Whether you play poker tournaments or cash game poker then it makes no difference, equity is still one of the first things that you think about when you play poker of any description. Let us look at an example to see what I mean here when I talk about equity in a hand. Let us say that it has been folded around to the cut-off and they raised to $12 in a NL400 cash game. You are on the button and you want to three bet this player. Which hand would you rather have to three bet them with…..Jc-10c or 8d-4s? The answer should be fairly obvious and it should be the J-10s.

You simply do not know how your opponent is going to react to your three bet. If you could look into a crystal ball and see that this player would fold to your re-raise then you would be fine to re-raise with either hand. But the fact of the matter is that you cannot possibly know whether or not your opponent will fold. They could easily four bet you and if this happens then you may have to fold the hand as your opponent is representing so much strength in that instance.

But they may call your three bet and if that happens then you want your hand to have as good a chance as possible of winning the pot. A hand like J-10s can make straights and flushes as well as big two pair hands and decent sized pairs. Also your re-raise can help you to represent hands as well and so the play gives you the initiative. So this is why you are better off three betting with a hand that has equity if called. Tournament poker isn’t like this for several reasons and the main one is that you are under time pressure to get chips. Also a three bet in that form of poker is threatening people with tournament extinction and so the re-raise carries with it far more weight.

This is what confuses certain players when they switch to cash games because they see players on tournament poker television shows making some weird and wacky plays. This is little realising that these shows are not only heavily edited but they are also full of players who are chasing chips constantly to try and ward off the ever increasing blind pressure. But in cash games without that same level of urgency then the player is far better off only getting involved in deep stacked situations when their hand has decent equity when called.

If you raise before the flop and are called by a single opponent then you may want to launch a continuation bet on the flop. If that bet gets called then you may want to bet again on the turn and this may especially be the case if a scare card comes on the turn that you could represent. If you are aggressive enough and in the right set of circumstances then you may want to bet again on the river to carry through the bluff! This sort of move was only part of the arsenal of the very best poker players in the world a few years ago but times have changed these days and the vast array of educational material has been the main reason for that as people learn poker.

However there is one other reason that you should bet all three streets as well and this is little talked about or known except by the professionals. If you think very carefully for a minute about what you have just read then you will see that the first two reasons that I have quoted are basically hands that are very powerful or very weak. So if the only times that you bet all three streets is with powerhouses and fresh air then your range when you bet the river is going to be polarised.

So if there is say $200 in the pot and you make a $200 all-in move with air then there will be $400 in the pot and it will be $200 to your opponent to call. These are pot odds of 2/1 but opponents who have been watching you will know that you either have a powerhouse or fresh air. While they cannot guarantee which is which, they do know that the pot is giving them 2/1. This means that they only have to win one pot in three to break even and powerhouses are not that common.

To avoid giving your astute opponents this kind of information then stronger players bet all three streets with hands weaker than monsters like top pair for instance. This makes you a far stronger player although against weak players then this could be a chip burner as weak players may be calling down with better hands. However you need to be aware that there are three reasons for betting all three streets and not just one.

I don’t multi-table much and also I don’t play as many hours as I used to. Another problem with trackers in a game like no limit hold’em is when you start to play the bigger games. By this I mean games at the $10-$20 level and upwards.

When I play serious no limit then I tend to play at the $25-$50 level online and sometimes at $10-$20. But once you start to play against the calibre of opponents that you find at $25-$50 then you can easily be up against some of the best players in the world. This means that you have to approach the game totally differently and I have my own way of operating that has stood me in very good stead.

Trackers in my opinion lose much of their effectiveness against poker players who are very adept at situational trickiness. I am talking about players who only make certain plays when certain criteria align themselves. They don’t even know what they are going to do themselves until they do it. Or how about the player who makes his mind up before the hand even starts that he is going to try and move you from the pot here even if it means going all in with junk.

You raise pre-flop with A-Q, the player on the button calls you with 6s-4s. The flop comes 10d-7c-2s and you continuation bet the flop and get called. The turn brings the 3h giving your opponent a gutshot draw and you fire again on the turn only to face a big raise or an all in bet. Just how do you combat that? How can you combat with statistics someone who has never previously done something and will not do so again in that session? Fine so you can remember that move for later for when you play him again but the next time, he will come at you in a totally different way than before. He will make you lay down once again but in a different way to last time.

Why? Because he is very good that’s why and your tracker statistics are not going to be of much use to you here. You could get two separate players with the exact same statistics of VPIP (voluntary pot $ in the pot), PFR (pre-flop raise percentage) and AF (aggression factor) and yet the way that they obtain those statistics could be totally different making each player totally unique.

