You’ve built your bankroll….are you ready for poker venues involving real money? Clearly, I’m not able to answer that question; only you can. Yet, I can offer a variety of advisories.

If you’ve not mastered the aspect of patience…don’t do it.

If you’ve not aligned yourself with a sensible playable pockets matrix, don’t do it. If you’ve not measured your risk tolerance against a tangible guideline, don’t do it. If you’ve not developed the where-with-all to take good player notes, don’t do it. If you’ve not corrected your visible tells, don’t do it.

If you’ve not experienced a long-term ‘Flops Seen Percentage’ of less than 18%, don’t do it. And, if you’ve not tailored your game to a mixed playing style, don’t do it.

• Plus, if you’ve not implemented emotions management techniques, don’t do it.
• If you’ve not maintained a 100% consistency of focus, don’t do it.
• If you’ve not grasped the importance of table position, don’t do it.
• If you’ve not learned the simple computational method that relates to Pot Odds, don’t do it.
• If you’ve not mastered the complex computational method that relates to Implied Odds, don’t do it.
• If you’ve not rejoiced in a long-term ‘Flops Seen Win Percentage’ of greater than 60%, don’t do it.
• If you’ve not developed the ability to put forth ‘white’ deceits, don’t do it.
• If you’ve not evidenced your capacity to pick up on competitor’s tells, don’t do it.
• If you’ve not decimated your opponents here at NoPay, don’t do it.
• And, if you’ve not recognized your advantaged skill level, your talent, your command of the game, and your propensity for winning, don’t do it.

Possibly, in the absence of your readiness for a move to ‘real money’ play, you’ll want to continue with the free poker ‘easy pennies’ available to you at NoPayPOKER.com. And, it’s important to note, that countless ‘Farm Animals’ await in unsuspecting fashion for the quality of play that you’ll bring to the NoPay tables. Their very presence should be ample cause for a minor celebration on your part….a Fat Tuesday on any day of the week, during any month of the year.

Principally because their involvement at the NoPay felt will continue to expand your bankrolls; in freerolls, small buy-in’s, ring games, and sit-n-go’s. The pasture dwellers are everywhere….you’ll need to target their pennies, you’ll need to take their pennies, and you’ll need to facilitate their return to the muck, mud, and mire of their odorous confines.

The truth is that a great many of the players you’ll be competing with at the NoPay site just love to ‘fling chips around’; they rejoice in the thought that Lady Luck, destiny, or divine intervention is going to propel them into the winner’s circle.

To their ultimate dismay, they’ve yet to realize that fate…the random order in which cards are dealt…will only bring them fleeting moments of glory; they’ve yet to realize that the absence of skill on their part has permanently pointed them to the ‘Farm Animal’ pastures. And, while you may occasionally feel a compulsion to assist, tutor, or educate them, please come to understand that any such action on your part would be a complete exercise in futility. They’ve already had every possible chance to learn, and, during each possible learning opportunity they’ve allowed the lessons to fall on deaf ears.

Now, to begin the 2009 Articles, as has been the case with every opening Article I’ve written during the past five years, the subject matter of ‘Patience’ rests atop the pinnacle of discussion topics. It is the foundation on which your game play is constructed.

It represents 50% of all the ‘skills and assets’ you’ll bring to a poker table. It is the primary reason for the movement of pre-game money belonging to others to happily traverse the path to your pockets, purses, and wallets. And, for all intents, it is an essential pre-requisite to your involvement in ‘real money’ poker games.

Moreover, should you be planning on participating in free texas holde em ring game play here at NoPay, you ought to know that you’ll be entering an environment that is controlled by a few good players (a little rail-birding and you’ll know who they are). Plus, there are a handful of average players (I’ll not name them; again, rail-bird and you’ll quickly identify their screen names).

With limited game play observation, you’ll quickly come to understand that the balance of NoPay ring game players are no more than the ‘Farm Animals’ you’ve already acclimated to in your freeroll gaming. Of even greater importance, keep in mind that all of these players are taking part in what is a 10cent/20cent No Limit game….they ain’t playin’ for serious money; it’s likely that none of them could compete in a ‘real’ high stakes game.

Yet, you’re gonna’ want to target all of their pennies; that includes the good, the bad, and the ugly. In the end, those pennies will amount to a fistful of dollars.

Yet, In the absence of patience, you will unquestionably empty your wallet or purse in rapid fashion…you’ll be broke. Now, the proof of this isn’t but a few minutes away. All you need to do is watch an on-line game, a B & M game, a freeroll, or a NoPay ring game.

You’ll find an impatient player at just about every table. In very short order, he or she will have donated their stack…all of it…to the other participants in the game. Go look; it’ll serve as an object lesson. Or, better still, play in a ‘real money’ game without patience…that will serve as an even more pronounced and profound object lesson. Why? Not a tough question to answer. You’ll be the one who has donated his or her stack…all of it…to the other players at the table.

Clearly, I don’t want you to be donating anything…with the exclusion of gifts to your favorite charity, place of worship, child welfare group, environmental cause, family, or a politician with a brain (if you can find one). But, I do hold certain expectations for you; where those expectations affect your bankroll…and, it’s the size of your bankroll that permits your gifts of choice.

Yet, while I may have no right to be waving my expectations before you, please understand that I do so only because I desperately want each of you to develop into long-term winners at ‘real money’ games. I don’t believe in losing…I only believe in winning.

