Empathy - the neglected skill
Related Articles
When I think about what qualities that are vital to becoming a good poker player a capacity for critical thinking, discipline, and creativity come to mind right away. But in talking to a lot of both good and great poker players over the past several years, I’ve noticed that one quality in particular that isn’t usually associated with poker separates them - empathy.
The ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes isn’t something that most players even think about. They ask the question “What does my opponent usually do?” This is the wrong question. The right question to be asking is “Why does my opponent do what he does?” If you try to put yourself in your opponents shoes and discover how they’re thinking rather than just what they’re thinking you’ll find many more ways to take advantage of them.
In online poker, a lot of players tend to treat their opponents like robots, as if they will always play hands the same way and always tend to do the same sorts of things. I’m even guilty of it myself and have been burned when a player does something that seems inconsistent with his previous behavior. Obviously when someone’s tilting that changes their play considerably but think about yourself and how much the quality of your play can change depending on how you’ve been doing for the past orbit/day/week/month and . Trying to figure out how your opponent is feeling at the time you’re playing against him can be exceptionally helpful.
An example - I was recently playing in a rebuy tournament where I was fairly deep and one of the other players was a multitabling grinder who I’ve played with quite a bit and respect. We both had decent stacks of about 35 bbs. In the past orbit, he had opened twice and, even though he opens with a fairly tight range, been shoved on and folded both times. My rather extensive notes on him said that he only calls three bets or shoves w/ a very tight range. However, I tried to think about how I feel when I open with decent hands and get shoved on repeatedly. I’m a very emotionally stable player but I get extremely frustrated when this happens and, despite the fact that in all likelihood the other players had strong hands, I feel like I’m getting pushed around. So for the next orbit the villain didn’t play a single hand, leading me to believe that he was not at all tilty. Then the following orbit he opened utg +1 for a standard 3x the bb raise and it folded to me in late position w/ AA. Normally against a tight player whose notes say “Won’t call three bets lightly” I’m fairly unlikely to get all this players chips by reraising unless he happens to have a big hand as well. I may even flat-call to try to induce a squeeze play from the blinds and disguise my hand vs. the raiser. However, knowing that he likely felt pushed around and at least a little frustrated I just shoved for a huge overbet of about 12t imes the size of his raise and he snap called w/ AQ offsuit. I never would have been able to put myself in this great position without trying to understand how my opponent was feeling and how that was likely to effect the way he played his hand.
As important as this concept is for online poker, it’s much more important for live poker. People seem, for whatever reason, to have a harder time consistently playing their A game in live poker. In my local cardroom, I frequently see skilled internet players come in and play well for a couple hours before losing their discipline for any of a number of reasons and losing all their money .
So many factors contribute to how well a given player will play when they sit at the table. If you strive to understand what those factors are and exactly how they will affect a player then you’ll be much better equipped to capitalize on the particular mistakes they will make. One of the most common situations you’ll see occurs when a player has had to wait awhile to get into the game. These players will often play much looser than they normally for the first several orbits. I know that when I have to wait that long I get impatient and my inclination is to play a ton of hands, so it follows that others are likely to feel that way too. I can realize that and make sure I don’t make the mistake, but most people in the cardroom are playing recreationally and aren’t likely to stop themselves from playing too loose. When I see someone who has had to wait for awhile I tend to make my bets bigger in the hands against them and value bet more thinly because they’ll often show up with hands like king four suited that they limped in early position with and then couldn’t get away from top pair to a bet on every street. Players that won a good amount in their last session tend to make the same kinds of errors; they likely hit a lot of draws or had their big hands hold up in their previous session and they think they’re “running good” so you can get away with making bigger bets than normal when you think they’re on a draw and they’ll still call you.
A key aspect of using empathy to your advantage is that you can expect a move based on how your opponent is thinking or feeling despite having no evidence of them using that move previously. The most glaring example of this for me happened just recently with a player who had been beating the game consistently for about six months but had always stayed out of my way and had never, as far as I could tell, bluffed me or tried to make a hero call against me. For a little while he had been comparing stacks with me and asking me how much I’d won the previous week and generally trying to get into a competition with me about who was the better player. I didn’t want to get involved in that so I’d always just say “I’m doing fine” or something to that effect. It seemed clear that he wanted to impress me, so I thought about how I’d play if I wanted to impress someone else. The two most obvious things would be to either make a big bluff and show it or make a big hero call against that player. If I had just been thinking like a lot of players think and only asked the question “What does this player do?” I never would have been looking for a spot where he would do either of those things against me. But because I was asking “Why does he do what he does?” I was able to be on the lookout and, sure enough, pick off a huge three barrel bluff he tried against me w/ ace high on a raggy board in a spot where I would have surely folded.
If you pay close attention to how your opponents are thinking and feeling you can find profitable situations that you wouldn’t have noticed otherwise. Taking this step can help you achieve a deeper understanding of the game and pad your bankroll as well.
