Sklansky's Mercy of Luck

[shipitfish]

In this very brief essay in Poker, Gaming, and Life, Sklansky argues:

Few people realize how much even expert players are the mercy of luck in the short run. One of the most dramatic ways to show this is by [pointing out that] no one could beat a draw game if they were never dealt a pat straight or better. [...] Without these occasional super hands being dealt to them, even the expert players could at best hope to break even.

For those who have never played draw, consider this to be roughly the same as never flopping a set or better in HE.

This is amazing to consider. If you “run bad”, you just cannot win. Luck is mandatory.

Comments

[guyumu.livejournal.com]

I just by accident read this post again.
I came 2nd in a no-rebuy tournament today (big to me).

I flopped allot of nuts. Board come TT3 and I have 33.
It's an amazing hand to have when someone has a T.
But it's lucky. Not nessecerily the cards, or what I got,
but also that someone happen to have a hand that seemed strong enough to win.

It's actually such a lucky game.
I mean, you get dealt AA on BB and everyone folds,
but also, you get dealt AA and someone else has KK.

To win at these tournaments (NL) consistently, I really doubt the cards are the ones that do it. I think any hand it's about how you play it, and how you play it against your opponent. What you have does not matter.

That's where that theorem of sklansky makes so much sense to me.
You have to get your opponent to make a mistake according to that law.
If you were able to make all your opponents make mistakes according to that law, you would win every single game you ever play.

I took a middle stack down to 2x the blinds on the final table, because he was a prime candidate to make a mistake.

Just too bad we wont always know when were making a mistake.

Anyways ;) Something like that.
You must post more, proffesional or not ;)