The biggest issue here is paying attention. Is someone overbetting? You only know if you’ve been watching their showdowns or folds when raised or re-raised.

You can’t play poker effectively while you’re talking to your girlfriend or boyfriend. You might get away with that for awhile if you’re a really tight player in a big tournament.

Otherwise, you need to pay attention.

If you find that a player is making big raises with crap like 10 J off, then you establish that person as a target for yourself.

Maybe they exhibit the same behavior with AA at some point, and you get burned. It happens. In my experience, some players get into a bully habit if they think you are a tight player. It depends on the blinds, their chips, and your chips… but you often have an advantage against those types of players when calling their BS with a mid pocket pair or what you believe to be strong overcards.

The point here, is that you have to watch their behavior to know what’s going on. Players who do that usually do it in somewhat late position. If they’re doing it in early position, they might be gone before you get a chance to exploit it. You have to watch to know.

Posted by as Learn Poker, Texas Hold Em at 2:38 AM GMT

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Here’s the situation. I’m in a multi-table poker tournament. The stakes were $150 + a $12 entry fee. So, I have $162 wrapped up in this game.

A friend calls right as the game starts. In large poker tournaments, I usually play only premium hands. So, I figured I could talk a little bit while I fold 20 times in a row, then pay better attention later. That was the first mistake. You should be watching everything carefully, including who lost what hand with what hand after a showdown. You should be watching how people behave in general. You can’t do these things effectively while you are distracted.

Here are the details.

I’m in the small blind. Blinds are 10-20 because we are in the very early stages of this game. For the same reason, chip distribution among the 10 players at the table was fairly even.

Dealt to me
Q A

The player in first position calls 20. Everyone else folds until it gets to me. I don’t consider
Q A to be a premium hand, but I called 10 to get in, expecting the big blind to check, 3 players in the hand, and one who is only there because because their chips were already paid.

Instead, the big blind raises 205. I was leary of the player who called in first position to start with. My hand needed to improve on the flop for me to have any interest at all. Here are the mistakes…

First mistake, if I’m going to play crap like
Q A in the early stages of a tournament and in late position, I should have raised it a little in an attempt to get the big blind to stay out of the hand.

After the big blind raised 205, the player in first position folded.

Second mistake, I’m still on the phone with my friend. He’s also a poker player. At this point, I’m both distracted, and getting cocky because we are talking about poker. I put the big blind (that raised 205) all in. I should have folded since I was risking my entire tournament on one hand that I didn’t particularly care for to start with. The big blind calls my all in. I would have preferred he folded, but I made the move, and he called.

Here’s the result on the board…

The big blind was holding
4 A

He paired his fours, and I was eliminated. I think he made two mistakes, but it really doesn’t matter when he has all of my chips, and I’m gone from the poker tournament. He misplayed, but my mistakes were mine, and I still had an opportunity to only lose 10 chips in the hand after his 205 raise. I should have taken that opportunity, because there’s really no reason to risk the whole tourney over
Q A .

So, first… don’t get distracted. Second… don’t get cocky. The two of those removed $162 from my pocket in about 15 seconds, and my mistakes were completely avoidable.

Posted by as Learn Poker, Texas Hold Em, How to Play Poker at 4:20 PM GMT

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First of all, you must have an understanding of pot odds before you even care about implied odds.

Here’s a quick example of implied odds.

You’re dealt
6 6 .

No Limit Game. You’re in a late position. There are two raises ahead of you. Let’s say it’s the first hand. Two people raise for 125 chips. Since you’re in a late position, you run little risk of that getting pumped higher. Do you call? Maybe.

You’re likely beat by one of those raisers, already.

If you run little risk of the pot being inflated, here’s why you call. Your chances of flopping the set are roughly 1 in 8.

Your dream flop is
a 6 4 . Why? You just flopped your set. One of the raisers also probably hit their ace. So, you have an opportunity to take their entire stack, or possibly 2 entire stacks.

That is one thing people talk about when they talk about implied odds. If you hit, you have a much bigger payoff, bigger than the 8-1. If you don’t flop your set, and have nothing else, exit at your first opportunity. This is also something you shouldn’t do when you feel the pot might get inflated. You don’t want to be in a 3 way all in race with a 66, and you don’t want to lose your 125 without seeing a flop. So, thinking about implied odds in an early position is riskier.

Posted by as Learn Poker, Texas Hold Em, How to Play Poker at 10:18 PM BST

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I advocate playing limit poker for sophisticated players who pay attention. Those are ring games I talk about, mostly because you have time to watch and evaluate. I like 6 player more than 10 player. With 10 player, you still have to play really tight.

With a big holdem tourney, you need luck. I call a big tournament 400+ people. You also need patience. You also need to understand that most players playing large limit tournaments are also fish.

So, when you have the hand, you push it. Here’s an example.

Table #69

Dealt to me:
10 10

Flop:
10 4 8

So, I just flopped my set. Also, highest posible set, given the board. No flushes, no straights. What do I do with 900 players left?

Bet, bet, bet. Big tourney… high card 10 as far as anyone knows, so the fish are biting. The board paired eights on the turn.

At the end, it was a huge pot because someone caught a full house, fours full of eights. It made for a nice pot, and the fish kept biting.

In a small tournament, I might have slowplayed that. In a big tournament, you have to bet, bet, bet when you know you have the nuts.

