The majority of regular poker players never seem to be able to come to grips with exactly what they are doing — or, more accurately, what it is that they are trying to do.
Middle-limit ring game players are notorious for being cry babies whenever time collection charges are due. There are lots of tales about high limit players who shriek at dealers or waitresses who assume a dollar chip was meant as a tip. While at the same time, very few players seem to understand that they win or lose money just like a worker punching a time clock. Let’s see, you put in the hours, and you make or lose your expectation. You apply and re-apply your advantages endlessly, and you accumulate dribbles and droplets of profit from everything which you do in, around, and in preparation for games.
But that just sounds like a bunch of hooey to most players. All they see is pots… big pots, small pots… big winning days and of course crappy losing days. They fall into that trap of thinking money is made in lumps. They think that it springs full-grown from Zeus’ forehead. But that is definitely not how it works. Money is made by planting seeds, nursing seedlings, and cultivating the resultant crops.
All winning poker is simply a matter of putting in the hours when you have it. Perhaps un-sexy, but there it is.
Poker tournaments are no different, even though the wrong thinking of most players is at its highest point when thinking of tournaments.
