10:23pm: Professional poker players look for any edge possible to exploit their opponent, but finding an edge may involve nothing more than simply turning on the radio. But does this hold true for everyone? Does music really soothe the soul while playing poker, or is it merely a distraction? This isn’t as easy of a question to answer as you’d think because everyone listens to different types of music for different types of reasons. Let’s look at the different motivations behind listening to music, and whether or not it is conducive to playing a winning poker session:

• To Entertain:

  Music is a great source of entertainment, but this is not necessarily something we’re looking for while conducting business at the poker table. A wise person once told me (as you’ve probably heard before) “never mix business with pleasure”. If you listen to music while playing poker, doing so for entertainment is more counterproductive than anything.

• To Relate:

  People love to have things in common with other people. It’s very reassuring to know someone shares the exact same interests in you. Ever hear the lyrics of a song and think to yourself, “god that sounds exactly like something I’d say”? If so, that’s great, but that means NOTHING at the poker table.

• To Inspire:

  It’s great to be inspired, although this is still not applicable to the situation. To say that certain music inspires you is to assume that you are more likely to be in tune with the lyrics than the melody. You’re better served concentrating on the cards, rather than picking apart each song for meaning while playing poker.

• To Move:

  This is a bit of a no brainer, but dancing and poker don’t mix. Subtle arm movements, and moving to and fro while in the seat is OK. However, an all out choreographical assault on the dance floor (or living room floor) while playing poker is definitely not recommended.

• To Relax:

  Perhaps one can make the argument that relaxation is a good thing while playing poker, but that’s to assume that everyone is hard wired the same way. Some people prefer to be a little “on edge” while playing poker, as it helps them make more accurate decisions. After all, it might not be a good thing to be TOO relaxed at a poker table, right? Therefore, we can’t say with conclusive evidence either way that listening music to relax while playing poker is good or bad.

• To Motivate:

  Now we’re getting a little bit warmer. Poker is a game that must be played without fear, and the only way to lose fear is to lose your inhibitions. There are plenty of songs out there that motivate you to not only become a better player, but also a better person as well.

• To Stimulate the Mood:

  This is starting to make more sense now, isn’t it? I’ve said this many times before: poker is a game of mindset. Those who are able to control their mood and their emotions at the tables are much more equipped to win than those who lack such control. If certain types of music evoke certain types of emotions, simply figure out which emotions put you into the mindset that you need to be in to play winning poker, and you’ve got the recipe for success.

Now that we’ve established a couple of motivations that are conducive to playing winning poker, perhaps we need to establish some particular songs that may evoke these desires. Remember, the type of music isn’t important — only the motivation behind it. Part 2 will feature some particular suggestions from all genres of music.

Start a Clean Slate at a New Room, a New Sharkscope, and Keep HFL Free in the Process

3:55am: As per the request of you guys, both through email and through various comments, I will begin a series of “mini video tutorials” that will cover my thought process through single hands from video tutorials that have not been posted yet. I have decided to do it this way because I find that visual learning is the best way to communicate, and tone of voice is very important when trying to get a point across.

These videos will concentrate on hands that are debatable in nature, and those that involve solutions and situations with a high degree of difficulty. All members will be able to comment, as usual, on each video and hopefully we can generate some intelligent discussion and perhaps bring some new angles to the table.

These mini tutorials will be posted on YouTube, and uploaded and embedded here as regular posts at random times throughout the week. If all goes as planned, you guys should have 2-3 of these coming your way per week from here on out, in addition to the full length tutorial that I do once every two weeks — so keep checking this week for the new additions to HFL.

Start a Clean Slate at a New Room, a New Sharkscope, and Keep HFL Free in the Process

1:45pm: This is a well written article contributed by SteveK (using the submit an article button). He brings up a lot of good questions, and I think it’s a good idea to ponder these things before moving forward with the answers to them. Enjoy

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Have you thought about it?

I mean, have you thought about it? By ‘it’, I mean how you would handle each type of player you run into at the tables. To me, that is the beauty of Heads Up matches; that you can label someone as a “calling station”, “maniac”, on tilt, too tight, etc. You do everything you can to exploit this current (or permanent in some cases) leak in their game like no other format. This applies to ring games and MTTs as well, but it is far easier to get deep in someone’s head in a heads up match. I play and talk to people on a regular basis that need to ask themselves the following questions, among many others:

• How do I handle a Maniac?

• Do I expand or tighten up my calling range?

• How do I handle “Tight Ted”?

• Do I try to bet him out of more pots or do I try to wait for a huge hand and hope he calls?

• How do I handle someone I’m pretty sure is drunk?

