Poker Skills
Being a winning poker player obviously requires a combination of many different skills you need to master. We’ll take a closer look at a few of the most important ones in this article.
Before we even begin: discipline. It is the single most important “skill” in poker. Without discipline, there’s no use to master all the other skills, because there’s no way you’ll ever be able to properly apply them.
Winning poker can be boiled down to a single sentence: Win on as many hands you commit too, commit on as few losing hands as you can. None of that is achievable without proper discipline. You see, the problem with the game of poker is, that it is designed to push you to your emotional limits. Whether you go beyond that or not, is entirely dependant on you.
If you cannot control your emotions, you probably shouldn’t be a poker player to start with. The single biggest enemy of any poker bankroll is tilting. Discipline will help you avoid the tilt and its effects on your bankroll, and in the same time, it will show you the way to success.
You have to be able to wait for a good hand, you have to be able to control yourself whenever you hit a monster. Whatever you decide to do when playing poker, discipline will condition it.
Besides being disciplined, a good poker player is constantly on the hunt for bits and pieces of information that will make his play better. The best way to learn new things is to observe opponents.
One of the biggest mistakes rookies make is that they perceive opponents as the “enemy” that needs to be eliminated. They couldn’t care less what their opponents do, not to mention those who consider that everyone’s inferior to them, so they’re too proud to pay attention to what they do. There is no room for emotions like pride or hatred in poker. Don’t be a slave to your emotions, listen to what your brains tell you to do, and learn to override emotions at all times. Watching an opponent carefully can not only let you in on a wealth of information and thus give you an edge, it will also probably give you some valuable pointers you may want to consider in the way you play in the future.
Flexibility is the ability to adapt to different situations and to switch gears on the go. As in nature, he who cannot adapt will perish. It is extremely important that you recognize the difference in circumstances and that you adapt to the situation as fast as possible. When you play in a poker tournament (whether it’s a STT or a MTT) if you cannot switch gears when the game gets short handed you’re out of there before you know it.
Messing up the pace a bit is also extremely useful to surprise your opponents. If you have a table image that depicts a tight player who only commits on extremely good hands, it’s not all bad. That means you can use that credit to pull a few bluffs. Nobody will suspect you’re bluffing, and they’ll let you get away with it.
The other example would be when all people around the table know you as a reckless maniac. That will make you a lot of money when you get a good hand. You act just as reckless on it as before, hoping that somebody will decide to keep you honest. Then you land the monster right in his face. Not only will that make you money on that given hand, it will also make people think twice about playing “policeman” next time you act nasty.
Bankroll management is also a very important skill in any type of poker. Play under-bankrolled and you’ll be surprised how difficult it becomes to eek out some winnings. Play properly bankrolled and everything will fold right into place.
