Two Plus Two Newer Archives - How to Survive Idiots

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This may be more of a rant than a question, but I have read all 3 of Dan Harrington's Excellent books....more than once...and consider myself at least an average NL Hold 'em player. I play mostly online at single or 2-table tourneys. On average, I about break-even (up $100, down $100 with $10 buy-ins). I can't seem to get any better results than this because I tend to get crappy cards in general, and I keep running into Fish who are having their one lucky day against me. Today was a case in point and I share this if for no other reason because I'm sure everyone here will nod their heads and go "I've been there...".

It was a single table tourney, and--as I usually do--I got to the bubble (4th place) and was the shortstack. This resulted from insane attrition of the other 5 players who all seemed committed to forking over their chips with all-in moves. In fact, I had only played one hand by the time there were 4 players left (35 was one of my BETTER initial holdings). Anyway, long story made slightly shorter, I got to a point where I had about $1,400 and I was up against the 2nd biggest stack who had around $2,900 I believe. I had A9 unsuited and, it turns out, he had A2 suited. I raised from first position to 3xs the BB (had to make a move at some point) and was called by Mr. A2. The flop came down A68 (in other suits). I made a small bet of $100 and Mr. A2 goes all in. I knew from his previous plays and bluffs that I had him dominated, so I called. Sure enough, I had him dominated (my reads are usually correct), and he pulled a 2 on the river to knock me out. When I asked him why he made the play, he initially said "I had an ace" when I pointed out the stupidity of that reply, and after checking on sharkscope that he had lost $2,800 so far and had an ROI of negative 38%, he gave me the real answer: He earns more than that in one day, so he doesn't really care whether he loses by making stupid plays.

Well, how the heck do you argue with that? I wouldn't be complaining except that this is happening a good 50% of the time in the tournaments I've played (which are now over 500). And it's more frustrating because I look up others' stats and some people have really good profits and ROIs and I yearn to learn their secrets [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Anyway, sorry for the rant. No responses necessary unless you feel like it. I had to get this off my chest. I have learned a lot from this forum and from the books I mentioned. I just wish it actually translated into success more often.

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Saxman,

I'd like to bring up one point. I'm not much of a tournament player so I don't know how much this will help but remember this. An idiot player will play alot of hands. He will play unconventional hands unconventionally. He has no clue what kind of player you are because he is only playing his cards. He is gonna be in the action regardless of who is in the hand. Most likely they aren't paying attention either.

How do you fight fire....with fire. If the rest of the table is doing the all in move preflop every other hand, consider doing it too. A standard 3x raise with AA isn't going to do any good. That's just a pot sweetner for an action junkie. You need to get the idiots attention with a really big raise.