Holdem Secrets
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Click this link to download and install Full Tilt Poker. Receive the maximum deposit bonus of 100% up to $600. Bonus Code: 2XBONUS600 Click this link to download and install PokerStars. Receive the maximum deposit bonus of 100% up to $600. Marketing Code: PSP6964 Click this link to download and install PartyPoker Receive the maximum deposit bonus of 100% up to $500. Bonus Code: 2XMATCH500 Online Poker at Full Tilt Poker - Tips From The Pros http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/proLessons.php?lesson=1&email=LSN22 Lesson: 1 Sit N Goes Made Easy Howard Lederer March 14, 2005 The Sit N Go (SNG) is online poker's great gift to the aspiring tournament OTHER TIPS: player. Prior to the SNG, final table experience was hard to come by. You could enter a dozen multi-table tournaments and never find yourself at a final No-limit by the Numbers table. Or you could make one or two, only to get knocked out in 8th or 9th Andy Bloch Howard Lederer place. Adapting to an ever-diminishing number of players at a single table is a August 15, 2005 crucial skill in tournament poker, and it's a hard experience to find offline Phil Ivey without investing a lot of time and money. Online, this experience is a Chip Sandwich Phil Gordon Chris Ferguson mouse-click away. The SNG's advantages are many. For starters, it's low-cost, or even free. It's also fun, and convenient: You don't need to schedule it -- a August 8, 2005 John Juanda SNG starts every time the table fills up -- and it's usually over in less than an hour. It is the flight simulator of Final Table play, and mastering it should be Sizing Up Your Opening Jennifer Harman considered mandatory homework for the serious student. Bet Chris Ferguson Phil Gordon Now that you know why you should play, let's look at how: August 1, 2005 Erick Lindgren The most obvious difference between a SNG and a multi-table tournament is So You Wanna Go Pro Erik Seidel that when someone goes broke in a SNG, there isn't someone waiting to fill Rafe Furst Clonie Gowen their spot. Multi-table play consists mostly of full-table, ring game poker. But July 25, 2005 as players get eliminated from a SNG, the table gets shorter- and Andy Bloch shorter-handed. This reduction in players basically serves to artificially raise Dealer, Leave the Bets the antes. For instance, say you are playing five-handed and the blinds are in Front of the Players. Mike Matusow 100-200: You are paying 300 in blinds for every five hands, or 60 per hand. Greg Mascio Kristy Gazes As soon as someone gets knocked out, you're four-handed. Now you're paying July 18, 2005 75 per hand -- a 25% increase -- despite the fact that the blinds have Commercials remained the same. Accordingly, you're forced to gamble more, or risk getting Not Playing By The Book blinded out. Phil Gordon Tips From The Pros July 11, 2005 Since the size of the blinds relative to your stack size should always play a major role in you hand selection, I recommend starting out with pretty Playing Two or More conservative starting hand requirements. This serves two functions: First, the Tables at Once blinds dictate that you play fairly tight early; the blinds are small and you are Erick Lindgren nine-handed, so they don't come around as often. Second, this helps you July 4, 2005 establish a tight image, which you hope will pay off later when the blinds are high and you might really need a timely ante steal. How To Win At Tournament Poker, Part But there is another not-so-obvious reason to play tighter earlier and looser 2 later: The payout structure rewards tight play. Most SNG's pay 50% to first, Chris Ferguson 30% to second, and 20% to third. This payout structure dictates that you play June 27, 2005 for third. Why? Looking at the payout structure another way might help. Basically, the payout means that 60% gets awarded once you are down to How To Win At three players, 20% gets awarded when you get down to two players, and the Tournament Poker, Part final 20% gets awarded to the winner. If you can just get to third, you get at 1 least one-third of 60% of the prize pool, or 20%. You've locked up a profit, Chris Ferguson and you have a chance to win up to 30% more. It's only now that you're in June 20, 2005 the top three that your strategy should take an abrupt turn. Now