In The Pulpit presents poker articles from writers outside the Church!

If you're looking for poker articles from outside writers, stop looking! Here they are. In The Pulpit is the place for people with something to say.

So if YOU have a subject you'd like to get off your chest, drop us a line to Letters, Pray! (opens in a new window).

As each guest speaker is replacd by another, the previous speaker's work will be sent to The Crypt (opens in a new window), where it will be archived.

Meanwhile, here are poker articles we've sourced from outside for your enjoyment. Read on, MacDuff!

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Your evolution/development as a poker player

by Bruce Carmen

I was having one of those overly-analytical insomniac moments in the wee small hours today. I am in the middle of a nice run, which has salvaged my crappy year and gotten me solidly into the black after six months in the red. I got to thinking. How have I evolved as a player from when I first got serious about poker?

When I first started playing seriously in casinos in 1998, I was a veteran of a lot of home games and little Holdem. I understood position, trapping, bluffing (sort of) and personal management. But I knew very little about the math of the game and even less about varying playing styles.

Doyle [Brunson] says in poker articles that it costs about a Cadillac to learn how to play Holdem. In my case, I wasn't playing often enough or for enough money to have it cost me a Cadillac. Maybe a used Ford Fiesta...

So how have I evolved as a player? Other than having learned the math and technical aspects of the game, I think the major difference between a decent player and a truly experienced player is recognition and adaptation.

Let me use an analogy. Golf and poker are a lot alike. There are certain basics, without which you can't play either game competitively.

In golf, you have to know how far you hit the ball with your different irons. You have to have a fair degree of hand-eye and large muscle co-ordination. You have to know how the playing conditions (firm vs slow green, wind direction) affect the movement or flight of your ball.

In poker, you have to have a basic understanding of all of the things we always discuss: starting hand selection, position, money management, odds, personal control. If you have no skills in any one of these areas, you can't compete with any player of any quality.

But in golf, there are many different successful playing styles. You can fade it, draw it, hit it low, hit it high, putt masterfully and strike the ball fairly well, or strike the ball beautifully and putt decently, and succeed.

In poker, it's the same. You can play tight, loose, somewhat aggressive, very aggressive or downright crazy and, with the basics in place, succeed.

The difference between the two games is that in golf, with some very minor exceptions for match play situations, you don't have to adapt your play to your opponent's style of game. You can play your game and succeed, and your opponent can play exactly the opposite and succeed.

In poker, identifying your opponent's playing style and adapting your game accordingly is the difference between survival and success.

This comparison came to mind after last night's $100PL O/8 game. I was about even, and the table was joined by an absolute maniac, fortunately to my immediate right. His philosophy was simple. He was there to play big pots and bet you out of hands.

He raised the pot almost every time he had anything playable and one of the last three positions. He followed every raise with a pot-size value or continuation bet, depending on whether he had hit or was just muscling.

I am one of the looser and more aggressive players in that game. But that style wasn't going to work against this guy. What worked was tightening my starting hand standards when he was acting before me (90% of the time)and waiting to pounce on him.

He got me a few times, but I got him more, and walked away with almost a double buy-in. Another player in the game, also loose and aggressive by that game's standards, tried to go toe-to-toe with this guy without premium cards and dropped at least two and a half buy-ins.

Could I have adjusted my game and succeeded under the circumstances three years ago? I doubt it.

(This was sourced among many 'informal' poker articles, raised as a point of forum discussion, and was first published at The Poker Forum. Have any feedback about this or any of our poker articles? Want to submit your own poker articles to The Church of Texas Holdem? Write to Letters, Pray! (opens in a new window).

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