[_GUN_]

Over the last couple years, through the USPC and the WSOP, the game has been heading in a new direction. The faces get younger every week; the play becomes more aggressive, and the play becomes sloppier.

I watched final table of the ME live last year and it was about twenty minutes into the match, before a flop was even necessary. It was raise/reraise, no flop virtually every hand as things got underway.

My question is this---is poker permanently being changed for the worse or is hyper-aggressive pre- and post-flop play going to be just a phase? Are we stuck with maniac poker or is it just a fad? Are we going to have to wait on all the 20-something internet stars to simply grow up and evolve? Will we continue to see people try outduel each other on every single hand or will bad beats tally up and force the internet crossover players to rethink their maniac ways? I really disliked DeMichele, Alex Jacob, and Jordan Morgan at the 2006 USPC. Everytime someone was dealt KQ suited, A9o, or 55, they seemed to reraise pre-flop with it. I honestly couldn't see any variance in their play.

Here's how I see most pros I respect play AQo, they raise and occasionally reraise if they think it will take the pot pre-flop. I can cite a hand where Howard Lederer reraised with AJo when Chan opened the pot at the inaugural WSOP TOC. Howard berated Hellmuth for folding AQ, saying if he had raised, he would've folded. Hellmuth wasn't feeling it and dumped it, but Howard read Chan as weak and came over him. Howard didn't improve and Chan doubled up with his middle pair.

I really disliked DeMichelle from the 2006 USPC the most. He made a comment about how poker was in the dark ages and that he and the internet wizards would pull it out of a primitive state and improve the strategy of the game. I mean Doyle Brunson was playing poker before DeMichelle's father was born. The whole reason everyone learns poker so quickly is because they have years worth of experience, they can pull from poker books. No one has to grind it out like they used to and create their own path. You can go from a beginner to relatively competent in 1-2yrs. I just can't honestly say I respect people who reraise every single flop with no pair and no draw and call themselves top of the species.

1) I understand the concept of playing players and not your cards.
2) I understand the concept of aggression.

What I don't understand is that hold'em is a flop game with community cards and internet crossover players are taking flops out of the game by jamming every pot pre-flop, by reraising with Q2o, 4-10, A9.

DeMichelle, in his infinite wisdom, of being a 22-yr old kid, who spends his entire life playing monopoly and internet poker in hotel rooms, said that poker was in a primitive state. I mean has he watched poker on tv before? Do you see him as a complete moron, or is he a relatively intelligent person who just hasn't grown into his pants, yet?

My theory is this...all great players started out very aggressive and gradually tuned it down with experience, becoming more selective with their hand selection and with their aggression. I think the Doyle Brunson's, Chip Reese's, and Scotty Nguyen's all moved past that and found a better balance of aggression. Even Mike Matusow has begun to play tighter against the current crop of players and look where he was a few years ago.

Are we just going to have to wait on all the internet players to take huge losses and gain experience, in order for poker to de-evolve to a more controlled game? Will they eventually bust out of a tournament with a horrible bluff, look in the mirror and say, "I just cost myself $400,000 by finishing sixth instead of fourth?"

I just don't see any patience from the cross-over players. I, for one, enjoy creative poker. I like players flat-calling with AK and then if you whiff, you dump. If you hit, no one ever thinks their has AJ is dominated on an A59 rainbow flop. Personally I like slow-playing hands pre-flop and playing flops fast. I just want to know if hold'em is going to become a complete joke, where the king of the idiots is glorified and the academic players are left on the rail. I just don't understand how they can play that much poker and not realize the pros they claim to respect, have absolutely no respect their play.

Is it possible, also, that hyper-aggressive trash play is here to say, but the elite pros will just continue to thrive in their own world, far removed from the internet players?

I just don't see 22-yr old internet maniacs retiring their laptops to play $400/800 or higher at the Bellagio.

[dad604]

The sloppier the better for the good players. That might be true of the tables you watched on TV but over the last few years, it seems to get tougher for me. Maybe I am just going the wrong way...

[ipgyst]

Tight aggressive poker will always be best. Stu Ungar was a firecracker like these guys, and I read a story (I forget where, might have been Mike Sexton) about one time he was at the WSOP at a table full of pros. He ended up with all the low-denomination 25 chips at the table, but he was a shorter stack because he didn't know when to slow down, and the pros know how to counteract his aggressive play.

