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Originally Posted by thaskalos
One of the qualities separating the "expert" player from the merely competent one is the ability to control this "temptation" that the looser pre-flop play sometimes presents during the latter stages of the hand. The expert NL player does not abide by a set-in-stone pre-flop strategy; he reshapes his pre-flop strategy in accordance with the dynamics -- and the stack sizes -- of the game that he is participating in. What the onlooker may perceive as "undisciplined" pre-flop play may in fact be the optimal way of playing for the conditions present in the particular game at hand. The "relaxed" pre-flop play isn't just an "antidote for boredom".
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Here's the thing. In theory, I can demonstrate mathematically that against bad enough players, you can increase your profits by playing looser in position (AND ONLY IN POSITION-- OUT OF POSITION YOU STILL MUST PLAY TIGHT) in a deep stacked no limit game.
Indeed, I can even demonstrate that mathematically in a limit game, though of course the advantage will be less than it is in no limit.
However, a lot of things that are theoretically true are not true in practice, because we humans have this need for instant gratification and these things called egos and all the rest.
And what actually ends up happening is as follows:
1. It is really easy to convince yourself to play hands you should fold (because of absolute hand strength, relative hand strength, or position) because you are facing bad players.
2. It is really difficult to tell the difference between +EV hands and -EV hands in a specific game situation, which feeds into (1).
3. The number of actual poker "experts" is far, far, far lower, than the number of people who think they are poker experts.
4. The gap in skill between people who style themselves poker experts and other players, when expressed in terms of the EV of a single hand, is far lower than these "experts" imagine.
5. As limon states, loosening up pre-flop puts the player into more difficult situations post-flop. Specifically, you create huge reverse implied odds for yourself, which is what happens when you are facing bets from players who have stronger ranges and you have a made hand.
Importantly, saying "experts adjust for different table conditions" (which is what you are saying) isn't an answer to this. Nobody's saying you should play a rigid table of hands pre-flop. For one thing, pretty obviously, a hand like KQ is a 3 bet against a certain type of player's raise, a call against another type of player's raise, and a fold against a third type of player's raise. There's a million examples like that.
I assure you that all the players limon called "boring" make those sorts of adjustments all the time. (Notably, one player he called boring was Tom Dwan-- if anyone is famous for making these adjustments, it's Dwan).
But the problem is with the SPECIFIC type of adjustment that goes "I'm better than these guys, so I can get away with playing a problematic hand that I otherwise would fold". Not an analysis of their ranges, or their specific exploitability, or anything else. Just "I can't beat them with my generically superior post-flop play".
And my claim (and I am sure limon's) is that players who think like that end up giving away money. Not only because the strategy itself isn't nearly as brilliant as they think it is, but because the KIND of brain that thinks like this tends to have huge discipline-leaks, whereas boring pre-flop play correlates with not having discipline leaks.
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In NL, the pot grows at a rapid pace after each round of betting...and the betting decisions get more and more critical as the hand progresses. When the player is comparatively short-stacked...then the post-flop decisions may often be considered "automatic". But even the short-stacked player can acquire a large stack during the game...and that's when the overriding importance of proper post-flop play becomes obvious. IMO...the only time when pre-flop play becomes as important as you make it sound, is when the player insists on remaining short-stacked forever...by table-hopping whenever he acquires a large stack. But, this method is hardly the preferred approach of the expert NL player.
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In mathematical terms, you are looking only at magnitude and ignoring frequency.
Every X hours, a live deep stack no limit player will get into a big pot post-flop where those superior post-flop skills may make that player some significant amount of money.
Much more frequently, that same player will put smaller amounts of money into the middle. She will win some of those pots, of course, but the expected value of those bets, often made against players with stronger ranges, is likely to be negative. And some of those "smaller" amounts of money will nonetheless be quite large, due to reverse implied odds and the amount of money it costs a player to make a second best hand in a deep stack no limit game.
The player will remember the big post-flop pots won and not remember all the more frequent smaller amounts lost, because that's how human brains work (plus confirmation bias!).