• Should I make any adjustment at all?

It gets more complicated if you use Sharkscope. You ask yourself, “Wow, this guy runs at a 10% ROI and he is raising every pot, what does this mean?” and “This guy runs at a -15% ROI, is my top pair with a crap kicker good here when he is putting me all in?” Upon looking at this guy’s chart, I see he does quite well at these stakes but moves up and gets crushed at the higher games. Sound familiar?

How should this affect my approach? This guy usually plays much higher, so why is he down here and how should this affect my approach to him? It’s essential to have a plan of attack going in, but in any competition adjustments are everything. Do you know how you would handle each type of player once you have put an appropriate label on them? You should.

5:47pm: This seems to be one topic that everyone seems to agree to disagree on. X number of people feel that any information you give, and I do mean ANY, can only hurt you in regards to poker. On the other hand, some would rather reveal to other players their results, as their style is a product of the assumption that the other player already knows what kind of player you are. To break this down, we need to make a list of the benefits of both sides of the story. There are good arguments on both sides the story, but let’s first examine the side of those who say “hide it.”

1. Hiding Your Sharkscope Results (Benefits)

• Your opponent has no clue if you’ve made $250,000 in your lifetime playing poker, or if you’ve lost $1,000,000 in the same span. Therefore, they can make no assumptions about you or what kind of player you are based on PROFIT alone. The less they know about you, the more equipped you are to keep them guessing, and this confusion could lead you to victory.
• Your opponent cannot hone in on recent trends in your graph, and therefore cannot tell how you’ve been playing in the last 100-200 games or so. Consequently, if your game hasn’t been top notch recently, and you find yourself on tilt, your opponent will never know it.
• Personal privacy is an important concept, especially as relates to online poker. You believe that it is your business, and only your business to know your results. The only way to ensure this is to hide them.
• “Sharks” are less likely to prey on those whose results are blocked. Many people refuse to register first in heads up sit n gos because they like to Sharkscope their opponents before they play them. If your results are blocked, then they will more than likely move on to easier prey.

  Now, let’s take a look at those who say it’s better to show the results than it is to hide them:

2. Displaying Your Sharkscope (Benefits)

• If you have good results, “Sharks” are more likely to stay away from you if you register first. It’s just common sense. This is a business, and everyone’s in it to make money. It’s just simply not a good business decision to play someone who is near the same skill level as yourself.
• If you have good results, people are more likely to believe you when you bet. Therefore, it is a lot easier to pull off big bluffs and drag small pots without a hand. A good part of heads up play is based on deception, and they’re already playing into your hand when they believe you’re telling the truth.
• Sharkscope is a great tool that automatically tracks your results. Therefore, if your results are enabled, then you won’t have to go through the trouble of tracking them by hand or via an Excel spreadsheet. All the work is done for you. When results are blocked, you have to do a lot more work as far as money management/account skills go.

So, there are a few solid arguments for both sides of the issue. One thing that should stick out to you is that there are far more effective benefits of enabling your Sharkscope as a good player than there is for the below average player.

At the end of the day, this is a matter of personal preference. While this article may not have changed your mind either way, just keep these things in mind when deciding for yourself what sounds like a better idea to you.

2:40pm: I get a lot of questions about whether it’s a smart decision or not to use the chat feature while playing heads up sit n gos. Personally, I think it’s completely a matter of personality and how you react to it. If you feel like you’re giving away more than you’re getting in return then I wouldn’t suggest doing it. On the other hand, if you feel like you can use chat to successfully manipulate your opponent into playing the way you’d like them to play, then by all means go for it.

Some people say “gl” before every match, but do they really mean it? I’m as polite as they come as far as table etiquette and manners are concerned, but I truly believe anyone who wishes someone good luck in a heads up poker match is only doing so because they are wishing karma will reward them for being nice. Therefore, saying “gl” doesn’t really mean “good luck”, it means “I’m doing the right thing by wishing you luck so that maybe by some off chance karma will return the favor and throw the luck to my side instead.”

Anyhow, this goes much deeper than “gl,” I’m talking about play breaking, time consuming chatter designed to throw you off your game. I’m talking about when you have a dead on read on someone, call them with King high, and then see the blue letters light up in the chat box. You know they’ve said something referring to the play, and there’s a good chance it’s negative. The real question is: Should you look? Should you even have chat on at all?

To be honest, 90% of the time my chat is OFF. That’s not because I feel like I give away more than I get in return. Rather, it’s a result of me feeling uncomfortable even entertaining the idea of being friendly with someone with whom I have intentions of taking their money. I do feel a little bad that in keeping chat off I may be perhaps rejecting extended “arms of handshakes” in cyberspace. But as I always say, this is a business. This is about money. Every choice I make is to maximize my profit, and to make me feel as comfortable as possible in doing so.

