At times you have to admit when you are not good enough or you have to admit if your game or method of operation needs improving. With me this has been a constant and unfortunately a natural process. The gambling industry changes so rapidly that taking any amount of time away can leave you seriously out of touch in a very short amount of time.
I would be fooling myself if I thought that I could go back straight into limit hold’em against very strong players and find immediate value. My game is still back in around 2007 and while I follow the games very closely both in watching them (when I get the time) and speaking with other players, it isn’t the same as playing in them and you need to give a healthy respect to that very important fact.
The Isaac Haxton video was indicative of not just how online poker is becoming but how it has got and we are definitely talking about this in the past tense now. Ike spoke in that video about heads up games but it can be applied to any form of poker.
You need to know your place in the pecking order and if you don’t have a good indication of where that is then you are going to be guessing and as Amarillo Slim once famously said….”guessing is for losers”.
Only after I started targeting certain players did I get my head above water at $25-$50 but looking back, I shouldn’t have even been in these games. I honestly think that $25-$50 in many ways is worse than the nosebleeds. The standard is every bit as good in my opinion, the only difference being that they are playing for less money, have smaller bankrolls and do not want to endure the massive swings in the nosebleeds.
This means playing lower down the pecking order but if you want to play a level like 25-50 then you have to pay it 100% respect. This means being totally motivated and driven to immerse yourself in the game 24/7 and if you don’t do that then you will always be behind the players who are. I would say that when it gets to a stage where the sharks are trying to feed off each other then you have a problem. You may find their weaknesses and they will have them but the problem is that they will be working on yours……and once again they will find them.
I would like to know how many high-stakes players in the nosebleeds would be winners if it were not for half a dozen value players? I don’t want to play lower down as a grinder, I just cannot hack that kind of lifestyle anymore but I do enjoy the odd session when I am bored or at a loose end. I don’t mind playing NL400 but I couldn’t grind it and even NL400 is a very tough level these days. Anything under NL400 simply isn’t worth me bothering with on a financial level.
I would definitely use Poker Office as a way of conducting dossiers on players long before I ever play them although even that isn’t enough as the very good players are situational aware and adjust accordingly.
I was on Alex Bowler’s blog yesterday, he is having a bad run at the moment but he will be back but his several recent tournament pick ups will have glossed over what has been a bad month for him quite nicely……nice one Alex and keep up the good work. Alex is a great player at his level and this is my point, these are the types of dudes who inhabit these levels.
Anyway see you soon and look after yourself
The Dean at poker loco
