Great Play!
I was sitting here laughing about Glen's comment in the other thread.
"Fuck you! I have kings! ... Oh, you have Aces? VNH"
And so it led me to wonder about this hand, and another hand I played against Rob, and consistent numbers of hands I played against Jim, and then ... a moderate amount of the hands that I have played against Tom. Throw in clone and on tilt and I think that about covers the majority of people that I can really say have ever either a. "read my hand" or b. Had my cards dominated every time that we went to showdown.
So... with that in mind I wonder out loud...
What is "good play"? What does it mean to you?
When I was starting out playing, "good play" was winning. Didn't matter that we were playing wild games and I caught 4 of a kind and a wild card. I was winning; it was “Great Play”!
Shortly after I started losing in my little home game, it became folding. Folding was a key to winning; somehow inherently I realized that the best way to keep your money was to not put it in the middle.
Then I read Super System. Which was far too much for me, but I took from it ... hand selection. "Great Play" wasn't enough to just fold after you missed. It was to start big and if the cards went your way you would end even bigger. So I memorized starting hands.
But here is the problem, you see where this goes, up to the 4 levels of thinking, into counter tells, and from there finally a complete departure from all of the things you learned to start over again.
So I wonder... is good play something that WE (we being the individual) decide that it is, or is there a set system? If we judge everything on the mathematical "correctness" of the decision, I feel like we miss opportunities that could be had. Maybe "Great Play" is something social that requires another person to confirm for you?
So if Sklansky's mathematical decisions are not the way to go, is Doyle's way considered "Great Play"? Essentially, he uses the size of his stack and plays big stack poker all day, and there is no question that he is damn good at it.
So what do you consider "Great Play"? What are the criteria? Is there such a thing? I consider myself an average player, meaning that I have played more than others and played better, but in present company, I am not considered a "Great Player" (nor have I considered myself as such).
Another example of great play. I heard of a person on the boards here who played on the same $25 for something like 5 or 6 years. I personally consider that excellent play, and far above the average. Is that "Great Play"?
Discuss. |
