Is focus on reviewing large pot hands overrated?

[Marcus_Trivinho]

I used to play consistent NL100 > 10 years ago and recently started to play again.

Needed to relearn some basics and I do not have time to play a lot.

However I have played 9k hands on NL2 and I'm about break even. Which is not very satisfying but hey.

I read Nathan Williams book and post hands where I lost large pots, sometimes also the ones where I have won but am unsure if I played correctly.

However I'm not sure if it makes sense to focus on the large pots so much when trying to learn and improve? Could it be that the larger number of small to medium sized pots play a much bigger role?

How would I go about analysing this to improve my game? Any other strategies for improving? What is good up to date material on online micro cash game to read? (I do not like videos so much)

How do you go about finding the relevant hands of a session to post on the forum?

Thanks 🙏

 

[crazycitizen]

Hello

Hmm, I would say focusing on large pots makes more sense. Because there are more likely to be mistakes made in larger pots. I.E. did u choose the right line, did you read his range/specific hand correctly, were the bet sizes optimal, were you getting correct pot odds/implied odds etc.
Also pots you lost should be studied more than pots you won, for the same reason.

However, studying the smaller pots/spots is also of importance. Even pots you folded pre-flop should be studied in a way.
Basically study the small pots a bit, medium pots often and your big pots close to all the time.

In terms of differences over the last 10 years. I would say the main difference is: 10 years ago you would heard the term 'LAG' and 'TAG' a lot. But these days it's 'GTO' and 'Exploitative'.
(Side-note: players 3bet PF a lot wider these days than 10years ago, so grinders are generally 4betting lighter these days to counter it, but nothing crazy)

So, by studying GTO or using a solver like 'piosolver' you can see how 'GTO' you played.
And by seeing the general weaknesses from the player base at your level you can see their mistakes and you can strategize how to exploit them.

There are quite a few programs for learning GTO out there, personally I liked PokerSnowie and piosolver, but I'm not big on books so hopefully someone else can suggest something.

For Exploitative, I'm a big fan of Charlie Carrel, I know he has some material out. But there are others of-course.

As for which hands you should post, I'd say whichever are the situations you cannot answer yourself. But after studying some GTO and Exploitative styles you can start to answer a lot of them yourself.

Hope that helps!!

 

[roger perkins]

I like to review hands that I thought I played either bad or good. But I think I more try to review my entire night to try and identify my overall game. I also will sometimes concentrate on a specific part of my game if I think I have been weak there. Example I might work on button play or how I defend or not defend my BB. Maybe I work on my 3 bet ETC.

 

[ObbleeXY]

However I'm not sure if it makes sense to focus on the large pots so much when trying to learn and improve? Could it be that the larger number of small to medium sized pots play a much bigger role?

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I think it is good practice to go through your hands after play and identify where your leaks are. Identifying your leaks will help more than any other activity.

 

[Collin Moshman]

I've definitely had large-pot-only study sessions. You're guaranteed to see hands where you made significant decisions worth more EV than your average spot. But for sure I would also look at small-medium pots too. For these, I don't usually apply a tracking software filter like I would for large pots (BB won/lost > X). Instead I'd just review games/sessions or do a filter like VPIP = True and look at a number of hands.