But I have found that at the higher levels that concealing your own play is just as important if not more so than finding out about your opponent and this applies whether you play holdem or Pot Limit Omaha or whatever. No one will ever convince me otherwise and if anyone wants to criticise then fine, they can play poker their way and I will play it my way. I will simply not allow dedicated online professionals to data mine me or swap information about my methods and strategies and likely ranges so that they know how I play before I even sit down.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson
Author – “Winning Cash Game Poker”

Whenever I sit down in any poker game I am watching my opponents like a hawk. But it is sheer naivety and ignorance to think that at least SOME of them are not watching you as well……of course they are. The level to which they are watching can vary from the very keen players who take notes to the player who is merely subconsciously observing.

Whenever I play poker, I do not try to create a particular image unlike many players. I just play my normal poker game and let the natural flow of the cards do that for me. If for instance I sit down at a table full of players who I do not know and get dealt four premium raising hands on the spin and I win those four pots without a showdown then the rest of the table is hardly going to believe that I am playing normally are they.

They are going to be seeing me as a loose maniac who they cannot wait to play back at and put into line. Yet I have been playing entirely normally but unless your opponents have seen that then they cannot possibly know. But I need to be aware of how much I have been raising and betting because the rest of the table are going to be basing SOME of their decisions around what I am doing or what I have done, this concept applies whether you are playing poker tournaments or cash games.

So in this instance, I will back off from playing a marginal hand or attempting a bluff because I feel that the probability of me being called has increased. This is what I call “Speed” and it falls into several categories. When certain players sit down to play, they sit down with a set system and never deviate. If the poker game is very weak then you may earn money doing this but be advised, the ONLY poker game that you are capable of beating by playing this way is a very weak one.

People who play at the same speed are easy to beat. Passive players who stay that way are easy meat, the very aggressive players can be beaten although these types can be dangerous in the short term. I am constantly watching my opponents and the overall speed of the game. If there is a lot of loose calling and raising going off then I change speeds and slow down. What is the point in bluffing if you are going to get called or raising with marginal hands if they are going to get re-raised.

Professionals refer to this as “changing gears” and you may have come across this expression either in a book or magazine or by hearing it on TV. I do not go into ANY game with a set plan in the strictest sense of the word. My plan if you can call it that is to mould my play around what is happening on the poker table RIGHT NOW.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson

Hand 38: Small Blind, J-8, folded to cut-off who raises to £20, I fold. Stack size £797.

Hand 39: Button, 8-3, folded to me and I fold. Stack size £797

Hand 40: Cut-off, A-10, Player to my right raises to £15 and I fold and keep out of trouble with a dangerous hand. Stack size £797

Hand 41: 8-5, UTG calls, folded to me and I raise to £20, all fold. Stack size £809.

Hand 42: UTG, A-4, I fold. Stack size £809

Hand 43: Big Blind, Kh-5h, 3 Limpers and SB calls, I check. Flop 3-9-7 and all check. Turn card is an ace and it is checked to button who ends matters with a £20 bet. Stack size £804.

Hand 44: Small Blind, 10-6, folded to me and I raise to £15 and take it. Stack size £809.

Hand 45: Button, Q-J, Two limpers and I raise to £25 and all fold. Stack size £826.

I was still playing fast here even for a six handed poker game but no one on the table was trying to keep me honest and I was getting away with too much for me to stop. Throw in a couple of genuine hands and this was a highly profitable hour of play for me. This is a typical hour for me in many ways, the only differences being that £326 is way above what my proper hourly rate is and I got lucky with the 8-5 big time on hand 15.

Basically this is the type of poker game that I love. Most of the players were letting me get away with things and no one was being overly aggressive. Aggressive players and maniacs can really take you for a ride when they get lucky. You get them all in and in bad shape and they outdraw you not once but several times in the session with gut-shot draws against top set etc.

What I hope that this session highlights is in how straight forward I played. However I must stress that since this session was played some years ago, games at these levels have become seriously tougher.

I now use Poker Office at the NL400 to NL600 levels although it is also rare that I play as high as this now online and my usual levels are NL100 and NL200. It also has to be said that my level of play and the average player at this level at the time that this was played meant far greater value. Most if not all players didn’t use tracking software like Poker Office back then so there was a high level of naivety about the games at that time which needs to be factored in.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson
Come and see the excellent blog at bwin poker blog

It is the same with maniacs (loose aggressive) as their constant barrage of bets, raises and re-raises make them formidable opponents. They know that given the right type of timid opponents then they can make them fold all sorts of mediocre hands and they can end up taking pots down with absolute junk.

It seems that whenever you bet they raise or whenever you check they bet. When you are running cold then they tend to absolutely murder you. The thing is with loose aggressive players is that their constant aggression has two distinct advantages. Firstly they take advantage of timid and cautious play. The second advantage is that they also beat players who are running bad!