Well…what is it that I expect? Patience, more patience, and then even more patience. What level of patience do I want you to bring to every table you sit at? It’s a simple answer; there’s nothing complex about it, there’s nothing confusing about it.

I want you to bring as much patience as I bring to every B&M table where I sit. If possible, I want you to bring an even greater amount of patience. Can you do it? Sure you can! However, in order to replicate my level of patience, in order to exceed my level of patience, you’re going to have to fully comprehend exactly where my level of patience resides. So, read the next few paragraphs, and you’ll have that comprehension; you’ll understand all that is expected of you….more importantly, you’ll understand all that you should expect from yourself.

I recently played in a 6 hour $5/$10 No Limit session at my favorite B & M. I usually take a 5 minute cigarette break every 45 minutes; although I won’t go out on a ‘smoke’ break unless I’ve participated in a hand sometime during each ‘three quarter of an hour’ segment of play.

However, on this particular day, I reached the point where I hadn’t had a ‘nicotine stick’ in just over 3 hours. That meant I didn’t have a playable pocket for approximately 100 hands; a zero % flops seen percentage for more than 180 minutes.

And, while that is far from normal, it did happen. Would you describe that as extreme patience? Of course you would. Would you describe that as extreme tight play? Surely, you’re currently thinking it was. Yet, it wasn’t tight play at all…it was no more than a rare run of indisputable pocket rags. And, the $200 I lost in small blinds/big blinds, where raises would not allow me to play the pockets I was dealt, went into my competitor’s stacks.

Ultimately, I was dealt pocket 8′s while seated with the Dealer Button. A three times the BB raise was made, and I called. The flop included an 8, giving me a set…the other 2 cards were a Four and a Three. The 8 and the 3 were spades. A $150 bet was made by the original raiser, one other player called, and I called.

The turn was another Four; it was also a spade. I now held a full house, 88844. And, I was playing against an overpair, held by the original raiser, and a flush, held by the other caller. I was about a 19 to 1 favorite to win this pot; only the overpair could potentially suck out on me.

Certainly, you could dispute the 19 to 1 if you want…but, my player notes made it very clear to me that the original raiser was not playing with a pair of pocket 4′s. He’s a reasonably good player, and he would not have raised the BB from early position with pocket 4′s. Thus, when he bet out post-flop, I clearly knew that he was holding an overpair....likely Tens, Jacks, or Queens. If he had pocket Aces, my notes told me that he would have been a pre-flop ‘limper’. And, if he had pocket Kings, my notes told me that he would have bet 4 to 6 times the Big Blind; looking to isolate his hand against a single pocket….just one player.

The river was a red seven. The original raiser checked, the caller…who held the flush…bet $400 into a $540 pot. After the second “call, fold, or raise” prodding from the dealer, I raised the bet by $400. The original raiser folded (he’s the one who held the overpair), the player with the flush went all-in; an additional $625 went into the pot.

I then called the added $225, and took down a pot that had become approximately $2,500 (minus the rake).

A big win? No doubt. A reward for being patient? Maybe not; the random order of cards simply shined a light on me. Yet…you must come to understand that the level of patience I displayed during this 3 hour time span is exactly what you need to duplicate…what you need to surpass.

You can do it…I’m fairly confident that you can. Mostly because patience is a skill that can be easily learned….easily developed. However, since women intrinsically possess more patience than men, it might take a bit more work on the part of the males who end up reading this Article.

Therefore, If patience is not something that you can list as one of your individual/personal characteristics, I’m willing to bet my last dollar that many of you can make it one; just get busy with ‘patience developing’ exercises.

As an example, last year I described an exercise in the ‘Tournament Play – Building a Bankroll’ series of articles…take a few minutes to read it. Then, get busy with the exercise. Truth be told, I do the exercise at least once a month; sometimes more.

Much like the significance of real estate’s ‘location, location, location’, in poker it’s ‘patience, patience, patience’. And, I refuse to let you indifferently walk away from the overwhelming importance tied to the use of patience. You simply can’t win money on a long-term, consistent, and unfailing basis without it…no exceptions; none at all.

If you can’t reach the level of patience described above, if you can’t make patience the biggest asset you bring to the table, if you can’t elevate patience to its proper place in your game…get out, you don’t belong at a ‘real money’ table.

Hopefully, I’ve delivered the message; either bring a significant level of patience to the ‘real money’ games, or, don’t go anywhere near the ‘real money’ games.

Last, and possibly of paramount importance, I need you to recognize that none of you belong in ‘real money’ games in online poker. You each need to stay away from places like Ultimate Bet, Poker Stars, Full Tilt, Absolute Poker, and countless other poker venues available on your PC’s.

Why? Here’s a simple answer. The games played on the Internet are NOT honest. There have been way too many instances of ‘documented’ cheating scandals, and there is an undeniable propensity for collusion between players on all of the Internet gaming sites.

However, you can, and should, be playing free poker at NoPay Poker. It’s free, you can’t make a deposit, you can’t lose your own money, and it’s the very best poker environment for each of you to be expanding your poker playing abilities.

Plus, you can win pennies with regularity. And, those pennies will, in time, add up to hundreds of dollars….just ask any of the free poker NoPay members whose names reside atop the NoPay ‘Lifetime Earnings List’.

Best of Luck at the Tables

Michael

(c) copyright 2009; no reproduction, all rights reserved by D. M. Vadnais

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