Poker learning is cyclical; or at least it is for me. I tend to go through a cycle that looks something like this:

1. I rock. I’m invincible. Fear me!
2. What the hell, why am I having such bad luck lately?! No fair! I don’t deserve to be down!!
3. Okay, so I screwed up in that hand. And that one. Oh, and I could have played that smarter. Geez, time to re-read [insert book here].
4. *finds topic that needs refreshment* Aha. Oh yeah, I have to learn to pay more attention to that in the future. (#4 gets repeated for a couple of topics)
5. Let’s see if I can find some hands where I can practise this. Here are some good examples… Oh, okay. I get it now; I should have [action] instead. Okay.
6. *Plays a couple of thousand hands* How could I even be a winner before? God, I sucked at poker back then.
7. I rock at poker. I’m invincible!

Rinse and repeat.

Does this sound familiar? Maybe not - it’s possible that it’s just me. For what it’s worth, I’m somewhere around stage 5 in my cycle right now, and the current aspect of my game that I’m working on is position, specifically my relative position to people who have yet to speak. Here’s an example of what I’m talking about:

QJo, the flop is 8-9-K rainbow, the pot is 10 small bets, and the player before me bets. Should I call? Why or why not?

You sure?

Absolutely sure?

…

I don’t know what you answered - although it’s statistically unlikely that you answered anything at all, and more probable that you simply just read on, you slacking cheater! - but whatever you answered, you were wrong - unless you thought “Hah! That’s a trick question! You haven’t told me anything about who else is in this hand, and what kind of action I can expect if I call!” If you did think that - be honest, you didn’t; it’s okay to be a cheating slacker but let’s not lie to ourselves, m’kay? - you are right on the money. The pot odds are there to make the call, if you presume that everyone else in the hand will either call or fold, but I haven’t given you that information yet.

When you look at pot odds - and implied odds for that matter, but that gets exponentially more difficult with more players involved - you must take into account not only how much you have to pay right now to have a stab at the pot, but also factor in the risk of someone (who hasn’t acted yet) raising. This call is only okay if you know you only have to pay one bet to see the turn; if you suspect that the player(s) behind you will raise, you should fold.

Being trapped between two raising players is a disaster if you’re on a draw. Your first call may have looked good on paper, but you cursed as the second guy raised. And now you have to call again, because the odds are still there (and in fact, they’re better now than they were before) - and all of a sudden you’re out four bets on a draw that was worth one and a half at most. So how do you defend yourself against this?

Well, you can’t, really. You have to make a guess as to how your opponents will act behind you, and you have to do this based on reads and preflop action. Making this decision is still never easy, and you’ll often be wrong - everyone behind you just fold, when you thought they’d raise, etc. - but making a conscious decision is at least better than just randomly calling without even considering that there is a risk you’ll be paying a too big of a price for your draw.

… and this is what I’m currently working on - trying to improve my decision making when there are people yet to act. Trying to learn to lay down more mediocre hands in small pots with people yet to act, and working on being more aggressive with mediocre hands in large pots with people yet to act. For instance,

JTs on a flop of Q-T-4, person in front of me bets. The pot is 5 SB (including his bet) and there are two people behind me. I should fold. It’s a small pot, so I don’t stand much to gain from fighting over it.

JTs on a flop of Q-T-4, person in front of me bets. The pot is 9SB (including his bet) and there are two people behind me. I should raise! It’s a large pot, and I want hands like K9, 89 and AK to fold, so that my jack kicker becomes a valuable out.

I still need to work on this aspect of my game. Don’t worry, though - before you know it, I’ll be invincible again. But only for a short while.

/Fredrik