Strategy with Kristy: John Kim Part Two
John Kim is back for another edition of the Strategy with Kristy podcast. Last week, he talked about what it takes to be a professional poker player.
This week, Kim talks about interesting hands he's played recently and also discusses a couple of hands he watched his students played.
Here is a snippet from the interview:
Let me tell you a really quick story about why you want to take your time making decisions. In the 2006 [World Series of Poker] Main Event, the year Jamie Gold won it, I ran pretty good and made it to Day 5. We were down to 73 players. I had 30 big blinds or something close. Everyone folded to me in the small blind. I had jack-ten offsuit. I limped or raised, my action doesn't really matter, but he looked over at my stack and contemplated raising. Obviously, he has a pretty good hand if he's thinking about raising preflop. He was just a standard player, nothing out of line. The flop came ten-two-four rainbow. I just remember thinking, "OK, I have top pair. I have 30 big blinds. I guess I have to go broke." That's obviously the wrong way of thinking.
I think I bet, he raised, I three-bet, he shoved, and I snap-called without even thinking. He rolled over king-ten, and I busted in 73rd. It's the worst feeling when you bust after playing five days in the Main Event. When I walked away, I was just thinking, "Man, why did I do that?" If I thought about it, I could have avoided going broke there. I knew he wanted to raise preflop, so if he's raising my bet on the flop, he always has ace-ten or king-ten. I should have taken my time and thought about that.
Here's the other thing. I finished 73rd, but the two guys who finished 72nd and 71st are right behind me. My payout was, $65,000 or something like that, and 72nd paid a little over $100,000. Literally, if I would have just thought about it for three seconds, I would have made an extra $30,000.
So ever since then, I told myself that I would never act in haste. Always think every decision through.
Tune in every week for new episodes of Strategy with Kristy. Feel free to send in questions, ideas or suggestions for the podcast to [email protected]. Also remember to follow PokerNews on Twitter for up-to-the-minute news.
