The Poker Mind

Poker in so many ways gets to the depths of human nature. Determinism and fatalism is something that poker players think about all the time. I can't tell you how many times I've been driving home from a tournament and thought, "why did that king on the river have to be a king?" A king being the only card that lost the hand and tournament for me. It could have so easily been a three? Or a seven? Why did it have to be a king? We are asking the poker gods. We are asking the Prince of Fate or whatever else you want to call him or it or . . . what pronoun do you use for a spiritual figure? Anyway, why did that card have to be a king anyway?

The good poker player learns to put these incidents behind him. For me, it takes a few hours of "why oh why" and then I'm fine. It finally sinks in that I made the right play. In fact, I made a rather good play and the call was exactly what I wanted. I had pocket aces and my opponent flopped a pair of kings. I wanted him to call my all-in bet. I was trying to trap him. And if it happened all over again, I wouldn't do a thing differently. And if this hand kept happening over and over again, I would be way, way ahead. A big part of poker is probabilities. In the end, if I keep getting in with the hand that has the better odds of winning, I will be a winning player. Of course, I console myself, there are going to be some nasty losses along the way.

It reflects the two natures of man; the rational and the spiritual. We wonder why things happen the way they do. We pray. We often have trouble comprehending events. Yet we also know that 7:1 means that you are going to lose one out of every eight times. When that one happens, accept it. Move on. Some players are better than others at doing this. Chris "Jesus" Ferguson, despite his religious nickname, is the epitome of the mathematical rationalist. I've seen him lose to a one outer full house on the river and he calmly got up and shook hands with his lucky opponent and left the room. Mike Matusow is the spiritualist. He rants and raves and cries when the unlucky world crashes down on him. "This only happens to me" and "I can never win" come wailing out of his mouth, when deep down he knows that its not true. The man has won millions over the years and is a world class talent.

This duality pulls at us all the time. Why can't we accept what we know is inevitable? It's hard. Many people cannot accept negative events -- ever. In poker too, we always remember those bad luck hands that came at the worse possible time. For me it was when Doyle Brunson hit a two-outter nine on the river in the 2005 Tournament of Champions. The event was memorialized by ESPN and for some reason, they continue to replay it on ESPN Classic every chance they get. (What did I ever do to you, Mr. ESPN?) I also was deep into the LA Classic in 2006 when my Ace/King hit an Ace - Seven - Four flop and my all-in bet was inexplicably called by pocket Queens. Ace on the turn. "Overkill" some numskull at the table said. Then . . . Bam! Queen on the river. I lose. So just as hurtful events in our life are never truly forgotten, but rather integrated into our being, the process is mirrored in poker (on a much lower scale of course).

That may explain why many professional poker players are . . . how can I say this politely . . . strange. They must face the inevitable body punches that everyday life hits us with, then they must face the pounding that poker dishes out. Ah, but those poker victories. They bring our positive emotional state to another level altogether. What is the analogy relative to the real world? Nirvana? Could be.