Losing coinflips often will make you a BETTER multi table tournament player!

[Bob23bk]

Well when I hear coinflip I consider it 50% vs 50% or very close to it. Somehow I see people calling what I would consider bad beats, coinflips. Something like my QQ vs his AJ and he hits one J on flop and second on river. Is it just weak players that have a wide definition of a coinflip or is any strong but not nearly nutted hand considered a coinflip.

The example you give is far from a coinflip, QQ vs AJ (suited, for this example) is ~2:1 favorite (32% vs 68%). A coinflip would be much closer like you said, 66 vs AKs for example (52% vs 47%)

 

[Haki]

Took a quite of time to read , but it's great. Thank you for the post.

 

[dj11]

All good points.

I have an issue with the BRM 'rules' you espouse. Not that they are wrong, they are not wrong. Rather that they might be nitty. But everyone should understand them.

There are folks in the world who enjoy the game as entertainment more than as some badge of honor. For those who can afford it, a night of OLP (online poker) is as much fun as a night out drinking and dancing. They are willing to drop $50 on such a night. They mostly understand they will wake up the next day with little more than a hangover and memories. Maybe they got lucky and wake up the next morning to a new mate or a bankroll.

In either case, they will want a guide on how to tend to that newly found lucky win. Well, we generally don't offer love advise around here, but we can offer BRM advise, and so the formula you offer is not bad. Like I said, perhaps a bit nitty. It was born mostly during the heady days of unfettered poker growth, between Moneymaker and Black Friday. It was born by 2 distinct groups, the FRW's, and the (generally) bad players who got caught up in the headiness of the game, and found themselves depositing several times a day, and losing fast.

Everybody involved saw that personal responsibility was necessary. No one wanted anyone to experience personal ruin. Chris Ferguson created, no, formalized, the BRM concept with his $1-$10K challenge. It took him a long time, over a year. And he had (has?) talent. But he was successful in spreading the concepts of BRM and personal responsibility.

Meanwhile, there are players out there with money and ease of deposit, who just want something to do tonight. They don't really need BRM.

What every player should understand is where they fit in the grand scheme of things. Do they 'need' to be somewhat frugal? If yes, then they 'need' BRM to be an important part of their game. If no, then WE need to welcome them.

 

[VicGent]

Good post made some very good points as did some of the replies. Must make mental note not to push what I think are coin flips and are really just me chasing the pot with little hope of winning with the rubbish I have in my hand ie stop chasing action

 

[rock0001]

i think the term ¨coinflips¨ in poker is mistakenly used in some cases. there are some situations in which the odds of winning the hand are almost 50% 50% like ak suit against 22 however for example a pair of tens will be 55% against 45% against ak suit and thats not exactly a coin flip scenario. medium and high pairs will have lots of odd against a single player however they lose they value against 2 or more players on the pot, on the contrary a hand like AK or AQ or KQ plays very well against 2 or more players because if you hit a pair it will verylikely that you are ahead in the hand, also you may have straight and flush draws which will be more profitable to hit them on a multiway pot.

 

[EvertonGirl]

Great Post. I am the one that loses most of my flips

There is hope for me yet

 

[Sil3ntness]

10 BB 6 max SnGs can crush even the best players soul. Variance shows no mercy.

*sings EPT song* "GRIND ON THE RIVER... on the river! Survive on the river... die by the river." (least I think those are the words)

 

[bbiase]

I really think that most players shouldn't even think about going full pro on poker before hitting 2.5 mil mark ahead of lossess. Most of the biggest names in poker were probably loaded with money before going even regular on medium stakes with their college paid or stable day jobs. A Tom Dwan wannabe should just think of poker as a second life. The kind of second life that pays for your partying, traveling, entertainment (of course if your job can't afford that), but should never leach a single penny from your first life.

Also, on the coinflip situations, I also think the same advice could be applied to "losing to regulars/grinders". Just like you can't avoid rounding the EV down when playing coinflips, you can't avoid rounding the EV down against players that can outplay and outmuscle you with his bettings consistently. Just like you want to be one or two steps ahead or opponnent wen he's thinking about playing coinflips, you want to be one or two steps ahead when playing more experienced/loaded/aggressive players than you, or simply avoid then and settling for fishes.

 

[dino]

welcome to CC and keep posting
interesting read

 

[Stalfos]

"The worst variance forges the strongest players"

I hope so. Thanks for the posts.

 

[pokervike]

Am I sure there isn't some Ancient Mayan Altar, where upon you can slaughter a goat, perform a magical dance, and sing a song to the Almighty Bulltilt Gods in prayer that you can hold with a pocket pair against BroadWay cards? No, I'm not 100%. I certainly hope that exists, because if it does, I'm going to get rich very quickly.

Please read my thread then stop by for dinner. We should talk of such things. I'll be serving rack of lamb but that's just coincidence not variance....

 

[Xmaster]

Good post! It's important to notice, that Tournament Poker is a little bit different than cash games in these situations. If you know, that a call for a big pot in cash games will mostly be a coinflip, you will call pretty much always, because of the pot odds. In Tournaments this isn't the case, because a double up of the starting chips doesn't mean that they are worth twice the buy-in. The chance to win the tournament may double up, but the tournament winner doesn't gets 100% of all buy-in. That's why taking coinflips in tournaments is not as good as in cash games.

 

[fletchdad]

Just saw this. Great post, and well said. You look like a very +ev new member. Thanks for not only joining, but contributing.

 

[Tgen]

what you basically say is that understanding the variance will make you a better player and yes this is obviously true , if player understand when he is running hot or not will make less likely to tilt when he is losing and he will stay focused and put decent volume to overcome it.

 

[walkerbear]

Great post! Ive folded, say pocket 10s, at the table and then when the other player plays QQ or AK and hits an ace or king. I fold 89% of the time, your psychology post made a lot of sense. I finish in the top 1-3% now in a 1300 MTT tournament.

 

[c1g]

That was a great post and read, thx for writing it. You have to win your coin flips to win any multi table tourney...

 

[avipokiri143]

What an inspiring post man. Seriously! I love playing MTT's and I do on pokerstars. I understand each and everything you said and it is true, you tend to lose most of the flips and try to avoid flips as much as possible. Keep going and good luck at the tables.👍🏼

 

[tfree93]

Loved your post. I've also noticed quite a bit bs during games when you are big stacked and you call an all in from a short stack. When I have a great hand, against multiple opponents it doesnt matter your hand strength but heads up the coin flip is much more rewarding. Could be wrong thats how I feel

 

[WiZZiM]

yep, really good stuff here

 

[andreigabor]

That was a great post and read, thx for writing it.

 

[dominating69]

its 2021

just created an account in 3/2021 just to say thanks for putting this into the universe..