WEAK ADVANTAGE

I had a really awesome New Years Eve this year. The evening festivities were fun, taking in the Maroon 5 concert at Mandalay Bay and strolling the outskirts of the Las Vegas blvd. watching the fireworks overhead. It was a great time of celebration and dancing in the streets with good friends.

The day started out with me playing doubles tennis with 3 tennis pros! Wow, what a treat to play with such talent. Everyone wanted to put something on the match and of course me being the weakest link, my team needed a spot. We settled on the spot of my partner and I starting out 1 game up and 15-0 every game for the match. Alas it was not enough and we went down in flames 2-6 / 3-6. Although I lost the match, I was reminded of  a valuable lesson I learned in poker early on:

Play at a level in which you can successfully compete with your competition.

What our pro opponents did that I quickly recognized is make very few mistakes. They excelled in execution. Nothing fancy, but basically just kept hitting the ball back, (mainly to me of course!), focusing on the weak link in the chain.

Whether playing live or tournament poker, focusing on the weak links at the table is where your profit is made. Whether your missing a shot in tennis or making an unprofitable call or bet in poker, the result is the same, a loss and a gain.

My personal challenge early on in poker was accepting that I was involved in a competition and in competition my job was to defeat the other players. More specifically, to play profitable poker my job as I came to learn it was to beat up on the weak and take their money.

I resisted this and avoided this every opportunity and as a result paid a heavy price.

Instead of going after the weak players, like some idealistic robin hood, I would search out the better players and go after them. Instead of looking for the weaker games, I would look for and play in the biggest game in the room in some egotistical show of brazenness that oftentimes left me battered and bruised with a big slice of humble pie.

Growing up with a sister with downs provided special challenges. Oftentimes my family and I were the butt of jokes and made fun of by the other kids in the neighborhood. We were shunned in many circles of a small town. I remember one incident in 3^rd grade in particular in which another student was being beat up on and I lashed out and dove in to fight the bully’s. A rare show of courage at my young age, but I was so fed up of others beating up on those who couldn’t adequately protect themselves.

I found these personal feelings and considerations carried over into my budding career as a poker player. Standing up to pros at the poker table was like standing up to the bully’s in school. I couldn’t differentiate the two and oftentimes left the poker room with nothing but lint in my pockets.

One thing these losses did provide me with is thicker skin. I also developed the courage to stand up and compete with the best, as I had to improve my technique and skills in order to survive. Quitting was not an option for me as I also agreed with the philosophy “Winners never quit and quitters never win.”

I learned that if you’re going to play with the pros, you better have a pretty big spot or advantage going into the match. That advantage lies in the skill of application of the knowledge you acquire in playing the game. I may have lost a lot of money learning the game, but I acquired a lot of knowledge sitting and playing with some of the best.

Kenna