… and I feel comfortable with chat off. Most of the time anyways.

12:08am: I get this question a lot, most recently tonight in the forums. Even though I posted my response in the message board, I will also post it here on the front page because I think it’s a legit question that needs addressing.

eejit, “You seem to prefer regulars over turbos, why?”

trujm, “I prefer regulars over turbo as a matter of personal preference in addition to them being better suited to my playing style. I believe that small blinds and deep stacks more often throws the edge to the more skilled player. Anytime the blinds are smaller in relation to the stack size, there is more room for actual play, and therefore more decisions need to be made - and the more decisions need to be made, the more the advantage swings in my favor. I feel that at the end of the day, Im better at winning the battle in the trenches than most of my opponents.

Im well aware that turbos yield a higher hourly wage than regulars for most people. However, I dont feel that is the case for me in particular. In my opinion, theres too many preflop all ins in turbos where both players have all their chips in on a coin flip. I try to avoid coin flips in heads up sngs whenever possible, as I like to keep my variance as low as possible (see my graph). Ive tried turbos across 4 different sites, and my roi is not nearly as impressive in the turbos as they are in the regulars. Not to say Im bad at turbos, its just enough of an an hourly wage increase to justify taking myself out of my comfort level.”

2:15am: This might seem like a totally wacky question, but it’s actually totally legit. Hear me out.

One thing I’ve noticed that is probably the achilles heel of most of the players I play is that they have a complete lack of trust towards me. It doesn’t matter how many quality hands I show down, there’s always some fool willing to call me down with ace high. Granted, if I see someone doing this early on, I’ll probably throw them a bone (false information) to make them believe that ace high will continue to be “good” throughout the match. If they feel like their call is rewarded, they will probably continue to try and make hero calls throughout the match. It’s pretty sad, but most of the time it’s true.

Anyways, why does this happen? Why are so many people so untrusting now a days? Personally, I think it has to do with their personality. People either trust people or they don’t. It’s almost hard wired into our blood, which is influenced by past life experiences, both good and bad. Those with good life experiences probably trust people (poker players included) a lot more, and those with bad life experiences are probably a little bit more skeptical of everything they are told or shown; not to mention the countless amount of times people have been burned by folding a pretty good hand, only to have their opponent show them nine high. All of these experiences can permanently re-wire a poker player’s way of thinking, and not for the better.

Consequently, the untrusting person finds himself “curious” way more often than he should, resulting in some pretty non profitable sessions. We refer to these kinds of players as “calling stations”, however my friend and I like to call them “the police” because they’re always patrolling your bets.

Whether or not you agree with me that life issues have anything to do with one’s play at the poker table, what cannot be denied is that many people need to re-evaluate the frequency at which they call to fold. I once heard a guy at a poker table say as he called off the last of his stack on a very big losing night, “I might go home broke, but I’m not going home curious”.

It is because of guys like this that poker will continue to be profitable to those of us who know how to lay a hand down.

10:08pm: I hear people talk about it all the time: button, button, button, button. Did I mention the button? Everybody preaches the importance of acting in position, and how acting last distinctly gives you an advantage in poker. As a result, according to most you should always take the initiative and put pressure on your opponent when you’re on the button, especially in heads up situations.

Is it really that important? It depends on your playing style — everyone is different. Some people feel in position when they’re in position, and some people feel like they’re in position when they’re actually out of position. For an example of how the button can be used to your advantage, look no further than the semi-bluff raise on the flop with the intention of getting a free card on the turn. I would venture to say that 80-85% of the time, when you raise the flop on the button in a heads up match your opponent will check it to you on the turn, leaving it completely up to you to take the free card on the turn. However, this only works when used in moderation, as your opponent will catch on a good portion of the time. One of the advantages of acting out of position is that when you lead out into an opponent who has raised pre flop, a lot of people freeze up in that kind of situation, and misplay their hand.

So which do I prefer? To be honest, both. I always feel like I can outplay my opponent from any position, and feel equally as comfortable being first to act as I do when I’m on the button. If my opponent is aggressive and I have a strong hand pre flop, I would much prefer the button. However, whenever my hand is strong post flop I actually prefer to be out of position. For example, let’s say you’re playing against an extremely aggressive opponent and you’ve been dealt pocket aces. In this situation with this kind of hand, being on the button enables me to limp pre flop knowing that I’m probably going to get a raise out of my opponent. How you play the hand from there is completely up to you, but the important thing is that most opponents don’t recognize that you’ve got a hand at this point and will continue to misplay their hand on every street. However, if you flop a set of deuces against an aggressive opponent, odds are they are going to bet if you check it to them, allowing you to extract even more value out of your hand.