I think it takes a strong player to do well against loose aggressive players, but it can be done. Most of these guys are loose aggressive because it is what works online and they win most of the time with it.

I like no-limit holdem, but I prefer a (limit) mixed game because it requires more skill. If you took somebody decent at stud eight-or-better and put him up against the internet young gun hold em master in a game of stud eight-or-better, my money is on the decent player because the other guy may know what stud eight-or-better is, but I doubt he is very good at it.

We call a lot of these guys poker players, but really they are holdem players. If they were the kings of poker and responsible for some sort of enlightening, they'd be crawling all over each other to get into the 3000-6000 game at Bellagio or the 50000K H.O.R.S.E. event. But they ain't there, and I've never heard of any of them saying that they wanted to be there. Their braggadocio makes for good copy in a news article, but it's empty and hollow. That's why I like Negreanu so much, because he is a good poker player and loves to play all the games. Same goes for Chan, Harman, Brunson, Greenstein, Benyamine, and anybody else who shows up at the 3000-6000 game regularly.

[99%evil]

I think the Horse tournament will become th eprestige tourney, a tourney that really shows poker skill. I agree with the comment above, these guys are hold'em players not poker players. I have a feeling a bunch of them made some cash online by getting lucky, the next thing you know they've got $250,000 in their P* account...and so do 1,000 othe rguys just like them. String enough lucky pre flop all-in's together and you're a poker pro with a million dollar bankroll.

I think it's like any other competition where a new younger crowd comes in thinking they know more than the vets, they'll take over the sport world of their league...then over time reality sets in, they realize why these vets have staying power and aren't just a flash in the pan. It's hard for a lot of online players to not make it to final tables just by their shear volume...if they make up 75% of the field from online satellites../they're just bound to be a few that get far and take some pros out on the way...

Edit: The more I think about it the more I forget to think about the aspect of the poker tourney... In tournies you need to accumulate chips to get to the end, the aggressive player is willing to gamble off their chips to try and accumulate enough chips to get to a final table...the play along the way may appear horrible, but it has little to do with poker skills it has to do with getting chips. You don't see these types of moves at cash tables, yes there is aggressive plays, but blinds don't increase and you can sit back and feast on this play. In tournies time is of the essence and if you can accumulate early, you can bully more later and continue to add to your stacks... So the erratic play does have a means to the ends, but this is due to the tournament, not the poker. You need chips to get to the end, some of these aggressive players would rather risk all early, accumulate chips than try and survive to the end...surviving puts you in defensive mode which does not bode well as you are getting blinded away.

All has to do with tournies, not poker, just think of it that way...it really is hoping to get lucky several times, or just steal pots to accumualte...

[monkeydog]

I think 99 hit it on the head...tourny play is getting the chips, and LAG seems to work. Personally I have a hard time playing like that. It is nice when you get somebody who has watched too many final tables on tv sit at your cash table though!

[the3rd]

Pokerstars qualifier Hevad Khan may be this year's Jamie Gold and Eric Molina combined from what I have read. He will dominate TV time and make the ME more unwatchable than previous years.

No limit tournament poker is forever changed. TV producers love the spray and pray style. It fits the short attention span, action junkies that comprise the majority of the viewing audience. The WPT blind structure supports this. For every style, there is a counter style. As more people master it, the perceived bad play will slow down. There was a time when check-raising was height of dirty poker.

I really don't see a problem with it. No poker aficionado regards these internet junkies as elite pros. Even casual poker players do not. To go further, I think most of the internet wizards will admit they are not a world champion if they take down a bracelet.

If you don't like it, there are plenty of alternatives. Limit, non-hold'em...

[Big Mike]

As Ed Miller put it in his book Getting Started in NLHE: "No Limit is a flawed game; limit is far more robust".

The very nature of no limit poker makes it possible to negate any skill disadvantage one might have. You may have read about Sklansky teaching some guy's daughter a simple system (based on going all in preflop) that allowed her to cash in her first tourney.
It isn't really that the game has become less skillful, just that different skills are now being emphasized. Knowing preflop percentages and odds, and being able to judge your hand's equity versus the opponents range is probably becoming as important as making a good read and playing the flop and turn.

