Rough Around the Edges?

The smallest increases gained over time can become huge gains over a lifetime. Every percent on a loan over the course of thirty years equals thousands of more dollars you will spend than the cost of the original purchase. Each percent is another hour you work, another moment spent toiling instead of living life. These small percents make men rich and keep men poor. Life is all about the small edges you can gain over the next guy.

In poker these small edges are there but not always so evident to most. There are many aspects of equity of a pot. How many chips you have, your hand strength, how likely are they to fold, and so on and so forth, etc. etc. The size of the blinds and antes usually dictates what we are willing to risk. Will I risk my whole stack when I have 100 big blinds on a coin flip? Probably not. Will I risk my whole stack on a coin flip when I have 12 or less big blinds? Absolutely. Will I risk ten big blinds to move a spot up in the money without being at risk myself? Most of the time, yes. Will I jam k5 suited in the small blind when we both only have 14 big blinds? Yeah, I will.

For some of you this is obvious. For others they ask why? Why would you risk your whole tournament or stack on that spot where you only have a slight edge or you slightly have the worst of it? The answer is I will take any edge I can get. Over time those small advantages will turn into bigger ones and my bankroll will benefit from it. Over a lifetime I know those small gains will turn into giant ones. Without those edges I lose my advantage over most of you and I play a lot of break even poker. I don't want to look back on my poker career in thirty years and know I never made it because I only managed to keep my head above water.

If you played your entire lifetime and only managed to one percent return on investment, you would not end out great, but you would end out good enough to buy some things you never would of otherwise. If you increased that by five percent, you have found some security in your investment and got a sound return on your money. Once you get above ten percent on your investment you start to become free. Your money works for you and you move beyond security and start to experience freedom. In my opinion, freedom to live our lives is what every human being strives for in the first place.

You may see me make mistakes at the poker table. We all do. Mistakes can be costly. I try not to make many of them. Remember this everyone: The biggest mistake you can make as a poker player is not having the courage to get your money in the middle when you have the best of it. This is an absolute statement but won't yield you an absolute result. Sometimes you will lose when you had the best of it. Not every time you had the best of it will you be getting it in. Overall though, failure to play the small edges in poker will not only cost you money you will never see, but also security and freedom you will never experience, as well as dreams that never became reality. Just something to think about.

Be Well
BigJoeJones