What to do when you hit the plateau?

Yesterday I was watching UFC 61 the first couple of fights were neat, however, the last fights were horrible; since both fighters were so good the fight became a boxing match, no one was on the ground, there were no good combos and nothing exciting.

This got me thinking. This years World Cup was not that exciting to watch as well. Why? Because of the lack of goals. Every team is using the same advanced defense techniques that makes it really hard to score. That’s why now the soccer community is thinking of new ways of making this sport exciting again since it hit the plateau.

There is plateau in anything you do; when you are on a diet, you hit a plateau, when you work out, again, there will be a plateau. And of course, there is a plateau in poker.

Lately, I was analyzing the players on my table at Casino Niagara. Disregarding he drunk college boy, every one on my table was playing exactly the same way. They tried to be random, being unpredictable, forgetting the odds and the stats…etc. At this level poker becomes a game of pure luck. As a beginner, poker (specially Texas Hold’em) is a lot about luck. As you advance in the game and adapt new techniques, the game becomes more predictable and more skill-oriented. However, as the poker community gains these skills, these new techniques are not as effective leading to the creation of new more advanced techniques.

Nowadays, I personally believe we reached a level were the game of Texas Hold’em has developed too much neutralizing the skill part of it and increasing the luck factor.

I believe that the new techniques that will rejuvenate poker are in NLP (neuro-linguistic programming). I am saying this because I have used it for years in poker and it works wonders.

For example, you flop a monster hand, but when you bet everyone folds so you end up winning a small pot. How can you maximize your winnings? By making your opponents bet. You can try making your opponents bet by commanding them to bet which I don’t see woking or you can persuade them to bet by using neuro-linguistic programming. Also, if you bluffed a pot ad would like your opponent to fold. You may attempt to tell him not to play it, or you can persuade him using NLP.

Finally, NLP will elevate poker to the next level. I don’t know what will be the next step after everyone uses NLP. Maybe a modified version of the currently game theory. We just have to wait and see.