importance of position?

sup!!!! Can anyone please tell me or point me in the right direction to understtand the importance of position. I realize that the closer to the button you are the more information you can gather from other opponents. thanks

If you act after someone you have the advantage becuase

1) You have more information to make your decision (you've seen him act preflop and on the flop while he's only seen your actions preflop)
2) You can check to close action and take a free card.

I cant think of much else. But in a game of imperfect information, 1 is a huge advantage.

-'rilla

3) When calling raises you have less/no chance of being re-raised.[/quote]

4)opponents have to consider that you are yet to act behind them and thus generally cannot play as aggressively

Position can become very critcal on the turn and the river. Lets say that you and 1 other opponent are in to see the flop. You are holding - A 10 suited diamonds, the flop is 2d 6d 8s. He was in the Small blind so he is first to act on the flop. He makes a bet into you. You re-raise his bet and he calls. Now on the turn he is likely to check to you. Lets say the turn is a 3 of clubs. You can either raise him to try to steal the pot right now if you think he isnt too strong or you now have the chance to take a free card. So you check and the river is a 9 of diamonds. since you checked on the turn he now bets out and you re raise with you nut flush, he goes all in with his set of 2's and you rake in a huge pot.
This is one way you can use position to your advantage

since you checked on the turn he now bets out and you re raise with you nut straight

Nut Flush.

oops. fixed

Ok, here's some random thoughts on position.

In early position (EP) its much tougher (often ill-advised) to play 'drawing hands/speculative hands'. This is especially true in games where there's less dead money involved. At a very loose table, you'll be able to get away with "incorrect" EP starting requirements because all that dead money will effectively under-write your "mistakes". IOWs, you'll win big pots when you hit that will 'pay' for much or all your speculative play. That won't happen at a table where on average even if you do hit, you're not going to get paid off as handsomely. Now, your "mistakes" will materialize as a depleted stack short on chips. They will not be blurred out by others' mistakes.

As you develop as a player you should also start to notice that people build a deeper understanding and more respect for position as they move up in stakes. In general, at higher stakes there's less dead money in the middle of the table from hand to hand. You're forced to deal with the unpleasent realities that being out of position can bring when you find yourself in games where there's lots of aggression and isolation, and/or the players are on average much tighter. Interestingly enough, there's also a crowd of people at these middle stakes that talk like they know that position is important ("I had position, so I called", or "I never raise pre-flop from my big blind, what's the point, I'm out of position"), but their play and comments are a direct indication that they don't truly "get it" and definitely don't know how to use it to their advantage. These are the players that you want to seek out as opponents (see Fnord's post on exploitation quoted below); it's almost like they know just enough to be dangerous to themselves and to be profitable for you.

Again, wrt to marginal/drawing/speculative hands from EP, before the flop you have no idea what kind of pot odds you are going to be offered because you have no idea what the action will be behind you. Playing 22 (even from EP) with 7 people seeing the flop for one sb is EV+'ve. But, how do you know you'll have 6 callers? YOU DON"T!!! You rely on things you have no control over going your way. Playing 22 heads-up out of position against a PFR with tight raising requirements is EV-'ve. You typically have to hit a set to win, but you don't have the requisite pre-flop pot odds to try and flop one (I'm referring to limit here mostly ... in some, I stress some NL situations you don't need those pre-flop odds as much, because if you find yourself up against the right opponent with a set of 2s you might be able to take them for their whole stack (Implied odds baby!).

The importance of position tends to also be exaggerated in short handed situations compared to multi-way pots. Finding yourself heads-up/isolated, out of position against a pre-flop raiser with a hand like KTo is one of the worst situations you can find yourself in playing hold'em. If you hit the flop and get raised you may be forced to call them down with your dominated hand , or you'll fold incorrectly (i.e. the best hand) to the aggressor with position over you (remember it's HU). If you miss the flop and check, your opponent is going to bet with ANY holding and you are going to have to fold.

In general, you tend to loose the most and win the least when you are out of position.

All these points refer to position as it relates to your absolute position at the table wrt the button. But as you play a more advanced game, you also have to eventually learn to understand and appreciate what relative position at the table means to your game. (See Fnord's sticky in the Limit section:

http://www.flopturnriver.com/phpBB2/...ic.php?t=19103

; he's given some amazing insights into positional play (both absolute and relative) and he talks about how, if you manage to appreciate and integrate these positional ideas into your game, you'll be able to better exploit your opponents.

Good post RiverMonkey.

Just to add my thoughts, poker to me is primarily a game of information. The player with the skills to gather the most information, evaluate it correctly, and make the correct decisions based on that information will be a true poker master. This information generally falls into 3 categories:
1. Statistical knowledge of the game.
2. Knowledge of your opponents' playing styles/Knowledge of the table's playing style.
3. Knowledge of the action that has happened before you in the betting round and the hand at large.

#1 can be learned expertly by almost anyone who takes the time and effort.
#2 is more difficult on the single player level but relatively easy at the table level ... it can give you huge edges if you own a player, but owning a player takes very keen observational skills (and a vast amount of hands against them to draw conclusions from)
#3 takes learning what certain actions mean in general, but other than that is wholly dependent on position and relative position.

You must have a basic statistical understanding to do well in poker. You must also know how to change your play for the table you are at to do well in poker. Reading individual players can give you a big boost in your profit margin, but is not critical to be a very good poker player, especially online. The last thing, learning how to take the information of position and use it correctly, I think is just as vital as a basic understanding of the math and the table dynamic. The information you gain from position is huge. For example, ATo is a marginal hand to even call with UTG. But from the CO or Button, with noone entering the pot, is a clear raise in any form of Hold'em. Why is this? Because when you are UTG, you don't know if anyone else out there has AJ or better or pocket Ts or better and has you dominated (and there is a pretty good chance of this). Once you are CO, and only 3 more to act, the chances you have the best hand preflop are much higher because you have the information that 6 people have already folded.

If you have a problem understanding why position is so important, I would say to take some time each hand and ask yourself what your opponents' actions have told you. You must learn to make better decisions from this information. And the reason position will help you, especially preflop, is that you know the action of so many opponents before you have to make your decision.