Don't Be Too Careful

"If I'm not careful, I might get even," the stuck tourist sitting next to me in the $30-$60 limit hold'em game stated with a grin. He was right; if he wasn't going to play with an overly careful mindset, he just might get even. Of course, he meant it facetiously. Mr. Careful thought playing weak-tight was the correct strategy, and was constantly blaming his luck for his losses.

I see this mentality in many losing players. They started their poker careers playing too many starting hands and playing them poorly, and subsequently lost their rear ends. Their friends and compatriots, in an effort to help, told them they were playing too loose and needed to tighten up. And they did. They played fewer starting hands, didn't raise near as many situations, and were much more cautious with their betting - and their results got even worse. Dazed, confused, and battered, they now have no clue what to do!

Conventional poker wisdom uses the terms tight and loose, blending in an aggressiveness ratio to come up with the correct playing style. The correct balance between tightness and aggressiveness is a function of your opponents. There are times to play tight, times to play loose, times to be aggressive, and times to be passive. Knowing when each of those times is correct takes a lot of poker wisdom. Playing any of those styles all the time against knowledgeable competition is a sure losing strategy.

Mr. Careful blames his losses on his luck. "I never win with A-K," he says, "jacks just lose every time," and so on. Here's the thing - he was correct! His A-K and J-J hands didn't win with the same frequency as they did for the more aggressive players. In an effort to lower his losses, since he felt he never won with A-K, he quit raising with them; the same with jacks. When he missed the flop or an overcard came, he thought he "saved" money by always folding, even in cases in which the pot odds/situation dictated that it was hugely correct to call. When he hit the flop, he fired, almost never check-raising, even in obvious situations. The difference, as the saying goes, is not in our cards, but in ourselves. It's not that A-K or J-J played any better or worse for Mr. Careful; rather, he played them in a way that won him fewer pots - and smaller ones, at that.

Because he played so tightly, even poor hand readers wouldn't raise him without a huge hand. Consequently, numerous players correctly took off many flops with him, and correctly called to see turn cards for a single bet. He checked whenever a scare card came, making sure that he never got raised, but constantly giving his opponents a free card. And lo and behold, his opponents sucked out on him much more often. His good hands really didn't win with the same frequency as other players' good hands. But unbeknownst to him, it had little to do with luck. Rather, he was outdrawn more than others because he didn't play in a manner that protected his non-volume hands.

Also, when Mr. Careful did win a pot, it tended to be small. It didn't contain the bets that better players would have made. He checked whenever an overcard, straight card, or flush card hit. Even when he didn't get outdrawn, he missed bets. He never seemed concerned about the size of the pots that he won. He considered every pot that he won a victory! His mindset was not to lose bets, as he didn't understand that the extra bets that he won have the same value at the end of the year as the bets that he saved.

To play limit poker well, you must protect your non-volume hands and either knock opposing players out of the pot or increase the price they pay to draw at you. Failing to do so will result in getting outdrawn more often and/or unnecessarily giving your opponents correct-price drawing opportunities. And the more you give your opponents the correct price to draw, the more you lower the edge value of your hand.

And all of Mr. Careful's volume and protection problems were exacerbated by the predictability of his play. When even poor hand readers are accurately reading your hands and correctly adjusting their play to their correct reads, you almost can't win unless the deck hits you square in the face. If you never raise with A-K and raise only with big wired pairs, you'll struggle to get action on your big pairs, and will fail to fold players who call correctly when you have A-K. You must balance your hand range and your level of aggressiveness so that your opponents cannot read you. How much to do so is dependent on the type of game you are in, the quality of your opponents' reading skills, and the styles of your opponents in the current situation. Generally speaking, the better hand readers your opponents are, the more you should try to deceive them. The tighter the game, the trickier you should play your hands. In loose games, your opponents are going to call anyway, basing their thinking on pot odds.

When you play poker, your goal is to win money. If you play a style that's designed to keep you from losing money, you can never win. And if you play the same style all the time, you're also not too likely to win.

Longtime poker pro and author Roy Cooke's Card Player column has appeared since 1992. A successful Las Vegas real estate broker since 1990, his website is www.roycooke.com. Should you wish to inquire regarding real-estate matters - including purchase, sale, or mortgage - his phone number is (702) 396-6575. Roy's longtime collaborator John Bond's website is www.johnbondwriting.com. Find John and Roy on Facebook.