There is a third advantage as well and that loose aggressive play can play huge dividends as well in other ways because it can seriously tilt players when you outdraw them or you are sitting there with a big hand like AA on the very hand that they decide to play back at you with. This is a very interesting yet often overlooked factor of loose aggressive play.

You make a raise with AA after raising or re-raising the last ten hands. Your opponent in the cut-off is starting to get a little steamed that you are denying him opportunities so he raises and you four bet him…they have Q-J and shove which you call.

Here in this instance your previous play has tilted them into overplaying their hand and getting stacked. So how do you combat loose aggressive players? Well for a start you are far better off having position on them. You can then attack their range rather than them attacking yours. You will have position on them rather than the other way around. Re-raising to isolate will give you a strategic advantage.

Although do be aware of loose aggressive players who simply refuse to be bullied in this way and play back at players who three bet them. Another option may be to leave the table as well and this is an option that is rarely exercised. If you are constantly getting your steal raises called or three bet or you are getting pots taken away from you post flop by loose aggressive maniacs then you need to make the proper adjustments.

If those adjustments are not very palatable then your best remaining option may be to leave the game. If more players left poker games or sought out a new seat then more poker players would be winning poker players. Making money in online poker is a complex variable of interwoven factors that carefully interact with each other to create an internet poker strategy that will make you money.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson

First, what type of game are you playing? Odds are that you are playing Holdem, but beyond that, are you playing NL or Limit Holdem? Depending on what you are playing, there are several things that you can be doing while waiting for hands and while other hands are going on.

First, start to pay attention to what is going on around you. Try and take note of how players act when they are getting ready to come into a hand and how they fold. Afterwards, start to pay attention to their betting patterns and try and put a player on some type of a hand. Pay attention to all the action and take mental notes on the types of hands that the play shows down.

Another thing that you can do at the table is to talk to other players and try to work up some type of psychological profile on them. Many times, a person’s personality will give clues about how they play poker. Someone that is a skydiver will likely take more risks than someone that is a Rabbi. (I have played with Rabbi’s before.)

When someone tells me that they have a problem with patience at the table, the first thing I tell them is to learn to play 7 Card Stud. In stud, patience is key in starting hands. Also, there is a lot of information in each hand. If you are an astute stud player, then you will not be playing very many hands in the game. Also, the pace of the game is much slower. If you have the patience to play stud, then Holdem should be a breeze for you.

If you find yourself becoming too bored, walk away from the game for a while. A break from the game may energize you enough to allow you to focus more. Ultimately, if you are too bored at the table and find yourself playing hands just for the sake of being in a pot, it is time to walk away.

In a certain holdem event, me and two other players were down to the river. If I could remember it right, I need a club on the river to make a flush. River card came and of course I was hoping to have the card I wanted. Then when I saw light, I therefore called all in. Player 2 then asked how much and so I counted my chips. Player 2 suddenly said that I better have a hundred or so. Then few seconds passed and I revealed my cards, A high flush. Player 3 was upset then as he already doesn’t have the opportunity to call the all in because of what I did.

Any comments about the incident? Also, do you think I should have been eliminated from the hand as I have flipped my cards over?

Thanks in advance!

Regards,
Nathan Lewis
Nathan,

You are not eliminated from the hand. Player 3 has the opportunity to still call. You must act first. You cost yourself some bets, but that is all. Your hand is not dead.

I played holdem with some family members just this evening. I admit most of us are just newbies.

At near mid part, three were left for the pot including me. With a small pot, I went all-in. Two other players had more chips than me, later, they called my bet. Flop then came. However, two cards were not revealed.

Do you think the two other players should have continued to bid on the turn and river card, actually right after I called all-in? Or else with the other two players, the two cards may have just been flipped with no more side bidding? Any idea?

Thanks!

Regards,
Darrel Koester
Darrel,

Your two opponents have the option to bet or not to bet after they call your all in bet. They must still at least check it down on the flop, turn, and river.

I have something to ask about mucking.

The other day, I played holdem with some colleagues. After all the cards were on the board, there were only two players in, player A and player B. Player A went all in while player B called, however, on the muck pile flipped his cards face up.

Player B won against player A, but on the contrary, player A has taken home the pot as majority of the players at the table believed that player B folded and his cards touched the muck so he should not win.

Any comments?

Thanks!

Best regards,
Keith Yao
Keith,

Player B called Player A’s all-in. At that point, both hands must be flipped up and the hand played out. The fact that he flipped the hand up on the muck pile is irrelevant.

The only time a hand hitting the muck pile becomes dead is when someone folds a hand or folds a hand out of turn. If it touched the muck pile in that case, it is dead. If someone is showing their hand in an all in or showdown, it does not matter if the hand touches the muck.