634Winning More with Less
posted on November 9th, 2009
It’s not a big secret that winning a lot of poker hands and averaging about 10bb/hr is a great way to walk away a winner. But let’s think of this in terms of how we go about doing this.
Let’s say you’re playing at a 2/4 NL Hold ‘Em game and you win 2 hands per hour. You don’t lose any hands during this time. Are you guaranteed to walk out an online poker winner?
No.
When you take into account the blinds and the antes and the rake, it’s quite possible that winning just 2 hands an hour may not cover your losses in blinds, ante, and rake.
What we have to consider is how big the pots are we’re winning. We call this maximizing value. Now there will be times when you can’t help your opponent folding when you’re value betting (or probe betting to see where you stand in a hand). But there will be times that you can maximize your value by stacking off.
I illustrate this point by showing that 2 hands and hour win rate may not always be a winning strategy. Let’s say the two pots you win are 16 dollars total. That’s +32. But you have to subtract 4 from that each time since at minimum that’s what you have to call. So in optimistic terms, winning two hands that amount to 32 dollars is more like winning two hands that give you 24 extra dollars. So you’re up 24. But you have to factor in more than that.
Let’s say in that hour, the orbit hits the table four times. So you’re losing at least 6 dollars each orbit considering you didn’t win the hands when you were in the blinds. So this six multiplied by four gives us a negative 24. Your two 16 dollar pots, actually lost you money if you consider the rake.
But let’s say you just win one big hand per hour but you win half a stack with it. 200 dollars. You subtract your 4 you have 196, and you subtract your 24 and you still have 172 in profit just from winning one hand.
I’m trying to put in perspective that sometimes small balling isn’t the best way of making the most profit with your time. Sometimes that one big pot will far outweigh the 2 or 10 small pots you won in the last hour playing poker online. And sometimes that’s all you’ll need to show a profit is that one hand.
