Posted by Dr Fro 8:20 AM
From the same Poker Room site linked below, I found this gem from Bob Ciaffone:

An examination of poker literature will show considerable disagreement on
the subject of where to sit at a poker table. We are, of course, not talking
about avoiding tobacco smoke, excessive body odor, or a player who overflows his
allotted seating space. We are discussing purely poker considerations.

Why the disagreement? Let me outline the problem. Two principles that all
poker authorities agree on are it is desirable to act after your opponent and
you want to act last or as late as possible in multihanded pots. Quite often
there is a player in the game that is a bulldozer, someone that plays a lot of
hands and does a lot of betting. You cannot have everything. If this individual
is on your left, you play a lot of hands with him having position on you. if
this individual is on your right, the betting comes through you and the field
acts after you do. So there is no one seat that is desirable in all situations.

Which is more important, to have position on the bulldozer or have position
on the field? To me, this is not a close decision. I want to be placed well in
multihanded pots, so I would rather have the bulldozer on my left. I believe
anyone who tells you to plop down on the immediate left of a heavy bettor is
giving you bad advice. Here are some reasons why.

First, when there is a player in the game who does a lot of betting and
raising, the game usually gets fired up, and most of the pots are multihanded.
You will not be dueling heads-up against the bulldozer very often. Note that in
the old days, a lot of your heads-up situations in hold'em came from being in
the blind along with your opponent, but most of today's players chop in this
situation.

Second, having position on a guy who almost always bets is not worth as
much as some people think. In a sense, you can act after him by checking and
having him bet, if you wish. Position is of greater value when it is on someone
who is less predictable.

Third, your toughest poker decisions often come as a result of a bet
through you by someone who you may well have beat, but some unknown hands behind
you. When you have a mediocre holding such as second pair and a good kicker or
top pair and a weak kicker, you are a likely favorite against someone who bets
every time it is his turn to act, but not against too large a field. If you
raise and try to get the bulldozer all to yourself, you may run into a good hand
and find out about it only after a sizable investment of funds. Just calling may
let people in on a draw that you could have knocked out with a raise.

My advice is to consider the seat on the immediate left of a bulldozer the
"death seat," the one place you should avoid in a hold'em game. Let the
bulldozer have position on you, but get good position on all those multihanded
pots where he pumps. He who acts last has the blade.

Choosing your seat is a topic that does not get a lot of discussion. It is something that I have thought about a quite a bit and I am always very intentional in my seat selection. I think Bob makes a good point in attacking the conventional wisdom that the best seat is one to the left of the maniac. (As a matter of fact, he takes this wisdom to be so conventional, he actually never bothers to point it out.) For the most part, I agree. The way I would make his argument along the same field v maniac line he drew is this:

- You already have an advantage over the maniac. You are a better player than he is.
- You need every advantage you can get over the field, so take it by positioning yourself to have an advantage over them.

However, I am not sure that his advice is golden. I think there are some situations where it still makes sense to sit to the left of the maniac. For instance, if the maniac is Ted and he is not only aggressive, but also completely unpredictable and random. I am talking about the sort of maniac that will single handedly determine whether each and every person at the table will be a winner or a loser. In this case, since it is only the maniac about which you are concerned, you should sit to his left.

For the more normal maniac, I would take Bob's advice.

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