[glass_onion]

I'll add my :02. First I disagree that halfback pass or statue of liberty play is the best +ev option. I'd think far from it, due to the interceptions that come. Coaches choose it because a run up the middle rarely results in a 50+yd touchdown. Sometimes in a football game, as in a 10 person tournament, you have to gamble to win, as safe +ev plays wont achieve a desired results.

At the ring game level, long term profitability is the only long term desired result and gambling on a -EV decision is obviously not optimum. As many posters have said there are other things that can take a probably -ev play in terms of what the final hands were and turn it positive. Reads, mixing up play, a host of metagame features, range of hands you put the opponent on, and inducing donkey tilt.

Now I primarily play 2/4 and less, with occasional shots at highter. I make very few 'mix it up plays' and I do just fine. I adjust to my opponents passive or donkish tendencies, but i'm of the belief that 95% of my opponents won't put in the time to recognize that I typically check the nut st8 on the river and look to donk it on the turn basicaly every time, or that about the only hand i'll RR preflop doesnt involve AA.

As proof of this I submit the fact that I win consistantly at every level, and have for over 18 months. Any competent opponent should see that I'm betting preflop 10% of the time and come up with pretty much what those hands are. They should DEFINETELY see that I'm not continuing past flop on a float - that is i've got odds every damn time. Now sure I'm semi bluffing and cold bluffing sometimes, but not too bloody much. A freind asked me the other day how I'd play myself and I said I'd play full stacked, be betting 3/4 pot on all flops and folding to raises when applicable, and I'd POT every turn that didnt' complete a draw. The fact that no one plays this way against me is proof that very little 'mixing it up' is nescessary to beat idiots.