A Lucky Lady?

"Is that lady good or is she just lucky?" the tourist sitting next to me asked.

"Neither!" I responded.

The lady in question had a mountain of chips in front of her. She'd been kicking butt for the hour or so that the tourist who asked had been seated. But, she was stuck for the day, is losing for the year, and is buried for life in poker. That's not my definition of either lucky or good.

Like so much else in the game, and life, for that matter, appearances are deceiving. Indeed, the fact that poker is deceptive is part of the potency of the game. In the short run, cards dictate the results, and could make Felix the Cat look like a world champion. But in the long run, the quality of poker decisions and competitive skills are what make a player a winner or loser.

Shortsighted players get caught up mentally in the immediate results of things. They become emotional over losing, then make decisions based on those emotions and lose equity in the game because of it. The power of denial, a force that affects all of us to varying degrees, causes them to believe their losses are due to bad luck, and ignores their bad decisions. They come back to the table again and again, blaming their losses on everything but themselves. Occasionally, reality blasts into their minds when they hit a wall … but some people never seem to get it! And while this may be a good thing for the poker economy, it is, nonetheless, sad.

That old concept comes into play again: The recurring sum of the volume you bet times the edge you bet it at, added into a recurring field, will equal your expectation. Over the course of time, luck will be a neutral factor and your expectation will be very close to your actual earn. For example, let's say you lay 11-10 on a 50-50 proposition. After 100 trials, you have 50 wins and 50 losses. In the 50 wins, you won $500 (50 times the $10 won on the bet); in the 50 losses, you lost $550 (50 times the $11 you bet). Your net loss over 100 trials is $50. Believe me, all bookmakers fully understand this equation! Poker equations are much more difficult, as the pot sizes and number of possible scenarios make the equations much more complex. But, the concept remains the same. Winning players let some variation of this concept drive their games. And they don't let the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune make them think they are either better or worse than they are. Steady wins the race.

If you want to be a winning poker player, you need to accept the premise that poker is a game of skill, and the less gamble there is in your game, the more consistent your wins will be. How well you get your money in over the course of time is what dictates your results. If you continuously get your money in with the worst of it, at the end of a series of trials, your expectation field is going to be negative. There's no question that luck plays a part in short-term results, and a fortunate streak when taking a "shot" in a higher game or a tournament can jump-start a player down a path to riches. But if your skills are lacking in comparison to those of your opponents, you will lose – maybe not today, and maybe not even this month, but over time, what should happen does happen in the game, and if you play against the odds, the life span of your bankroll will be brief. So, to keep your bankroll fat and happy, you need to play in a manner in which your decisions are superior to those of your opponents.

Many poker concepts extend from the premise that poker is a game of skill, not luck. You need to have a full awareness of reality, and not view poker (and also life) situations from a perspective that substantiates what you want to believe. You need to develop poker skills, and learn how to play the game. Study, think about the game, and take poker seriously.

You need to develop what I call "competitive skills." Concentrate, play your best at all times, and do what it takes away from the table to perform well at the table. That can translate into many areas, from fixing the problems in your personal life to taking care of your mind so that you can attain peak performance.

Within a session or series of sessions, don't let short streaks of bad luck affect the manner in which you play future hands. Don't attack the player who just put a bad beat on you because you want to get even. Don't start playing looser in an effort to get "unstuck" before you have to meet your wife for the show. Respect the money with which you purchased your chips, and realize that poker is a long-run game. The chips you don't lose today don't have to be made up in the next session you play.

Don't get caught up in "bad-beat syndrome." This psychological disorder is prevalent in players who are not running well. After losing a hand, they scan the room for a sympathetic soul to whom they can tell their bad-beat story. Sometimes a nice person can be found who will pretend to care. But, the bad-beat storyteller never realizes that he is focusing on the negatives. That is never a psychological trait of winners. Positive thinkers have more positive results, in both poker and life.

One of the great things about poker is that unlike most other casino activities, the player has the power. Your decisions affect the odds of your wager, and as long as you keep making the best decisions you are capable of making for each given situation, you are using your skill to steer the outcome your way.

We keep score with money. But, if poker were baseball, each session would be an inning in a game that never ends until you make the last out. Sure, you'd like to win every inning, but that is not the point. The point is to win over the course of the whole game. Ego – a part of the human condition that exists to varying degrees in all human beings – should not play a role in your poker decisions. Respect the money with which you play and the other players in the game. Treat the game as a competition, play to win, put forth your best effort – and always keep in mind that poker is a game of skill.

The tourist who asked me about the "lucky lady" tried hard and focused on the game. As the lady took more long-shot draws, ran uphill against the field, and played weak hands out of position, her mountain of chips eroded away as inevitably as if by wind and water, and the somewhat skillful tourist got a little piece. He ran a little lucky and played a little good poker, which is a fine combination. But, I still am not sure he knows the difference between lucky and good.

Roy Cooke played winning professional poker for more than 16 years. He is a successful real estate broker/salesperson in Las Vegas. If you would like to ask Roy poker-related questions, you may do so online at www.UnitedPokerForum.com.