learned from some other teacher in the first place. We are all, in a very real sense, just passing it along.

All of which gives me the freedom (or generates the rationalization) to share with you a few cool thoughts that I've recently gleaned from Greg Dinkin and Jeffrey Gitomer's book, The Poker MBA. The book is about winning in business, but it's also about winning in poker, and while you and I (at least in the context of this column) may not care about winning in business, we sure as heck care about winning in poker!

So let's take a peek inside...

By focusing on the larger picture, you avoid trying to win a small battle that may prevent you from maximizing your return. We see the opposite of this - a sort of win-now, lose-later attitude - all the time at the poker table. Some hothead loses a hand he thinks he should have won, and immediately goes to emotional war against the weak, tight player he feels has done him wrong. Maybe he becomes so infuriated that he actually drives the timid player from the game! This hothead has lost sight of the big picture: That timid player may have won some chips on a given hand, but he's destined to lose them back if he stays in the game. As you grow in your poker sophistication, you'll occasionally get beaten by players who clearly know less about the game than you. Treat them nicely and they'll give it all back. Never make them feel angry or self-conscious, for they may just walk away, taking all your money with them when they go.

Experts are only as valid as you perceive them to be. Select what you think is valid for you, and ignore the rest. When you first start out playing cardroom poker, you run into all kinds of experts who happily tell you what's wrong with your game and what's right with theirs. A lot of times, they're just flapping their gums for the sake of making themselves feel good about themselves. Every now and then they have something useful to say, and you should definitely pay attention to that, for the sake of stealing wisdom where you can. But don't assume that another player is smarter than you, or more expert, just because he's logged more hours than you. If you bring consciousness and concentration to the table, I'll take your chances over a loud-mouthed or self-indulgent "expert" any day.

Stay away from ventures and potential customers that may take all your profit away. Sometimes the best investments are the ones that you don't make. Some players, when they bluff, don't mind getting caught. They consider the chips they lose in these circumstances to be "advertising." They're not always wrong, but often (especially in the low-limit games where we all start out) players are not sufficiently attentive to notice whether you're bluffing or not. If you advertise in that situation, all your advertising dollars will be wasted on people who aren't really customers in the first place. Bottom line: When you get the goods, bet the goods. All other strategies, especially at low-limit, should be used extremely sparingly, if at all.

It's tough to admit when you are wrong, but those who do win more often, ultimately gain the respect of their co-workers, and have an easier time living with themselves. Every poker player makes mistakes. Whether you've been playing 20 minutes or 20 years, I guarantee that you haven't made your last mistake in this game. The question is, What are you gonna do about it? Are you going to deny your mistakes and leave them strewn in your path like land mines, just waiting to explode again? Or are you going to accept your mistakes, learn from them, seek not to repeat them and in all ways lessen their hold over you? This is the sort of "gut check" that makes poker (in my opinion) a superior gamble to slot machines or table games. Not only do we have the chance to win money, we have the chance to learn and grow as well.

Copying a winning formula is cost-effective and efficient. Study the success of others in business. If you still haven't made the leap into cardroom poker (and why haven't you? - we've been at this a while now) maybe all you need to do is watch the game for a while. Commit an hour or two to leaning against the rail and watching the action go down. You'll quickly learn the routines and rhythms of the game, so that the fear of not knowing these things will no longer hold you back. You'll also see how the winning players win, and even if you don't understand every strategy or tactic they use, you'll understand that they are all, fundamentally, strong and aggressive players who aren't afraid to bet when they have the best of it. Strong and unafraid is a winning formula in any line of work.

When you can preview your outcome through a self-test, it will enhance the odds of a winning decision. It used to be that the only way to learn poker was to play poker. Thanks to computer simulations and free-play internet sites, that sad reality is a thing of the past. With little or no financial investment, and a minimal investment of time and skull-sweat, you can preview your play to your heart's content, and make sure that you don't enter the field of real combat until you know that you're battle-tested and ready.

I'd like to than the authors of The Poker MBA for letting me share (steal) some of their ideas and add my own thoughts. It's been fun - so much so that we'll do some more of it next time. Till then, what are you waiting for... go play poker!