Why Experience Matters in Poker

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We’ve all been in the situation where we make what should be a very ‘tough-to-call’ bet, only to see our opponent snap-call and win the pot. In these situations I sometimes find myself shocked; not that the player called, but that he called so fast! I find myself scratching my head –as you probably do as well– thinking, “How on earth did he call so fast? What did I do wrong that gave away my hand to the point where he didn’t even have to think about it?”

Well, after some deep thought, and some productive conversations with other players, the answer to this dilemma seems to be that your fast-acting opponent may simply have the experience to make these types of split-second decisions; experience we may not possess at this point… Although I wouldn’t fully discount that you gave off a tell or gave away your hand in some other way.

Unfortunately, too many poker players underestimate the value of experience, relying solely on the math and strategies of the game. But experience can turn seemingly difficult decisions into simple ones, just like a world-class athlete can do things that seem superhuman to you and I, and make them seem fairly easy or routine to boot.

Systematic decisions vs. Intuition

Think of it this way, when you began playing poker the decision of what to do with a hand like ATs when it’s folded to you in Middle Position took a few moments to process. You had to go through all the different scenarios you’ve read about; think about your chip-stack and the chip-stacks of the players still to act; whether or not ATs fell into the right “category” of hands to play from this position, and so on.

Now fast forward to the poker player you are today, where after several months or years of playing the game decisions like how to play ATs from Middle Position are made almost automatically. It’s not that there are fewer factors to consider, it’s simply a matter of experience; you have played enough hands of poker to know what to do in these situations; you’ve gone from having to process all the different information available in a logical, systematic, way, to being able to intuit the answer based on your experience, because you have a good idea about your opponent’s likely range; you know how ATs fares against this player’s likely range; there is no need for in-depth analysis.

A much simpler example of this is a school-age child learning to do addition. As they practice more and more there is no longer a need to count off 2+2 on their fingers; they simply “know” the answer is 4. As they continue to learn, even far more complicated equations become automatic: 2 + 2 + 2 = 6; 4 x 4 =16; 12 x 12 = 144; and so on. When they were first learning the answer to 2 + 2, the idea of being able to answer 12 x 12 on cue was awe-inspiring if not impossible; to a kid, a person capable of these kinds of feats is probably considered to be a wizard, the smartest man alive; just as we view poker players capable of making snap-decisions in complex scenarios mind-readers and superhuman players; chances are they are probably just good players with a lot of experience.

Instinctive play does not mean illogical play

When we use instinctive play we are not trying to be “soul-readers”; instead we are relying-on and trusting our experience. Logic does not go out the window and we shouldn’t be playing on “auto-pilot” or making willy-nilly decisions. What we want to do is focus on what is important and the things we don’t know or are unsure of, instead of the information we have down pat. It’s the difference between “the unknown” and “known”, and as anyone who grew up in the 1980’s knows, “knowing is half the battle” (you should have the GI Joe theme song in your head now).

This is why major league outfielders can get such great jumps on a ball simply based on the sound of the bat or the initial flight of the ball. They don’t need to calculate the trajectory and speed of the ball to see where it’s going to land. $1, they don’t have the time to do that, and #2, they just know from experience, and the more experience you have the more routine complex scenarios become. If we could time-travel and view these same athletes when they were kids (with all of their great talent) we’d see that they probably tripped over their own feet or had a ball bounce off their head when they first started playing the game.

For an outfielder, WHO is at the plate is the important detail; it tells them where they should position themselves to begin with, along with factors like the wind and even things like the runners on base and the score. Once they hear the crack of the bat their body is already in motion, going forward or backward, before they even see the ball’s flight path (their experience takes over), and once they do see the ball’s flight path they adjust, perhaps slowing down or speeding up, or adjusting the angle they are taking.

For new poker players who are deciding whether to push all-in with ATs for their final 15 Big Blinds when the LAG player in the cutoff opens the pot, the decision will require a systematic evaluation of all the information: What hands have I seen this person play; what range might he have; and how does ATs fare versus these hands? Do I have fold equity or is my opponent priced-in to call? What are the chances I find a better spot in the near future?

To use a phrase from Nate Silver (yeah, I know, this is the second article I mentioned him in a row, but it’s a really good fit here) sometimes the signal can get lost in the noise for these players. While they are focused on all these different parts they have been told are important, they forget that they are on the absolute bubble against the chip-leader with five super-short-stacks in the game. On the other hand, an experienced player knows this is a clear fold given the bubble and the short-stacks, the other stuff is meaningless.

They also know that in a different stage this is basically an auto-shove barring some remarkable read. Under normal conditions there is no need to go through the process of determining your equity versus your opponent’s likely hand range (which an experienced player already knows) this is a +EV spot, and with a 15 Big Blind stack you have the perfect 3-bet shove stack and probably won’t get a better chance to get your money in.

As we grow as poker players our goal should be to continually move decisions from the systematic category (where the decision is made by looking at all the factors in a progression) to the intuitive category. This doesn’t mean we stop thinking about these scenarios, it means that more-and-more decisions are “known”.

Over-thinking

This isn’t just a matter of making our lives easier, or saving mental energy, if you continue to over-think different decisions when there is no longer a need, you’ll end up like Charles Barkley –and I don’t mean you’ll end up as a basketball analyst on TNT making fun of Kenny Smith.

Barkley, one of the greatest players in NBA history and a pure athlete who was blessed with strength, speed, and explosiveness, has a major problem. Like most retired athletes Chuck likes to play golf –or at least he did. You see, when Charles Barkley first started playing golf his athletic ability made him a bit of a natural, but now he has tinkered with his swing so much and hired so many coaches that his swing is an absolute abomination! Barkley was a better golfer after a month of playing the game than he is now, many years later, because he over-thinks the whole process.

The problem he is facing is that he is over-thinking his swing, despite years of playing golf; Sir Charles never managed to move his decision making from systematic to intuitive. He is still thinking, “don’t break your wrists but don’t be too rigid either; rotate your hips but don’t turn too much; square-up the face on impact but compensate for your hook; drive with your hips but not too soon; follow through…” So instead of working on improving his swing, Barkley’s mind is overloaded with the basics, along with the advanced things you learn when you have been playing the game as long as he has. He not only has to think about breaking his wrists, but he’s also remembering the article about when you should break your wrists; he has competing ideas floating around in his head… too much noise and not enough signal –Which is why he has a terrible hitch in his golf swing that is 100x more damaging to his game than breaking his wrists ever will be.

The same can happen to a poker player. If you are constantly trying to get things precise, or worrying about your fold equity when you are faced with a simple fold – perhaps you are on the absolute bubble–you may be missing the forest for the tree, and end up making a massive mistake that is far more costly than a slight miscalculation in fold equity. Poker decisions need to happen fast, and at some point we have to rely on our experience, and we have to trust our instincts –which are nothing more than a collection of our experiences used to make these split second decisions. When your brain is saying fold, loud and clear, don’t try to logic your way to a different decision based on noise –you shouldn’t completely discount the possibility that your instincts are wrong, but don’t go out of your way to try to prove them wrong either.

Obviously if you are new to poker your instincts will be poor; you simply don’t have the experience to know if your brain is telling you to do the right thing. But as you gain experience your instincts will sharpen, you will understand what aspects of the hand are important and what aspects are simply noise, and decisions once though to be complex will become easier.