The Spectrum

One of my favorite shows to watch on TV as a kid was ABC's "Wide World of Sports." We didn't have cable for most of my childhood so I had to take advantage whenever sports were on the tube. I enjoyed that the show covered all kinds of contests, from boxing and cycling to tennis and basketball. The tagline during the opening was Jim McKay saying, "The thrill the victory...and the agony of defeat." The second part was accompanied by a skier experiencing a violent (and I thought maybe deadly) crash during a descent down a hill gone horribly wrong. That image resonated with me throughout my youth, not just for the shock value but also the message it delivered. No matter how bad a loss felt.. that poor skier had it way worse. That truly was the agony of defeat.

Part of growing up, maturing and competing is learning how to lose. Gaining the understanding that this is part of the deal. If you play sports, you are going to lose some of the time. Occasionally even most of the time. You don't have to be cool with it but you have to at least be accepting of it. You will be getting your share of victories, sometimes even thrilling ones. But there will inevitably be some painful defeats. With the occasional agony as well. 

I had to learn this lesson all over again when I started playing poker. Losing is never going to be easy. And it does happen a lot. But how you deal with losing is a key factor in determining how you do over the long-term. Being able to brush off a rough hand or session is paramount if you are going to positively move forward. Letting it linger, going on tilt and playing poorly as a result, this is the biggest killer of poker dreams. Emotional stability is a crucial trait that almost all winning players possess. You will see some crazies go on hot streaks and win a ton over a short period of time. But they die out and fade away. They weren't equipped to right the ship when the tide turned. 

There are two key differences, however, when comparing poker and sports. The first one is getting past the tendency of being "results oriented", especially in the short-term. You win a tennis match 6-0 6-0 or a football game 45-3 and it's pretty clear that you, or your team, played very well. Poker is tougher to evaluate based strictly on results. You can get all your money in the pot with the current best possible hand and still lose. You can also make poor decisions and still win. On any given day, the luck factor can be quite high. Therefore, merely saying "I won" or "I lost" can provide an inaccurate picture of how you played on a certain day. Certainly winning feels better. But what enabled you to win? Could ANYONE have won with your cards? Or did you maximize what you had? Being able to discern this is very important

The other key difference is that in poker, death is always looming. Unless you have the most chips at your table, every single hand can be your last. You can't win the tournament until the very end. But you can lose it on any given hand. In most sports, you have a great number of smaller wins and losses that give you a greater or lesser chance to win the game at the end. If you throw an INT that gets returned for a TD in the first quarter or give up a two run HR in the first inning, you're down but certainly have plenty of time to come back. The poker equivalent does not afford you this luxury. One big mistake can be the end. Skirting around, and even hopping over, the pit of death can be a nerve wracking battle at the table.

But back to the thrill of victory. And the agony of defeat. Poker and sports mirror each other in one key way. Sometimes the line between those two very extreme emotions can be oh so razor thin. One strike away in baseball, one yard away in football, one second away in basketball. Teetering on the seesaw of vastly different emotions before sliding headlong into one extreme. In poker, oftentimes you are one card away, just one little card, from both ends of the spectrum. And that last card can change everything. The thrill of victory and the agony of defeat, both hanging in the balance. Exultation with one, devastation with the other. 

And with it, that one constant, never-ending, difficult question. The one that separates, ultimately, the winners from the losers.

Can you handle the swings?