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I've encountered this same phenomenon on the net as well. I regularly see flop rates of 80-90%. No joke, 9 of 10 players call or raise to the flop at least half the time. Individually, I think these people must stink at the game, but in a crowd, something weird happens. The odds of hitting a gutshot straight or backdoor flush are pretty low for anyone of them, but when 9 are going after it on every hand, at least one of them seems to hit every time. I'm #10 at the table scratching my head at people playing J3 off suit, not folding to my raises while I sit on pocket kings, seeing 5 or more go to the river on every hand and a gutshot straight pulling down the pot.

No one seems to lose or win consistently since they are all playing equally bad, they just pass their money around the table to the most recent lucky draw. Every pot is a big one and I'm licking my chops, but I couldn't seem to win with these guys taking down pots with 38 off when I'm raising with trips. I can't tell you the number of times I lost to J2, 93 or even some mope calling 72 offsuit and sucking out on the river.

Here's my question/comment: I tend to be pretty tight, playing less than half my hands. I tried losening up a bit in these games, but I just end up losing more chasing to the flop and beyond. After giving it a lot of thought, I came to the conclusion that the right strategy was to tighten up even more, rather than get loose.

The reason is deceptively simple (took me a week to come up with it): Since a straight or better seems to win every hand, I have to stop playing for pairs, even top ones. I won't play anything less than KTs. I'll call any pair (and raise top pairs + AK) to the flop and fold if I don't hit a trip. I'll call suited connectors to the flop and get out if I don't hit. I muck everything else. What do you think of the idea?

I've only just started playing with this strategy and so far it seems to work pretty well. I'm only playing about a third of the hands, so if anyone starts to notice how tight I am, my takedowns may start to shrink. Believe it or not, nobody seems to have caught on. I kept track the last few times I played, I was in 6 out of 32 hands, and won 2 of them, pulling in about $2 for every $1 I bet.

Good results, but very slow coming. It takes a world of patience to play so few hands. I'm sure I could do better loosening up as you suggest, but the trick is to loosen up the right way, aiming for more straights and flushes and less pairs. I wasn't able to do it right, and I started losing pretty fast, playing as bad as everyone around me.

Sorry for the long post and thanks again for being a great resource.

-Jim

Answer: That's kind of the idea that I was mentioning. If you were playing 50% of your hands before, or even close to that, I think it would be too much. Even in loose games, not every pot allows you to call with weaker hands. You will end up giving a lot back also if you don't have a sound strategy for why you are playing those specific cards to begin with.

For example, let's say you call with a hand like J8s in late position after everyone else called. The goal with a hand like that is to try to hit a flop that either gives you a straight draw, flush draw or better. If you catch just an 8 or a Jack, your hand isn't going to hold up.

Some comments my girlfriend made recently pop into my head... I've taught her how to play and she has moved up to $4/8 holdem, winning regularly at a popular LA cardroom. She was having a losing streak for a while and then tightened back up after she realized she was playing too many cards. She attributed her loosening up to seeing me play and the cards I was in with. But the key point that alluded her was that we don't play at the same limit.

Poker is very situational. If I were to only play premium hands at upper limits, I wouldn't win. People are too smart to pay me off and they would make it very hard for me to win because any flop that didn't look like it helped me would be a spot they could bluff in. The same goes for playing in extremely loose games, you can't rely on only AA, KK and AK.

The point here is that you need to gear your play based on the players as well as the texture of each pot. If I were to play her $4/8 game, I would play in a way that would maximize my chance of taking down some large pots. That's what it is about in limit holdem. You can win 10 pots and still lose that session if they are small. You can also just win 1 or 2 pots and still be a big winner after losing everything else.

I recommend that you play these looser hands in spots where you'll have a good idea of how the hand will shape up: blinds, middle/late position, and late position. You call only after a lot of other people are in, other wise you'll stick to your premium cards. Some of the non-premium cards that you can call with in these spots are hands that have the potential to make either a flush or a straight -- J9s, T8s, 97s, Q9s, etc. And once again, you are not in the hand to get trapped with top pair weak kicker, you are in the hand to flop a big draw or something like trips or two pair.

This is just an odds game. The strategy won't work though if you get greedy and lose discipline by paying off every other person's good hand when you are in there with weak hands. You need to wait for your spot and take them out. One last warning, it is very easy to reinforce bad habits in poker because everything wins sometimes.

Your goal is to form a strategy that can work over the long haul. Since poker is so situational, you need more than one tool in your bag. Work on adding and developing different tools to your bag so the time comes for a flat head screw driver, you won't pull out a 15lb sledge hammer and bash the crap out of it.

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