[Ed Miller]

[ QUOTE ]
I am not a confident player by any means. I don't think I'm better than anyone here, or most the people I play against. The hand was posted purely to get this response, so that next time, I know that no matter what my read is, I can't fold a hand like this. So...it has served it's function, and I appreciate all the help.

[/ QUOTE ]

Here's the way I see it... "going with your reads" is important, but to do that correctly, you also have to be aware of how likely your read is to be correct. No read is perfect... there's always uncertainty. Your opponent could have changed gears, you could have happened to only see him in a particular situation before, he could be on tilt or playing randomly, or whatever.

To borrow a concept from investing... you need a "margin of safety" with your reads. That is, "going with your read" is great if you can be somewhat wrong about it and still be making the right play. It's a lot dicier when your read has to be almost perfect for the play to be correct.

Furthermore, and here's something I may want to write an article about.. hehe.. you should take into account the prior probably of ANYONE playing the way you think your opponent plays. That is, not only do you have to think, "How closely do I have my opponent pinned down?" but you also should think, "What percentage of all players happen to play the way I think he plays?"

If it's a high percentage of players, then you should be more confident in your read than if almost no one else plays this way. Why? It's a Bayesian thing... if very few people actually play the way you think this guy plays, then the chance your read is off goes up.

Here's a quick (though very imperfect) example. Say you have observed him for a while, and you think he only overbets postflop with really strong hands. A fair number of people play that way... or at least it's a plausible way to play, so it's somewhat believable.

Now say you have observed him for a while, and you think he overbets the pot only when he holds specifically jack-five (say you've seen him do it three times already). No one plays that way... and because of that, you should be very suspicious of your read, even if you have a fair amount of evidence to suggest the read.

Basically, the more "plausible" your opponent's play, the quicker you should be to give him credit for playing that way. If you think your opponent does something really bizarre, then you need a lot more evidence to convince you of it.

In your example, I don't think you gave yourself a margin of safety. You assumed that your opponent played in this very strange way... and you had to be almost exactly right to make the play you did.