BBTwo Summary

* disclaimer - These are my thoughts and thus opinion. this is not meant to piss anyone off at all. nor is it to take away from anyones game, rip on anyones style of play, or insult anyones ability to play. I believe that there are no wrong ways to play this game. Maybe some bad ones, and likely some better ones, but everyone is entitled to play their chips the way they wish.

I am writing this from an outsiders point of view. I have been blogging since really July. Yes my blog was created last December, but I really only started reading and writing since July.

There are 6 blogs that I have been reading for more than a year (Fuel, Lucko, Chad's, Al's Mookies, and Hoys) basically because they held actual poker content, were well written, and to the point (except hoys, but he's cool so I read him anyway)

When I started reading more of you in July, I realized something... more on that in a second


What I have come to realize is that in most of these events, you have to be extremely lucky to win. and not just lucky to catch cards. lucky to have your hands hold up, lucky to catch hands in the right spot, and be called, lucky to not get run down, and even lucky to catch up when behind.

Yeah yeah yeah, lucks got nothing to do with it. But in this case I think it has everything to do with it. Thats not saying that winning players are only lucker players. Obviously thats not the case. But this is what I have noticed...

A lot of blogs out there give good commentary on hand histories, playing styles, how to, and just good poker sense. Based on specific plays in tournaments and ring games, and just generalizations based on hypothetical situations.

I think with everyone reading the same blogs, the newer or less experienced players all learn at the same rate, or at least from the same information. This leads to very similar playing styles.

Poker is not a hard game to learn. Hell with everyone reading the same books, or someone else's cliff notes on it, it's more like an instruction manual. Everyone can follow the same roadmap and basically be the same player. You don't have to be super smart, or really good at math. Just add water really.

If thats the case then why would Hoy rip LJ for making a call with AQ vs. a jam. Maybe LJ knew that a resteal with a lesser hand there would be possible and decided that she was good.. which she was... (not to rehash an old argument :) )

My point is with everyone playing the same style, something's gotta give somewhere.

What I have noticed since reading more of you is that almost every tournament, I have seen and heard, or read replies that someone made a bad laydown (by their own admission). I think this happens because they know that if they win, it will be considered a suckout, or, just a bad call. Even if someone jams a preflop raise with A6, calling that jam with JJ might be considered a bad call. Especially early on or with deep stacks late, or whatever the situation that would really make JJ almost have to fold.

What clouds that judgement somtimes is the fact that someone might post something about a horrible call along the way of a MATH tourny, or Big Game, and would rather fold than go with a read, or risk being admonished in someones blog about how horrible they played, or are in total based off of that play.

There are some really good players among us, and some really wild players tend to show up every once in a while, but I don't think there is a huge gap between the masses. And, yes, the better players will ultimately get themselves in position to get lucky at the times they need to. But more than ever, and more than live, I think the bloggaments are a weird mixture of a little more luck than skill, and a little more skill than just showing up.

Jec has proven that solid, tight, aggressive poker makes it the way that most will win a lot of these events. I don't think I saw Jec get extremely lucky at anyone point, meaning coming from behind, or busting an overpair, more than the average perccentages should allow. But I also don't think I ever saw him get run down much either. he played extrememly well this series, as he did last series. The only difference then from being point leader with no money to point leader with everything would be what? A little bit of luck?

I look forward to BBThree... Stay tuned.