The Importance of Position - Or Not.

[Jimmy B]

In all honesty though, I think you could write a book on positional play - every decision you make is affected by position in some way or other.
Some of it is pretty basic, eg. ten-handed, ATs UTG cf ATs on the button in an unopened pot. Using your position on the flop, turn and river can be more subtle and I certainly don't always get it right but put it this way, if I have top pair Q kicker on the turn I want to be last to act!
Agree with Bongo and patman too.

I used to play ten-handed limit cash a lot, less now, but loaded my hands into pokertracker a few months back. Almost fell out of my chair when I saw the amount won on the button - accounts for almost half of my total profit!

[Maroon]

Check here http://www.cardplayer.com/poker-tournaments/event.php?id=1270&screen=logs&type=1

Read "Who's the man" thread.

[elblondie]

I think everything has already been said in this thread...but I would suspect even those who don't rate position highly probably use the information provided by better position without even knowing it. It's common sense really. The later you are, the more information you have, the easier it is to make the correct decision.

No Limit Hold'em or Pot Limit Hold'em  does of course throw up the occasional perverse swerve ball when you want to be first to act after the flop..so that you can be first to move all your chips in... but that's a different story

[snoopy1239]

Postition is one of the most important factors in poker comps.

Think about all those times blinds are nicked and the part position plays to the thief.

[RED-DOG]

Everything is relative, the Importance of Position is secondary if your name happens to be Ernest

[Curly69]

My first post!

Don't tell me position isn't the key to the game! No wonder I've been doing so badly all this time!

In all seriousness, I'd say it's probably not as important now as it used to be as people seem less afraid of being aggressive from any position on the table, particularly the scandinavians!  The general approach these days seems to be that a huge raise from any position will take the pot the majority of the time.
That said, it's still an important factor which a lot of online players seem to ignore - far too many limpers from early position who then fold to a raise and waste their chips.

Positional play I'm ok with, but boy do I need some aggression!  Who's gonna give me some tips?

[AdamM]

...but if you're on the button and there's been a huge raise you can pass but if you're in early position and there's a raise after you've already entered the pot you loose chips. It's pretty basic isn't it.
As I said before, people are talking about position mostly in respect of nicking blinds from the button and that's missing 90% of the point about positional advantage. That's just "paying the rent". position is about having informational advantage in the big hands and also the moderate strength stuff your investment hands like K,Q, low pairs, suited connector or suited Aces. you get a good idea of the odds to make a proper decision on whether or not to play these hands.
I'm not a big maths player but I like to know if I'm going to take a flop with a low pair to hit a set or chuck it I want to know I'm getting a good price to do it.
If I'm going to set a trap with AA I want to know if I'm facing 1 or 2 players rather than face a family pot.

We all know this stuff don't we? it's pretty ABC stuff. maybe that's the point. playing out of position is a tougher skill so maybe the guys at the top draw an advantage from doing that well.

[tikay]

I can now reveal that the 2 guys whose conversaton sparked this thread were Mr Dave El Blondie Colclough, & the self confessed World Pot Limit Champion, Mr Brian Wilson, aka WSOP in05, & WSOPin06.

El Blondie contributed to the thread, but Brian did not. Maybe Brian does not understand position.