As others have said, as the audience becomes more educated, the HORSE tourney will become the premier event.

[smoore]

You gotta remember, Doyle, Slim and Johnny exported Hold'em in THIS GENERATION. That internet player is right, this is the dark ages (of hold'em). Perhaps the empire of 7stud laid the foundation for hold'em and then died out, like Rome did for the current Europe.

Hyper-aggression is not a fad but it used to be rare... ala Stu Unger.

BTW, Sexton has an axe to grind with Unger... possibly because of Stuey's drug use, possibly other reasons. In any case, you'll only ever hear Sexton give Ungar praise in a backhanded manner.

Stu was a card savant. He played card games on a level none of us will ever glimpse. The only reason he started to play poker is that no one would play gin with him any more. No one. Nowhere.

Add raw talent like that to a game like NLHE and you've got a winning, dangerous maniac. I think Gus Hansen could possibly be as good as Ungar but more people know how to counter that style now. There's a good fantasy HU match, huh? Ungar vs. Hansen... $10k, winner takes all!

So basically, "Get used to it!" You're going to see this rush of hyper-aggression get stomped a little by TAG, then the game will gravitate towards TAG... leaving the door open for talented LAGs to mix it up again. Back and forth, like any ecosystem.

re: lol donkaments!: Yeah, tournament poker is almost a completely different beast than a cash game. The difference isn't as pronounced in limit play but in big-bet tournaments, "You gotta be willing to die in order to live!" It's so true. I used to consider myself fairly good at hold'em but now realize I'm a TOURNAMENT player. Tournament player. Man that sounds dirty. Imma go play micro-NLHE. I want to be a POKER player!

[_GUN_]

Originally Posted by smoore

BTW, Sexton has an axe to grind with Unger... possibly because of Stuey's drug use, possibly other reasons. In any case, you'll only ever hear Sexton give Ungar praise in a backhanded manner.

Stu was a card savant. He played card games on a level none of us will ever glimpse. The only reason he started to play poker is that no one would play gin with him any more. No one. Nowhere.

Add raw talent like that to a game like NLHE and you've got a winning, dangerous maniac. I think Gus Hansen could possibly be as good as Ungar but more people know how to counter that style now. There's a good fantasy HU match, huh? Ungar vs. Hansen... $10k, winner takes all!

I have to respectfully disagree with some of these points. I've read Nolan Dalla's bio on Stuey and I've seen several live interviews where Mike Sexton discusses his feelings on Stuey. I've seen him cry just a couple words into a sentence. I've certainly seen praise and admiration that wasn't done in a back-handed fashion.

Hansen will never be Ungar. Gus Hansen is not as aggressive as people believe. It is a misconception of vocabulary. Gus is a loose or active player, as Barry Greenstein pointed out on his site. He makes continuation bets on the flop but surrenders to reraises. Maniacs don't fold to reraises, they shove all-in when reraised.

Barry Greenstein: "Gus is often mischaracterized as a hyper-aggressive player when he is actually an active or loose player. He plays a lot of pots and his success is a combination of this volatile style and good decision-making after the flop."

I've watched the 1997 finals of the WSOP multiple times (I own the tape). Ungar was a much different player at the end of his life. He flat-calls with AQ and lets a guy with AJ hang himself by leading out, then when he checks the river, Ungar makes a nice value bet and is paid off. If you observe 97' Stu, he is wiser and a lot more poised. He never throws a fit or makes a sound, he is very worn down from life, but his mind is still sharp. I think Gus makes a lot of poor decisions. He makes some horrible calls pre-flop with marginal hands and he shoves it in with Q-high and middle pairs, with absolutely no fear of being dominated. With his backgammon background, he should be much better at the math of poker. He seems to understand pot odds, but not hand match-ups.

The biggest similarity between Hansen and Ungar is neither will be remembered for big laydowns, they both invested too much in medium-strength hands like top pair.

[Poboy]

I think the young guys' attitude you describe is partly their age (everyone under 25 doesn't just have opinions, they have strong ones) and partly that their style plays well in tournaments. They take advantage of the freezeout/timed nature of tournaments, and the fact that the caller needs a better hand than a shover. In a cash game, their style would be very volatile.