Almost everyone who starts playing poker is attracted by the excitement and action of the game. However, once the honeymoon phase wears off, people start to realize that there is actually skill involved, and they want to win, usually starting in the small stakes games.
The problem for most people, however, is that they never get past the starting stakes. In fact, most people have a hard time breaking even in these games! The main reason is because they keep making key mistakes that prevent their game from moving forward and making progress. As a result, they just keep shooting themselves in the foot over and over again.
This article discusses five ways to help low-level, or small stakes, players stop making basic mistakes and improve their game.
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Unable to control tilt in Small Stakes games
The first way that small stakes players lose money and don't let themselves evolve is by letting themselves get carried away by tilt, which takes all the profit away.
Poker is a tough game to handle when you’ve been on a bad run for weeks, months, or even years in extreme cases. However, in the long run, everyone gets dealt the same amount of winning and losing cards. So the game is really just a mental test.
Those who can stay calm and control their emotions are almost always the biggest winners. If you want to finally start getting ahead in poker and move up from the small stakes, it is absolutely necessary that you take tilt control more seriously.
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Choosing the wrong games
Another way to shoot yourself in the foot is by playing the wrong games. What do I mean by that? I mean games that clearly don't have at least one bad player or someone who is heavily tilted. This is where the money in poker comes from.
Of course, if you play tournaments or sit and gos, you have no control over who you play against. However, if you play cash games, there is no excuse other than laziness for not studying the tables and making sure you are playing at the best possible ones.
Some people like to just sit down and start playing, and I can understand that. However, poker is becoming increasingly competitive, both live and online. If you really want to be a winner, you’ll have to be willing to put in the extra effort when it comes to table selection.
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Playing very passively
One of the beautiful things about poker is that in most hands no one really has anything good. This means that there are dozens of situations where the pot simply goes to the person who wanted it the most and fought the hardest for it.
Elite players know this, and from a technical perspective, it’s what separates them from the rest of the pack. They don’t get dealt more aces or make more flushes than other players, they just win more small pots that no one else seems to be interested in taking a risk in and being a little more aggressive.
That said, it is important to note that aggression in poker can be a double-edged sword. Unbridled and unfounded aggression will quickly turn a player into as bad a donkey as one who only bets when he has the nuts.
Still, next time you're at the tables, think about all the medium and small pots more carefully, the ones where everyone is just checking or limping. Is there a way to win the hand by betting, or even raising?
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Stop betting for value
Value betting at lower stakes is one of the keys to success. The reason is that at these limits many players have difficulty clicking the fold button.
It goes without saying that you should value bet as often as possible with very good hands like full houses and sets.
This isn’t to say that you can’t value bet hands like top pairs or even middle pairs. This is especially true on the river, if you think there’s a chance you’re ahead, often the right answer should be to value bet. Even if you’re betting correctly, sometimes you’ll end up getting called by better hands. Don’t be afraid of this, other times you’ll win the pot.
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Stop giving up on the right hands
The last way to lose money at small stakes is to not know how to fold the right hands.
Again, I'm not talking about super obvious situations that anyone can recognize, but rather situations where you have a medium hand, like top pair, and according to the board and your opponent's actions it's almost impossible for him to have a worse hand than you.
One of the great things about low limits is that most people play robotically. What I mean by that is that they don't balance their game properly.
For example, if your opponent calls your bet on the flop and then raises on the turn, he probably has a strong range that contains hands better than top pairs and two pairs. Even if you have a hand that looks great, like top pair, it is too risky to continue in the hand given the range your opponent appears to have.
River raises are another common situation where small stakes players are not lying about their range. The ability to balance out a playing range with late street bluffs is not something most low stakes players are capable of doing.
Then again, you can safely fold hands like top pairs on the river if it looks like your opponent will rarely have a worse hand than you.
In poker, there can be no such thing as a “see what happens” call, what exists are bad calls.
Final Thoughts
Poker is a simple game in theory. Anyone can be an expert on paper. The problem is putting it all together in the heat of the moment, because that's what really matters.
Nothing discussed in this article is revolutionary or overly complex. In fact, you probably already knew many of the things discussed here, perhaps even intuitively.
However, in order to evolve your game and improve your results at low limits, it is imperative that you really keep all of this in mind, at all times.
Article translated and adapted from the original: 5 Ways Smal Stakes Poker Players Prevent Themselves from Winning
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