Playing With Future Pots In Mind

As an aspiring poker player, I can plead guilty to the fact that I spend the majority of my free time discussing with myself different strategies and situations in no-limit texas hold 'em. This "problem", as others may perceive it, has helped me conceive the appropriate title for my blog: "Waking Up On The Poker Side Of The Bed". I hope these columns can give a sense of appreciation to those who also share a deep infatuation for the cadillac of poker, while also extending some knowledge to those who hope to improve their play of no-limit texas hold 'em.


I find it very interesting how many situations that we encounter in our everyday life that we can use to both improve our play, and to further appreciate its existence. I spend a lot of my own time playing, watching, and analyzing poker. It is this phenomenon that I have coined: "Waking Up On The Poker Side Of The Bed".


John Glenn, the first man to orbit the Earth, who later went on to become a US senator, once said, “People are afraid of the future, of the unknown. If a man faces up to it, and takes the dare of the future, he can have some control over his destiny. That's an exciting idea to me, better than waiting with everybody else to see what's going to happen.” It is amazing in life what can come to those who enter the unknown (future) with a plan and something to work with. In poker, too many players enter the future paying the price of past mistakes. Their present successes merely cover the tracks of past poor plays.


In poker, making the right play isn't always the easy thing to do. Many times we must walk away from big pots; pots that we have invested a lot of our own money in. Unfortunately, it is never fun to walk away from a large pot, especially since you most likely have a very nice hand, but you are setting yourself up for a brighter future if you can discipline yourself to do what you feel is right in all situations. To set myself up to succeed in the future, I choose to play with future pots in mind. I began playing this way when I first began playing poker. I noticed that I was not making hard lay-downs. I often felt in my gut that I was beat, but I didn't feel like I could lay the hand down (ala QQ preflop or AA post flop to large reraises). I felt like sometimes I was getting hooked too easily. I would flop top-top and allow a set to rake my entire stack, which in cash games is never a good thing. I needed to find a way to control myself in these situations.


Playing with future pots in mind isn't implying a lack of focus on the present hand, it is preparing yourself to succeed in the future. John Glenn was right, most are scared of the unknown future. In poker, there is no guarantee of what the future hands hold. We do not know what situations we face in future pots, but you must have confidence in your abilities, and if you have confidence, then you can, as Glenn says, 'face up to it, and take the dare of the future, then you can have some control over your own destiny.' Of course, to be most successful in poker, you must focus on the present hand and pick up as much information as possible. At some point in time you must accumulate chips if you want to succeed; you can't always keep folding for the future. Unfortunately, many players waste their chips in situations they shouldn't even be in, and therefore they are destroying their chances of making money in the future, because those future winnings will only cover those past mistakes. The rakes don't become profit.


Playing with future pots in mind can keep you from being the victim of a ram-and-jam. Ram-and-jam and check-raise plays often work in poker because they allow the person with the weaker hand to get some money in the pot. The effectiveness of these plays can be associated with the foot-in-the-door marketing tactic which gets consumers to agree to large purchase requests, by first getting them to agree to moderate requests. The thought process behind this is that since they have said yes once already, that it is easier for them to say yes once again. This is why so many companies still use door-to-door salesmen. If you say yes and let a vacuum salesmen come into your house, they believe you have a easier time saying yes to the purchase. This is often why ram-and-jams and check-raises are so effective when holding a big hand. Often times amateurs get easily hooked to a hand and will call off large portions of their stacks in later betting rounds with as simple as top pair because by folding they are admitting that their previous calls were wrong. Since they made those previous calls, they feel obligated to themselves to follow it through, which is much like the foot-in-the-door technique. I believe if you play every hand, and every street, reminding yourself that there will be future hands, that you will operate with a better mental discipline. You don't allow yourself to be so easily suckered over a top pair, or even two pair. Thus you will have more chips to use in those future pots, and the rake in those future pots won't be making up for past mistakes, instead they will be profit.


Famous essayist and author C. S. Lewis once commented on how we all enter the future at the same speed of sixty minutes an hour, no matter who you are or what you do. Make sure you enter it accompanied with some chips.


Good Luck!!


*****PJ*****