Quote:
Originally Posted by Smallballs
I understand what you're saying and kind of agree in part. However, I think part of his success has to be attributed to him being very hard to play against because he doesn't play ABC poker which confuses his opponents (HU against Ivey I think he got Ivey to make a couple of rare mistakes because he couldn't work out what line AF was taking - it could be argued that AF doesn't even know what line he's taking sometimes and maybe he doesn't).
I think his image probably helps him get paid off in spots early and that has helped get him deep in tourneys where he's no doubt run good also. Whether it's by design or just luck is arguable, but I think he's definitley smart enough to understand his image and how to use that to his advantage despite making some "technical" mistakes that we don't usually see from the pros.
Well the thing is, the reason bad players often confuse good ones with lines or plays that 'don't make sense' is because their lines are so bad it forces the good player to re-evaluate their perception of the other guy's play, and you often don't get the chance to see the period of adaptation that comes afterward.
There are often spots vs bad players where you have fold equity even though you'd never have it vs good players, but you don't find out until you've gone through such a spot, and you don't get the chance to use that info until it comes around again. You might be able to 3bet a guy super light because he folds to almost all 3bets, but until you get a hand good enough to 3bet someone for whom you didn't have that information (probably more than once in order that you see him fold more than once), you don't find out that he's folding too much so you can't adapt.
Essentially what I'm saying is that tournament poker is all about inferences based on tiny sample sizes, which is where variance is heightened. So far, Frankenberger has played a small sample of hands in spots where a high % of his tournament equity is on the line, and over those particular hands he has run extremely good, and he's happened to make 'unconventional' plays in spots where it hasn't affected his equity much. However, what you don't see in live poker is how much value he might lose in the long term by playing big hands 'unconventionally', or how exploitable he might become. People are super results-oriented and to say X, Y or Z play is good or bad just because it worked or didn't work is false logic - there's no such thing as 'can't argue with results' in poker. You can argue with them, and you can also argue that some random midstakes grinder is the best player in the world. LOL variance.