A Lesson on Handling a Poker Bad Beat
A strong hand ending up beaten; is this possible? It happens all the time. So what's the remedy? The effective way of handling a poker bad beat is to take a hike.
Nothing is more effective when it's bad beat we're talking of than to walk away. Bad beats happen, and the real surprise is that even veteran poker players are sometimes surprised and affected.
A poker bad beat is a good hand losing to another hand. The painful part is when a good hand loses due to a chance card---a good card that appears out of the blue and gives substance to a trash hand. Bad beat often happens in low limit poker where many players content themselves with playing any two cards all the way from start to finish, even if the cards are weak. But it also happens with strong hands.
The culprit also seems to be uneducated calling. Some players call even if their hands are poor or average. The call gets all the way to a river hoping that the river might produce a desired draw. It sounds silly, but at times such silliness makes it to the pot, and we suffer a bad beat with mouth agape.
But bad beats are normal. We shouldn't feel silly or idiotic about them. It's seldom a result of a bad strategy or judgment. Everybody suffers a bad beat now and then, an aimless drift to the river suddenly leaving us with nothing. It's okay to lose a pot or two from players who seem favored by lucky flops. But luck doesn't happen often. Strong strategy is still favored over mere reliance on luck. Good hands sometimes get beaten by better hands, and better hands by the best hand. But a good hand losing to a weak hand is something else. That's when the emotions can suddenly go berserk. And once this starts, the whole play is affected and losing becomes one tragic down slide.
One way of handling a poker bad beat is to select a strong hand from the start and never go for anything less. The better hands are selected the less chances of a bad beat. Another way of handling a poker bad beat is leave the poker table awhile, take a breather, and then come back when we're okay.
A bad beat is the hardest loss to take. We didn't see it coming, we're anticipating the pot, and then pfft! Everthing's gone, sometimes even our self-respect.
