Being able to play the player is the essence of winning poker. Good players win more with their good cards and lose less with their bad cards, and one of the key ways they do this is by adjusting to the players they are facing. Poker isn’t played against computer programmes with a consistent set of responses – it’s played against other people. Each of them is different, with different tendencies, moods, levels of thought and ways of reacting to your actions. To take a simple example, say a player has open-raised under the gun and you hold a pair of Tens. Are you ahead or behind the range of hands he’s holding? Against a regular aggressive player you may be clearly ahead but against a nitty super-tight player you may be getting crushed by his narrow selection of starting hands.
Good players also understand that their opponents are not machines and react to their situation. Your specific history with an opponent is very important in how you should play them. For example, they may be a player who plays weak-tight and can’t make big call-downs with marginal hands. However, if you’ve bluffed that player twice recently in big pots he will remember that and be far more likely to call you with a weaker hand.
It’s also important to realise that players’ performance varies. When players are tired, and particularly when they are losing, they may start to play badly. If a player is tilting and playing really badly you should take advantage of this by adjusting your game, being prepared to enter the pot against them much more often and making big call-downs against them. If you’re not making these adjustments and always playing the same hands the same way you’re leaving money on the table.
Thinking is the key
Of course this is a balancing act, and playing your hands for value is still going to be the main source of winning chips at the table. It’s very easy to convince yourself that the super-aggressive loose player is making another big bluff and call with a marginal hand only to be shown the nuts. The key is to gather knowledge on each individual opponent and use that to inform the range of hands you put him on. That way you can balance your poker fundamentals with the human side of the game.