Don't Bring Baggage to the Table

A year or so ago, a very good online player named Soupie said something to me that clicked one night. When referencing a hand where I contemplated raising on the button and didn't because I was afraid that the big blind might re-raise all in, he asked me why I was worried about the big blind shoving. I said that it seemed like lately everyone is shoving to a button raise and his response was, "so was this person re-raising people's late position raises?" I thought for a moment and realized that the particular player had not shown this tendency and I was making an assumption based on other games I had recently played in. He coined this as "bringing the baggage to the table".

But let's be clear...baggage is not tilt. Tilt is a short-term emotional response based on one or two negative outcomes. Baggage masks itself as a logical response that, like scar tissue, has started to build up from recent experiences. These experiences could be as recent as a few hours of play from other tables to as much as a few weeks of play. And like scar tissue, baggage can start to make itself permanent causing the decisions you make to be skewed.

So just because a certain play hasn't worked recently or you've recently gone through a hard patch of variance, it doesn't mean a decision is not +EV.

Examples of Baggage:

• Fear of Negative Variance - "I always lose coin flips, so I'm gonna fold even though I probably have the best hand"
  
• Negative Assumptions - "I'm not gonna raise since someone will probably shove on me" or "I don't want to get sucked out on, so I'm gonna bet big since people usually suck out on me" or "I might as well not bet since he's probably gonna call"
  
• Generalizations - "People who play these stakes always play a certain way" or "Pros are always bluffing"

So what can you do to overcome this? The key is to remain level headed and keep in mind is that each decision at the poker table is unique because each player is unique. You should also not let recent outcomes emotionally affect your decision making. Each time you start a new game, you must reset your head focusing on the present moment. And while your previous experiences are a reference tool, you should constantly evaluate your plays and analyze their expected value to keep your decision making crisp.