When Bluffers Strike Back
Being a poker author and teacher has been truly amazing. With every new observation I’ve made, I understand that its conveyance to the masses can cause ears to perk up and games to change. Now that Read ‘Em and Reap has been out for two years, an interesting phenomenon has been taking place. Although I’ll be honest and say I suspected this would happen, I just did not have a way to validate it until now.
When my book was fi rst released to Amazon.com, one of the very fi rst readers of the book left a comment that the book would make it more diffi cult for players because bluffers would have an advantage. Here I was, trying to improve the games of players around the world by sharing with them knowledge only a few had partially documented. I wanted those who could catch the tells to save their money and take advantage. Instead, it seems that I was helping both teams without realizing it.
It was an extremely prescient observation from my commenter and something I didn’t predict would be discovered that quickly. What he meant was that those who really take my teachings to heart, from either my book or seminars, will become better players who will not only be able to read tells more accurately, but will also be able to bluff more believably. It’s true. Guilty as charged.
So what happens when a player knows how the human body reacts to situations and can transmit that information to others? I suspected and hypothesized that players who became adept at reading nonverbals (tells) would be able to reverse engineer that information and use it to bluff effectively. I knew this because of my work in the FBI, knowing that the key to undercover work is to know the nonverbals of criminals. If you can act it convincingly they will believe it and that’s what undercover agents do.
Think about this for a second in terms of a criminal interrogation. It’s the same as poker. If I know their nonverbals and they know their nonverbals just as well, wouldn’t they do everything possible to throw me off in the opposite direction? They’d throw nonverbals my way that portrayed innocence rather than guilt and confi dence rather than weakness. Thankfully I didn’t run into a ton of suspects who did extensive research on this type of information, but it really evens out the ballgame in an unexpected direction.
Moving back to poker, the question then becomes how do we know if someone is bluffi ng if they are really good at their own nonverbals? They know what they are doing to a greater extent than what you think they are doing. Oh, that steeple, sure, that was intentional. Or how about a lip purse, that might work here. Pretty sick, huh?
This goes beyond false tells; it’s the mastery of an unexpected skill that can persuade another, unexpectedly of course, to go into the complete opposite direction. A direction that gives the advantage to the one who is being “interrogated.”
How can we stay a step ahead? Let’s start with the simple route to decipher our opponents – information. We could ask them what books they would recommend for reading tells. I think this question works better than if you ask them, “Hey have you read Navarro’s book?” That’s too obvious, but I fi nd that poker players never hesitate to give an opinion about the books they have read or favor.
Even better, that type of question makes you look like you don’t know that much and it gives you insight into what your opponent knows. General George Patton read the books that Erwin Rommel had written and in doing so knew the tactics that the “Desert Fox” would use. Patton could foresee Rommel’s strategies and counter them. You can utilize the same offensive if you know what your opponent at the table knows.
As you know, the tells that I talk about and the ones that other experts talk about, especially Mike Caro, are different. Knowing what literature your opponent favors may tell you much. This is no different than getting into the head of a suspect by investigating his past. Background information will always help.
However, let’s assume you don’t know what your opponents know, what should you do then? One way to determine this is to go with something that Annie Duke once told me – see if they are “overacting.” They are trying too hard to send you in the wrong direction and you need to see right through it. Most people who bluff tend to overact their position; they show weakness when strong, but they do so excessively. As we used to say in the FBI with liars, they are “trying to convince rather than convey.” When they go “Hollywood,” as Annie Duke likes to call it, your opponents are trying to convince you. Honest behaviors tend to convey – in other words, they aren’t over the top.
Another way to decipher this conundrum is to look at the behaviors you see and identify when they occur. Honest behaviors tend to take place immediately after a stimulus or event. When a player looks at his cards, his most immediate reaction will be the most accurate. The longer the delay between the event and the behavior you observe, the less accurate it becomes. It takes time for a nonverbal master to decide which nonverbal he’s going to utilize during each and every hand. He can’t just go into a hand with an idea of what to do. He needs to look at his cards then ask himself which nonverbal would work best in the situation.
During my video sessions (read: watching poker on TV) I’ve noticed repeatedly that post-fl op, players will steeple very quickly (confi dence, very strong) and then recover with some sort of show of concern with the face (facial massaging or show of consternation – you know, the face of “oh man, that was a terrible fl op for me”). That quick steeple is more accurate and should take precedence. Remember, the more time a player has to consider, the more acting that takes place. This sort of misinformation can also go the other way – they look at their hole cards and squint (weak) and then pretend they have a monster hand by verbally blustering. Trust the fi rst response.
If we see a more prolonged secondary reaction, why should we trust the fi rst reactions? Most people respond to the world around them in 1/25th of a second. We do this to survive and socially communicate every day from the time we are born and we have diffi culty overriding that which serves us every day. At a poker table or not, we are biologically forced to react the same way. Bluffers usually delay their behavior or perform an over-riding behavior to compensate for what they fi rst saw and felt.
The bottom line is this: know your opponent and what they know (books they have read). Look for the most immediate behaviors that convey information and don’t get caught up with planned or delayed reactions. With this in mind, you’re ready to hit the tables and have the advantage once again. Good luck.
