Your Worst Poker Enemy |  | Author: Alan N. Schoonmaker
Publisher: Lyle Stuart
Category: Book
List Price: $15.95
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Seller: have.a.great.read
Rating:  12 reviews
Sales Rank: 93,135
Media: Paperback
Pages: 256
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.2 x 5.5 x 1.2
ISBN: 0818407204
Dewey Decimal Number: 795.412019
EAN: 9780818407208
ASIN: 0818407204
Publication Date: May 1, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
"AT THE TABLE, YOU'RE YOUR OWN WORST ENEMY." --Stu Ungar, the world's greatest poker player Do you play hands you should fold? Do you sometimes go too far with hands, hoping to get lucky while knowing that the pot odds don't justify calling? Ever kept playing even when you knew you were off your game because you were losing and wanted to get even? Have you let anger or destructive urges affect the way you play even though you know better? Don't despair! Now, in Your Worst Poker Enemy, psychologist Dr. Alan Schoonmaker shows you how to reap the full benefits of the poker knowledge you already have by helping you to identify and stop psychologically based mistakes. This must-have book also features detailed sections that examine crucial points far beyond the scope of most other poker strategy guides, including: Using Intuition vs. Logic
Evaluating Yourself and the Opposition
Understanding Unconscious and Emotional Factors
Adjusting to Changes
Handling stress Dr. Schoonmaker will help you to recognize and defeat the often crippling psychological factors that distort your perceptions about yourself, other players, and the game itself and send you on your way to becoming the best poker player you can be!
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 12
 Know Thyself June 12, 2007
Herman Jackson
34 out of 36 found this review helpful
I received this book today in an order along with two others. After a cursory review I put the others aside and spent several hours reading "Your Worst Poker Enemy." I knew from the title that the book would in some sense be my biography - everyone's biography.
Shoonmaker, in the style I expected based on his other books, outlines why you are your own worst poker enemy and provides careful psychological analysis that will help you to make that enemy your friend.
The book is organized in five sections:
- Logic versus Intuition
- Evaluating Ourselves and the Opposition
- Understanding Unconscious and Emotional Forces
- Darwin: Adjusting to Changes
- Handling Stress
- Finally, essentially an appendix, a detailed review of suggested reading for players at various levels
The section that may be least anticipated by most readers - it was by me - is the one titled "Darwin: Adjusting to Changes." Here Schoonmaker discusses in some detail the changes that have occurred in poker due to the explosion fueled by lipstick cameras and the Internet. Poker players must adapt to these changes and to others on the way. Some of these changes are obvious to the most unobservant, but some fall in the category of "Unintended Consequences." One of the unintended consequences discussed is that Seven-Card-Stud has actually gotten harder because less-knowledgeable, less-experienced players have abandoned it for the (apparently to the uninitiated) easier game of Hold'em. If you are a Stud player it is of more than passing interest to know that the fish may have abandoned your game!
Schoonmaker will give you the pointers needed to "get your mind right" in order to play at your optimum. Poker is very much a "mind game" and the primary focus of this book is the player's mind, and in particular those "mind factors" that contribute so significantly to losing. He discusses various causes of losing play and what you can do to correct losing habits. This is the heart of the book, and it is done superbly.
In a quick read there is only one point with which I disagree. Schoonmaker makes a hard and fast distinction between logical players (Chris Ferguson, Mason Malmuth, David Sklansky, etc.) and intuitive players (Doyle Brunson, Layne Flack, Stu Unger). Though I agree with him in that these terms describe HOW these players play the game, I think a deeper analysis of the formative experiences of the intuitive players reveals WHY they play that way. Brunson spent his formative years (as regards poker) traveling with Amarillo Slim and Sailor Roberts from game to game in the Texas poker circuit. On the road and at other times away from the table this trio invested countless hours discussing the game, analyzing player betting patterns, strategy for playing specific hands, etc. Unger's father was a bookmaker and the son was apparently obsessed at a very early age with the numbers (see his biography "One of a Kind: The Rise and Fall of Stuey ',The Kid', Ungar, The World's Greatest Poker Player"). His memory was legendary, so much so that application of that skill to Gin got him barred from playing Gin at the Vegas Casinos. My point is that these intuitive players developed their intuition through observation, deep interest, and deep analysis. The intuition came after years of preparation.
Enough of my quibbling. This book is an outstanding piece of work and deserves a place on every poker player's bookshelf - and a periodic re-reading.
Surprisingly good... September 19, 2007
C. Grant (Houston, TX USA)
6 out of 8 found this review helpful
I have to admit that I've been on a poker book buying binge as of late and wasn't really expecting much from this book.
I read it from cover-to-cover in one sitting and it's a solid book on controlling yourself at the table.
Seriously a good read.
"Dr Poker" strikes again with massively helpful insight November 5, 2009
Sanjay Mehta (Henderson, NV United States)
I've decided to give Dr. Alan Schoonmaker the nickname Dr. Poker, since this book - combined with all his previous books - form an amazing body of work that is indispensable for the health of all poker players. If there's a leak in your game, your poker personality, your internal attitude towards poker or your approach to the game, Dr Poker is the man to help you fix it. And because his books are not about strategy but personal insight, they are rather timeless, and players at just about any level of play - from beginner to expert - will likely find a lot of information to improve their performance at the poker table.
Since different problems pop up in a player's psyche at different stages in their game play, this book (like his others) is an invaluable reference tool that requires constant re-reading to maximize its value. A first reading may isolate and fix a few problems with your poker attitude. Later readings may identify other problems that didn't exist the first time, but have developed since then. Like physical health, poker health is constantly changing and evolving and this book is the perfect tool as a constant reference guide to refer back to repeatedly.
This book has played a very major role in improving my poker health and I expect it to continue doing so for as long as I play poker.
Great Book June 2, 2009
Angela Burns
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Ordered this one afternoon and got it the next morning! Wonderful!
My husband loved the book....
For Every Poker Player May 17, 2007
Matthew Lessinger (Alamo, CA)
5 out of 10 found this review helpful
It really doesn't matter how well you play poker if you don't have control of your own feelings and emotions, and that's why Dr. Schoonmaker's teachings are so valuable. He does not claim to be a poker expert, but he is an expert of psychology, and every poker player will benefit from his knowledge in this book.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 12
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