Poker Strategy With Steve Zolotow: Ignorance and Apathy

Read this column to the end and it will reveal a common behavior that can have a major impact on your results. In New York City in the 70’s, the best high-low declare player was probably Norman Berliner. In this variation, you must declare whether you are going for high, low or both. Players declared simultaneously by placing chips in their closed fist (0=low, 1=high and 2=both), and opening at the same time. He was so good at declarations that the other players started calling him The Devil. Norman was the first player I ever saw declare low with a full house. And he was correct! He once jokingly asked me, “What’s the difference between ignorance and apathy?” After pausing a few beats, he stated, “I don’t know and I don’t care.”

Some 40 years later, I heard a comedian at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival make the same joke. Of course, it got me thinking about Norman and poker. To introduce my topic, I will describe two different no-limit hold’em hands that arrive at the same situation. A player is in the big blind. Three players limp, the small blind folds, and he checks. Everyone has a very deep stack. The flop is Q J 8.

Hand One: He has K Q. This gives him top pair with a good kicker, and a draw to the king-high flush. Since he doesn’t want to give a free card to three opponents, he elects to bet, and gets two callers. He now has to worry about a made flush or straight, a set, two pair, A-Q, and draws to flushes and straights that may or may not also include a pair. No matter what comes on the turn, he is going to be extremely attentive to his opponents. He will have a very tough decision whether to bet, how much to bet, and should be considering what he’ll do if raised. He will be watching their reaction to this card very closely. He will be thinking about their possible hands. He wants to overcome his ignorance about their hands and whether the turn was useful to them. He is far from apathetic. You can almost see the wheels turning as he tries to figure things out.

Hand Two: This time he has 10 9. The preflop action is the same. The flop is the same. This time, however, he has a straight flush. His hand is the best and will remain the best. It makes no difference what his opponents hold or what comes on the turn, he will win. Again, he elects to bet and gets two callers. The typical player in this situation spends no time trying to figure out what his opponents have or if the turn could have helped them. Now his ignorance doesn’t bother him, and he is totally apathetic to finding out more information. He already knows he has the nuts, so what difference do their hands make?

Little does he realize that he is making a huge mistake for two reasons. First, his lack of thought will telegraph the fact that he is extremely confident. Occasionally, one faces a normally thoughtful opponent, who appears to be playing very casually. This is often a sign that he has the nuts or something very close to the nuts. Second, it is very hard to flop an unbeatable hand. When this happens, you want to make the maximum you can. This requires trying to figure out what your opponents have and if the turn helped them.

The better you are at diagnosing their holdings, the better will be your plan for getting them to part with the maximum amount of money. If you think they’re drawing, don’t bet so much they’re forced to fold. If you think they have a good hand like two pair or a set, try to convince them you’re bluffing, or even go for a check-raise. A minimal check-raise can easily trap a set into calling to try to hit his full house. It will also gain an extra bet from someone who floated the flop hoping to steal on fourth street. Whatever you do, don’t fall into the trap of ignoring what’s going on around you.

In summary, always pay attention to what’s happening at the table. Try to work out what you think your opponents have and what they intend to do. Many players only do this with marginal hands. It is just as important to do it with great hands, even the nuts, to make more money. Although it isn’t crucial to focus on every hand when you intend to fold or after you’ve folded, it is generally worth the effort. How can you learn about your opponents’ behaviors and patterns if you don’t make a conscious effort to observe what they do hand after hand? Live poker players can’t rely on tracking software to give us a list of our opponent’s tendencies, they have to observe and then correlate their observations with the actual hand that is shown at the end. ♠

Steve ‘Zee’ Zolotow, aka The Bald Eagle, is a successful gamesplayer. He has been a full-time gambler for over 35 years. With two WSOP bracelets and few million in tournament cashes, he is easing into retirement. He currently devotes most of his time to poker. He can be found at some major tournaments and playing in cash games in Vegas. When escaping from poker, he hangs out in his bars on Avenue A in New York City -The Library near Houston and Doc Holliday’s on 9th St. are his favorites.

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