Poker Perambulation

I wrote about changing gears early on. Today, I want to go more into this interesting topic from more of a ring perspective. At times we inadvertently change our game because we are underwater or, more pleasantly, winning. But, the tendency is to make the wrong switch.People will frequently move to a looser game in the hope of recouping their loss. They play hands they normally wouldn’t play – doing so because we are stuck and often it was done by a trashy hand. Instead we should be tightening up our game.

It is human nature to make this kind of a move. But, human nature is what we want to see in our opponents and not in our game. You are stuck and chase more hands hoping to hit and punish those who’ve earlier taken your chips.

In the heady rush of a good session, we have the other tendency. We tighten our standards to protect our win. This is really a time for a bit looser play. Not loosey-goosey loose but controlled aggression with position or circumstance allowing more speculative hands.

Changing gears should be a conscious effort. Avoid those emotional changes and make the gear change a conscious move on your part is the profitable method. Allowing emotions to dictate a style move is costly.

This is a situation that few avoid. Tilts aren’t always blood vessel popping events. The dangerous ones go unnoticed in our play. We stay hunched over with mouse in hand and the thinking drops a notch after a bit. There aren’t the normal casino distractions on line and it is too easy to think we are concentrating and the opposite is true. It helps to stand up once in a while and do a shoulder wiggle or stretch a bit. Think about where you’re at and what has transpired and make the right plan of attack in a conscious manner.

ADDENDUM:

The Daily KOS has an article on Speaker Hastert and his relationship over the years to what has become the UIGEA. It is interesting a scary reading. It is a pretty long article with a lot of details about how government and special interests work.

I still trying to play the occasional Million Freeroll at Stars. Unfortunately, it is a 2:30 tournament and I usually think of it about 2:35. If you’ve got a few points there or want a free ticket you can use the site to register – that keeps the bills paid. I’m planning to play more tournaments there in the coming weeks. They have a nice blind structure. It is probably as good as you’ll find. And, they give points for the fee. What’s not to like about that?

Most of my play is still on FullTilt and at the Omaha High tables. Bounced around a few tables at the lower blind pot limit tables and was doing nicely until my Nut flush went head to head against the straight flush. Should have just called as I did see the straight flush possibility but the guy was a super aggressive that would push 2nd nuts and worse.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 22nd, 2006 at 8:55 am and is filed under Journal, Poker Thoughts. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.