TAG vs LAG
There is a lot of discussion in forums about loose players versus tight players. It is always the tight player who is mediocre; despite the fact they are winning for 4ptbb/100 they cannot be 'good' because they are tight. I have never worked out whether the people that write off the tags and nits are genuinely good loose players or just loose fish who think that they're good. I suspect it is the latter.
Consider a heads-up game without blinds. We have a loose aggressive player and a tight aggressive player who both play optimally both preflop and postflop. Who would win? I hope the answer is obvious... the tight player wins because his hand distribution has an equity advantage. In this example I think it would be foolish to call the tight player better (even though he wins in the long run) because both players are playing as well as they possibly can (optimally). [Note that if we had blinds this would complicate things because now we should assume that the looser player will win more of the blind money on average to compensate somewhat for the card disadvantage.]
My point is that being 'good' in this game does not have anything to do with being loose or tight. There are good tight players; there are good loose players. I'm convinced that the good tight players could play a profitable loose style and the loose players a profitable tight style if they chose to do so.
As far as this relates to my game - and the evidence suggests that I am just a break-even player at the games I'm playing in currently - I have seen strong evidence that a similar preflop strategy to my own can bring big returns in this game. This implies that I am doing some serious things wrong post flop. I certainly agree with this implication and I'm currently playing as much as I can in order to try and bring my game up to the next level.
I'd agree with you that tag >> lag at 6max & FR, but I don't think the HU comparison is the right way to go.
ReplyDeleteIn pure HU a tight player will generally be crushed by the LAG. The reasoning behind this is that usually both players have marginal hands, or just a high card. That coupled with the fact that most hands won't go to showdown (often due to those marginal hands) makes actual holdings less important. The play is more defined by character & habit than hand strength - that the lag is less readable and the tag more exploitable. I know you said blindless, but you're making it contrived to fit what you're seeing. Sklansky said poker was a battle for the blinds, and this is really true for FR & 6max. For HU it's less so since you naturally play more hands anyway (HU players use the term stealing, but it's nothing like true blind stealing that you see in 6max). However you can't take it out of the game as it's the thing that keeps the momentum.
It's when you go the other way - adding more players - that we see why tag is better than lag. With more players to see a flop, the chances of a stronger hand continuing increase. Playing marginal hands is harder, and a lag has to be a much better hand reader to be successful. Imagine a table with 20 people - each deal is using practically the whole deck. A lag wouldn't stand a chance I think.
hum, sorry for the wall of text (even sounds a bit knowitall, which is cheeky when you profit way more than I do :-) ).
ReplyDeleteIt got me thinking about formats I enjoy though, and obv HU appeals to me since I'm naturally laggish (not good laggish prob), but I reckon my favourite is when it's three handed. You get to play loads of hands, it's HU style laggy, but also with the positional perks of 6max say - one go IP without paying any blinds, possibilities of squeezing etc.
Now I've thought of that I wish FT etc would even have 3 seat tables, would be a very scary format imo (in a good way)
hey don't worry, I agree with what you're saying I was just using the silly blind-less HU game to make my point about 'goodness' being uncorrelated to 'looseness'. That probably sounds stupid but what I'm trying to say is that the best players will choose the strategy that makes the most in their format, be it loose or tight. It winds me up when people flame the Nits and Tags - because I am one myself I guess lol!
ReplyDeleteWow, three handed tables would be awesome, email time? :)
You think so too? Cool :-) Seems PS & FT are desperate to outdo each other at the moment, so reckon I will fire off some emails!
ReplyDelete