Apr
9
Strong Arm Poker is a phrase I coined sometime ago. It’s a style of play that can be very lucrative. Do not confuse it with being a bully at the poker table though. It’s imperative that you get a couple of things straight before embarking on this type of play.
As you probably have figured out by now, if you have played any time at all, there is a certain style that fits you best. One that you are most comfortable at when seated at the table. There are four mainline styles that are usually recognized.
Tight/Aggressive…..Tight/Passive……..Loose/Aggressive……Loose/Passive. Each style in the extreme makes up one corner of a box, if you were looking at these graphically. Tight at the bottom left, Aggressive at the bottom right, Passive on the bottom left and finally, Loose at the top left. Then there are so many degrees of variations of those categories that it would be impossible to list.
Based on that structure, you will find a point that most likely fits you. As an exercise it’s really beneficial to draw out a box and label it as previously mentioned. As you look at the box, you are looking to plot a point on an x,y axis, that represents your playing style. Moving on the X axis, you go from Tight out to Aggressive. On the Y axis you move from Passive up to Loose. Once you plot your style on the plot-graph, realize that is how you are playing right now. It doesn’t mean though that you can’t play differently if you find your present style not profitable.
You would actually be nuts not to change it….Right? Trust me, the answer is YES. If you play poker and are not winning, then your style of play is terrible, regardless where it lands on the graph. Actually there might not be anything wrong with your style, it’s just you are not very good using it. Poker style is very personal. So now we have your style, and will assume you are a winning player, or at least a good player that can hold his own.
Your style is developed within your local playing area. Now to use the Strong Arm style, you must be playing outside your normal playing area. It’s a must that you are not a known local. Because if you are, most likely your playing style is already known by other players. That’s pretty redundant, but to Strong Arm a table, you must be an unknown quantity. You must be able to compare your usual home field game with the flow of the present out of area game. Assuming you can do that, you will then be able to determine if you can dominate the table as a whole. Then you need to weed out the weak players, and look to isolate them in a hand anytime you can. This works best at No-Limit. If you find that your home game is more aggressive, that is the best case scenario. You are most likely to find that the bets are smaller and raises are smaller also. This will most likely allow you to be just a bit more aggressive and allow you to come over the top by a small amount and steal the blinds and small bets.
But don’t let this style lull you into a false sense of being a big tough player, and then not pay attention. Because a player will sit in the weeds with a monster hand and then drop the hammer on you and wipe you out. But with some patience and making moves in the right position and being aggressive you can dominate a table. If the game is more aggressive than you are use to, you can play the innocent lamb and sit in the weeds yourself, and drop the hammer on one or two of their locals.
Bottom line is that with some real patience and cunning, you can venture out of your local area and kick some butt and make some bigger scores.
Milford Walton
April 9, 2008
Comments
Leave a Reply