So to that end, I say it’s completely a matter of taste and playing style to determine how much stock you should put into all the hype about how to play the button. Like I said, everyone is different and you’ve got to recognize what position makes you more comfortable in these key situations. Personally, I think the button is slightly overrated, as there are no “magic bullets” in poker.

3:28am: PokerStars has always had the reputation of being one of the tougher sites to play on, if not the toughest. However, the recent wave of player traffic on PokerStars has also brought many fish in with the tide. Don’t get me wrong, I give myself credit for being a pretty solid player, however you don’t have to be any good to play hands like the one below.

But that’s not the worst part. This is:

ipoker42: bets 690
trujm: raises 630 to 1320 and is all-in
ipoker42: folds

If you’re going to attempt a bluff, slightly over betting the pot is fine. But it’s just plain dumb to over bet the pot THAT hard in an attempt to steal the pot. There’s $300 in the pot, which means he has $150 committed. There’s a valuable concept in poker called risk to reward ratio. This guy must have missed that lesson.

If that wasn’t bad enough, he does it AGAIN. This time, it cost him the match, however.

PokerStars Game #16497956578: Tournament #83544804, $50.00+$2.50 Hold’em No Limit - Match Round I, Level II (15/30) - 2008/04/05 - 04:04:47 (ET)
Table ‘83544804 1′ 2-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: ipoker42 (810 in chips)
Seat 2: trujm (2190 in chips)
ipoker42: posts small blind 15
trujm: posts big blind 30
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to trujm [As Kc]
ipoker42: calls 15
trujm: raises 60 to 90
ipoker42: calls 60
*** FLOP *** [Qs 2s 7s]
trujm: bets 120
ipoker42: calls 120
*** TURN *** [Qs 2s 7s] [4s]
trujm: checks
ipoker42: bets 600 and is all-in
trujm: calls 600
*** RIVER *** [Qs 2s 7s 4s] [Kh]
*** SHOW DOWN ***
trujm: shows [As Kc] (a flush, Ace high)
ipoker42: shows [3s 4d] (a flush, Queen high)
trujm collected 1620 from pot
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 1620 | Rake 0
Board [Qs 2s 7s 4s Kh]
Seat 1: ipoker42 (button) (small blind) showed [3s 4d] and lost with a flush, Queen high
Seat 2: trujm (big blind) showed [As Kc] and won (1620) with a flush, Ace high

Looking back on this hand, I disguised the hand pretty well but in his mind he had to believe he was bluffing, or else he wouldn’t have bet so much. Sometimes people struggle with decisions, so maybe he thought he would take all the thinking out of it by going all in. That being said, he’s not the only one to make strange plays the last few months. This kind of stuff has been happening on a daily basis on what used to be the “toughest online poker room”.

Or perhaps it has to do with the heads up sit n go boom. Obviously if there’s a surge of players playing a game type that previously wasn’t as popular as it is now, then there’s bound to be some inexperienced players playing the game. But THIS bad? It’s actually kind of reminiscent of PartyPoker-type-play. And you remember what that was like, don’t you?

Not that I’m complaining or anything

On that note, I think I’m gonna end the session. Final results: 6-2.

12:05pm: Is there any truth to the theory that certain days are more profitable than others? That’s may be for you to decide, but let me present you with my case. Take a look at it and compare to your results. Here is a graph of both my profitability and ROI on each day of the week:

By looking at my graph, two days stick out at you: Thursday and Friday. Thursday stands out from a profitability standpoint. Meanwhile, Friday stands out from a return on investment standpoint. Why is that? Do people play more loose knowing they will get paid at the end of the week? Conversely, you can see the least profitable day of the week for me is Monday. This is a complaint that I have seen a lot of people have. One theory is that all of the regulars are out on Monday. But if that is the case, why aren’t results repeated for Tuesday and Wednesday (or even Thursday, since Thursday is, indeed, a weekday). The odd part about my graph is that only 3 days are different from the “norm”. Tuesday, Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday all have pretty much the same statistics, from a results standpoint. That leaves Monday, Thursday and Friday as the odd men out. Oddly enough, Thursday is also my most profitable day on Full Tilt Poker.

So what gives: is it a more focused, determined me on Thursdays, or is it a less focused, less determined opponent on this day? This is a very interesting question and I’d be very interested in knowing your results. To run this report by day of week, just click on “More Options” next to the third graph, then “Graph Results By”, and then “Day of Week”.