Nope, I didn’t even place in the money in the tournament. But that one hand put me in a position where I had a chance. It’s a big field, so you have to pick your spots.

Posted by as Learn Poker, Texas Hold Em at 9:52 PM BST

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As I said in an earlier post… with NL holdem, it often turns out that you made a big mistake, or watched someone else make a big mistake.

You can keep all of the notes you like, but the dummies run out of money, and the smart guys will clock you if you’ve only met them once and caught them making a dumb move.

With limit holdem, you usually play with the same people for an hour or so, sometimes more. You get a better read on them. Are they savvy and got a bad beat? Are they dumb and deserved it? Either way,they probably both have some money left.

The savvy ones… do you know what they play? You can exploit that. The dumb ones… do you know what they play? You can exploit that.

Did you just see someone get a really bad beat? Do you assume that they are a little tilted? If you have a good hand, you exploit that too.

If you’re a watcher, then limit poker is your game. If you’re a bulldog, then you’ll find that NL poker is your game, or you’ll go broke fast. Either way, you have to know the odds, and you have to know the pot odds. We’ll cover those later. The point here is to play to your strength personality-wise.

Posted by as Learn Poker, Texas Hold Em at 7:26 AM BST

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I’m playing a $50 SNG, with 10 players. 3 hands into the game, I took two people out. Suddenly, I have 3000+ chips and everyone else has 1000 or less.

We all know that big stacks bully little stacks. When I’m the little stack, I see that as a nice opportunity.

When I’m the big stack… and in this case… it’s a big stack. You should tighten up and protect it. Don’t bully.

Someone is waiting on you to try to bully them, and you’ll find your big stack becomes average stack.

Likewise, it’s ok to take a few chances when the blinds are small and you can sneak in. That might leave you with a little luck and a bigger stack. Once your stack is small, you need to tighten up and pick your spots.

When you’ve earned (or become lucky) and have a big stack… don’t get reckless.

I won the SNG. Carefully watch what others think are good hands… but that’s a different post.

Of course… the strategy changes when you’re playing $200 SNGs or $20 SNGs.

One of the biggest problems with no limit games is this: By the time you know someone is dumb, they’re gone. By the time someone totally outplays you, you’re gone. That’s why you both protect, and take very calculated risks when playing NL poker, at any level.

Posted by as Learn Poker, Texas Hold Em, How to Play Poker at 7:01 AM BST

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I was in 3rd place in a 27 player NL Hold’em SNG on PokerStars today.

Here is how the hand played out.

I was dealt
Q Q in the big blind.

I had been playing these aggressively in the past. This was actually my 4th wire pair of Hilton Sisters in this SNG. So this time I decided to slow play since there were already several callers.

Bad move on my part. Pairs are better against only one or two opponents. If you have several callers you want to be playing higher hand like a flush or straight draw.

The flop was:
J T 9

Nice. I’ve got the high pair and a straight draw. Time to make a move. One player checks. I raise T1000. Two players fold and my opponent raises all in.

I’ve got him covered by about T1000 so I call. I figure I’ve got a pretty good hand and even if he had been slow playing aces I have the straight draw. I doubted he was slow playing but it was still a risk I’d take. If I beat this guy I’d go into the tournament lead.

He turns over:
K J

Awesome for me! I’m 81.31% favored to win the hand!

The turn is
4 The river is
J

What a load of crap! He just made a set of Jacks. At that point he was 9/1 odds to loose. I was 90.91% favored to win!

Argh!

Oh well. Thats poker.

My fault for not betting and trying to slow play against 3 opponents. If I had only one it might have been a good move, but against 3 it was pretty dumb!

- Fittsy

Posted by as Learn Poker, Texas Hold Em, How to Play Poker at 5:44 PM BST

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I mentioned this a few days ago in a post.

Mike Caro wrote an excellent article on how players are learning to play Hold’em by watching TV.

Tonight I had a perfect example.

I didn’t get the hand history but here is a rough breakdown.

Early in a SNG I am dealt pocket aces. I raise 5x the bet. I get two callers.

The flop comes something like 9 3 3.

I make a bet of 1/3rd my stack, about 15x the minimum.

Again I’m probably playing my cards too much, not thinking about my opponents. So when I am raised, I reraise and go all in.

My opponent turns over a K3 off suit.

So this idiot called my raise for 10x the bet with K3 off suit!

The he happens to flop a set.

I end up getting a boat. 3’s over aces. The third better gets a boat 3’s over 9s. The asshole who called with K3 offsuit, got 4 of a kind and almost tripled his stack.

The really telling part was the comments after the hand. I pointed out how I thought it was pretty loose to call my raise with only a K3 off suit. He went on to say “Its only $5.” Hello?!? What does that have do with your crappy play? Do you go into every low limit game and play loose just because it is low limit? Do you miraculously play good poker once you get to higher limit tables?

Somehow I doubt it. This is one of those TV Poker players that thinks playing wild and loose is a good way to play. Unfortunately calling 10x the bet with K3 off suit isn’t going to win very often. He’ll definitely end up loosing more hands in the long run. He got lucky this time, but playing like that regularly is a surefire way to loose your bankroll!

- Fittsy

Posted by as Learn Poker, Texas Hold Em, How to Play Poker at 11:45 PM BST

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