Decision making in poker
January 24, 2008
Poker is all about making good decisions. Some people think that poker is about the end result. Some people think that poker is all about winning. To some extent, you want that to happen but at the backbone of it all, poker is all about good decision making skills. How do you develop good decision making skills in poker anyway? How can you assure yourself that you will be able to make the right decision at the right time at the right place? Will you be able to walk away from the poker table knowing that you made a good decision?
Making decisions in poker is all about probabilities. What are the chances? That is the ultimate and fundamental question you should be asking yourself after every card is dealt on the table. What are your odds of hitting a straight on the turn card and the river card? That is the question that you should be asking yourself. Should you raise the pot? Should you increase the pot? Should you call? Should you fold? If the odds are favourable then you should certainly make a move. If the odds are ultimately in your favour then you should make an aggressive move.
If the probabilities are on your side then you know what to do. Even if the outcome does not turn out the way it should have been, you do not have to worry. At the end of the day, as long as you have made the right decision, everything else is left up to fate. If you can make good decisions consistently then in the long run, fate and luck will go your way. If you have pocket aces before the pre flop and you lose on an all in then luck was not on your side but more often than not, you will likely win an all in pot with pocket aces.
So does it matter if you win or not at poker? Yes, it does matter but it is not the be all and end all of things in poker. You have to understand, poker is much like real life. You can make the right decision but have lousy outcomes. You can make the wrong decisions and get lucky. At the end of the day, the more right decisions you make, the better your chances of getting good outcomes. In poker, you have to practice making good decisions, not expecting good results because you really have no control with the results anyway.
If you want to make sure that you have a good poker career ahead of you then you should make sure that you learn how to make good decisions. You should not worry too much about the outcome because at the end of the day, you have no control of it anyway. Even if you got a bad break on a certain day, you should not feel bad if you made the right decision anyway. Stay in there and you will end up reaping rewards later on.