Eric Rizen Lynch

Emotions and ego in poker

Soupie, a player I highly respect, has often told me two facts that kind of go hand in hand. I'd like to talk about those a little today in a couple of ways, partially because of a situation that came up last night. Poker is an emotional game. Between bad beats, suckouts, coin flips, bluffs, etc there is a wide range of emotions you often feel as a player during the course of an evening. Poker players are also often by their very nature ego-maniacs. In order to be successful you must have the attitude that you will be successful, and often that means feeling that you're the best player at the table.

So what do these two points have to do with anything?? Well, the most common example of emotion in poker is tilt. You *MUST* learn to control your emotions at the table. If you don't, you'll often find yourself spewing chips. But everyone knows that, and it's kind of like stating the obvious. What isn't always obvious is you must also be aware of other player's emotional states as the game progresses. Have they recently been picked off?? Sucked out on?? Have they been the one providing the bad beat?? Is their ego bruised?? All of these things have an impact on how the other players at your table will be playing, and you should be in tune to that if you want to get every edge you can. Players who have been sucked out on or otherwise had their ego bruised recently are often more often ready to take a stand, and sometimes players on heaters feel invincible. Some players, however, when running good tend to ease off the gas pedal and try and preserve their newfound stack. You must be observant enough to pick up on these things, even in online poker.

There are also a few stages in a poker game that can have long term emotional effects on you even after the tournament is over. I know very early in my 'poker career' just making it 'in the money' was a HUGE deal to me. Even though ITM is often just a fraction higher than your initial buy in, for a new player it was a big deal. The times when I made it very close to the money but busted near the bubble had a profound emotional impact on my play, and could affect me for days afterwards. A little later on in my poker career the times I would bubble near the final table would leave me scratching my head for hours as I try and convince myself I could have laid a good hand down and made it to the final table.

I'm at a point now, where I feel comfortable enough with myself and my game that I simply will always make the play that I feel will make me the most money long term. If I bubble the final table, I know I'll get another chance at it before too long. If I bubble the money, well I know my goal was to go deep anyways. It's an emotional state that over the course of many, MANY tournaments I've achieved. I always know they'll be a next tournament, and I have the long term results to know that I'm a winner, which allows me to not get too upset when I end up on the wrong side of things.

So why do I bring this stuff up today?? Well, last night I was railing two of my good online poker friends who were playing in the 45k on Stars, xTrACEy and WebGuySteve. They both played magnificent poker and deserved their deep finishes last night. The following hand came up and while I still believe xTrACEy made the right play, it was an emotionally devastating one that I hope she gets over quickly so she can continue her consistently deep finishes in tournaments lately.

There were 10 players left, and the tournament had just announced hand for hand, so everyone was aware they were on the bubble. Tracey had a little under 900k in chips with what I believe were 15k/30k blinds with a 3k ante. She had the unfortunate table placement of being at a table where almost all of the stacks that were ahead of her were there, while all of the short stacks were on WebGuySteve's table pretty much. Foshio, a player I highly respect who is very good was sitting in the cutoff seat when Tracey got 99 in the BB. Foshio, as a good player, knows that the FT bubble is a great place to pick up chips, as a lot of players become timid as they want to make the final table. Foshio made a pretty standard size raise (I don't remember the exact amount, but it was roughly 3x the BB) and it's folded around to Tracey. So there is somewhere in the neighborhood of 120k in the pot and after posting the BB Tracey has about 850k. Foshio could be raising any two on the bubble here I believe, and Tracey is WAY ahead of that and has a chance to take a pretty big pot. She raised all in here and Foshio woke up with JJ and called.

In hindsight the push might look marginal, or even bad to some people. But a good player knows that this play has a huge positive expectation. I'd say you get a fold here 95% of the time as Foshio will raise with a lot of hands, and will only call with a few for most of his chips on the bubble here, especially with Tracey being a fairly tight player who has been getting a lot of respect at the table. I believe he may have folded TT here and given how long he thought before calling I think he might have been considering folding JJ even. I also think there is a chance he calls with AK/AQ, hands that you are ahead of.

I still firmly believe that a push is correct here. Any raise less than a push is going to pot commit you on the flop anyways, and folding 99 against a likely stealer on the bubble certainly seems weak to me. It really sucks that she got unlucky here and ran into a hand, but I hope she still has the nerve to pull this move next time as I know it will make her money in the long run. Emotionally, I know this tournament had to be very hard on her. She's been consistently making runs into the money in this tournament finishing in the 70-100 range probably 5-6 times in the last 2-3 weeks. I've felt like she's 1-2 big breaks away from a huge payday, and I still firmly believe that. I'm sure she felt like this time should have been her big break though, and I really hope the emotional impact of this particular loss doesn't convince her to play weak poker near the FT next time.

The truth is, emotions cloud our judgement. When we win, we never analyze what we did wrong, only what we did right. In truth I've won more than a few tournaments while making mistakes, and I try and judge my tournament wins just as harshly in hindsight as my losses. When we lose though, we always look for the big mistake we made. Sometimes there is an obvious one, or even a subtle one. Often times in poker though, we can lose without making a big mistake, but simply by running into the wrong situation at the wrong time. Being able to look back and judge both our wins and our losses with scrutiny and honesty is a big part to growth as a poker player, and learning how to honestly evaluate your own game without clouding your judgement with results, is a huge step on the path to successful poker.

-Rizen