Every March along comes some young upstarts and young bucks. These are the college kids in town watching and betting basketball. They are sharp and frisky. Some play a mean game and some think they know all about poker but have no clue. But every young buck must first learn from the older generation valued principles. This is where my story begins as well as my poker career. When I was twenty-four years old I met a valued and trusted friend a professional gambler. He was not a master at poker but had studied the game. He advised me that with hard work you can make very good money at the game. So I went back home and studied over six months. Working on the odds reading all the books I could afford I slowly started to put a game plan together. But all plans have to be eventually tested. So one weekend we made plans. My game plan would be tested in La Center Washington that Sunday. This was it I was going to play my first hands. Walking into the small card room at 2:00pm in the afternoon, we asked the house what limits they were running that day. They were running two 5-10 and a Sunday afternoon old lady's game. The Sunday afternoon lady's game was restricted to ladies only and it was .50 cents and 1 dollar. Being apprehensive I put my name on the 5-10 list but walked around the room. Upon viewing the ladies game I noticed that most of them were in their 60's. A very nice lady called out to me"you ever play holdem young man?" "No", I responded. "In fact I have never played a hand at a table in my life." "Ladies this young man has never played a hand of poker can we make some room for him." All the ladies quietly nodded their approval. But then I started to think this was to be a ladies only game why would they want me to sit down. They figured they had a bad player on their hands. These little old ladies new the valued principal. Find bad players and try to beat them. That was the only reason why I was in that game. They knew how to spot an edge. You must spot edges in order to win. Edges come in various forms. They come from unknowledgeable players, players not concentrating, drunks, people that over play hands and a multitude of other edges given away by opponents. Your job is to spot edges or make edges. These ladies spotted and edge and made and edge that was me entering the game.

Every day I watch opponents some to be considered the best in the world. I spot an edge in almost 95 percent of the players. The 5 percent for which I cannot spot an edge are usually the best players in the world and are considered that by their peers. You as a player should be trying to get into that 5 percent.