it pays to gamble for the win. Let's look at the numbers again: 60% of the prize pool is Specialize At Your Peril off the table, and moving up one spot is worth only another 10%. But move Howard Lederer up just one more spot and it's worth a whopping 30% extra -- that's three June 13, 2005 times more for first than it is for second. And with the blinds going up, gambling for the win is even more clearly the correct play. Common Mistakes Phil Gordon I see many players employ a nearly opposite strategy. They figure they have June 6, 2005 nothing to lose, so they go for the quick double-up early. They take chances too soon when, in their view, there's "nothing on the line". Then, once they're Don't Play a Big Pot in the money, they tighten up, thinking about that extra payout for moving up Unless You Have a Big a spot. If you start to rethink your SNG approach and adopt a "slow early, fast Hand late" strategy, you will see an almost immediate improvement in your results. John Juanda May 30, 2005 Best of luck and see you at the tables, Ask And Ye Shall Receive Part II Erick Lindgren 1 of 2 8/16/2005 1:21 AM Online Poker at Full Tilt Poker - Tips From The Pros http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/proLessons.php?lesson=2&email=LSN22 Lesson: 2 A Way To Approximate The Odds Clonie Gowen March 21, 2005 It is very difficult to calculate the exact odds of hitting a drawing hand when OTHER TIPS: you're sitting at the poker table. Unless you're a genius with a gift for mathematics like Chris Ferguson, you will not be able to do it. That leaves two No-limit by the Numbers options for the rest of us: The first option is to sit at home with a calculator, Andy Bloch Howard Lederer figure out the odds for every possible combination of draws, and then August 15, 2005 memorize them. That way, no matter what situation comes up, you always Phil Ivey know the odds. But for those of us without a perfect memory, there's an Chip Sandwich Phil Gordon Chris Ferguson easier way. Here is a simple trick for estimating those odds. August 8, 2005 John Juanda The first thing you need to do is to figure out how many "outs" you have. An "out" is any card that gives you a made hand. To do this, simply count the Sizing Up Your Opening Jennifer Harman number of cards available that give the hand you are drawing to. For Bet Chris Ferguson Phil Gordon example: suppose you hold Ac 8c and the flop comes Qh 9c 4c. You have a flush draw. There are thirteen clubs in the deck and you are looking at four of August 1, 2005 Erick Lindgren them -- the two in your hand, and the two on the board. That leaves nine clubs left in the deck, and two chances to hit one. So You Wanna Go Pro Erik Seidel Rafe Furst Clonie Gowen The trick to figuring out the approximate percentage chance of hitting the July 25, 2005 flush is to multiply your outs times the number of chances to hit it. In this Andy Bloch case that would be nine outs multiplied by two chances, or eighteen. Then Dealer, Leave the Bets take that number, multiply times two, and add a percentage sign. The in Front of the Players. Mike Matusow approximate percentage of the time you will make the flush is 36%. (The Greg Mascio Kristy Gazes exact percentage is 34.97%.) Now let's say that on that same flop you hold July 18, 2005 the Jd Th. In this case you would have an open ended straight draw with eight Commercials outs to hit the straight (four kings and four eights). Eight outs with two cards Not Playing By The Book to come gives you sixteen outs. Multiply times two and you will hit the straight Phil Gordon Tips From The Pros approximately 32% (31.46% exactly) of the time. July 11, 2005 One important thing to keep in mind is that the percentage stated is merely Playing Two or More the percentage of the time that you will hit the hand you are drawing to, NOT Tables at Once the percentage of time that you will win the pot. You may hit your hand and Erick Lindgren still lose. In the first example, the Qc will pair the board and may give July 4, 2005 somearticle a full house. In the second example both the Kc and the 8c will put a possible flush on the board, giving you the straight, but not necessarily How To Win At the winning hand. Still, knowing the approximate likelihood of making your Tournament Poker, Part hand is a good beginning step on the road to better poker.