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Every time a fish sucks out, an angel gets his wings

We all know the feeling.

You’ve been waiting to set up the stupid fish forever…

The moment finally comes. You play your hand perfectly and manipulate all the table dynamics in your favor. The guy stacks off with his silly hand on the turn, and… Binks river.

Jesus fucking Christ!! … Right?

No.

When a bad player sucks out on you, you should be happy.

That’s right.

I’m not saying you should not care, because that’s the nature of the game, and in the long run things will even out, and all that. No.

You should actually be happy if a bad player sucks out on you – and here is why.

Let’s say you get it in as a 70% favorite, and lose.

First of all, you won money in EV, the so-called Sklansky bucks. So that’s great.

Second, the weak player didn’t bust and leave the table (as they often do), but actually doubled up. So now he has, even more, money, with which to make bad decisions!

In other words, you made Sklansky bucks AND you are in a position where you get to make more Sklansky bucks against the fish with more chips right away.

 

If you bust him – that’s it, he is gone. No more Sklansky bucks to be made.

So if you understand this reality of poker, you should be rooting for the fish every time you get all-in.

Now, this takes discipline, of course. The natural instinct is to curse when they suck out on the river.

Many players get tilted when the fish sucks out – indicating a fundamental misunderstanding of the situation.

In an ideal world, you would be winning all of your all-ins against the equal and better players, and losing all of your all-ins against the fish.

This way you would keep the fish playing and play (donating Sklansky bucks to your hand after hand), and you get your EV back from the regs.

Think about it. Not only would this keep greasing the fish merry-go-round, it would also frustrate the other regs, and possibly make them into stupid moves against you (or the fish).

It’s the best of both worlds.

So the next time the fish sucks out, don’t try to control your emotions, don’t tell yourself that such is poker, and in the long run you will win because you are better.

No! High-five the monitor, and get busy making more Sklansky bucks against the fish!

 

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