Mike Matusow: Love him or loathe him here is his latest Poker tip

 

Finding the Low Cards in Omaha Hi/lo

A while back, I played a hand in an Omaha Hi/Lo Limit tournament that had everyone at my table jumping off their chairs. They thought I was crazy and couldn’t believe my play. But I made the right move. In fact, the play illustrates an important Omaha Hi/Lo concept that’s not widely understood.

Here’s how the hand went down.

It was a nine-handed table. The under-the-gun player raised and another early position player three-bet. Two other players called the bet cold. It came around to me in the big blind, where I held 9-K-Q-2. This is usually considered a pretty trashy Omaha-8 hand. But I didn’t fold here; I four-bet. I then flopped the nuts and took down a huge pot. When they saw my hand, the players went crazy. How could I four-bet with that kind of trash?

I could do it because I made some good assumptions based on the way my opponents played their hands. This was a tournament, where most players tend to be pretty cautious. Few will play any hands that don’t contain Aces, and just about everyone is sticking to hands with a lot of low cards.

So when the under-the-gun player raised, I felt pretty confident in assuming that he had an Ace with some other low cards. The same goes for the player who three bet. The two callers must also have had hands that they thought were pretty strong. I could be all but certain that all four aces were dealt to these players, and that they held a lot of the deck’s low cards.

I was also confident that, in this hand, the flop was going to come at the high end of the deck and that I’d have a chance to sweep a huge pot because there would be no qualifying low. And that’s exactly what happened.

This hand shows that in Omaha Hi/Lo, you can often make some good assumptions as to what cards remain in the deck and what the flop is likely to hold. For another example, say that you’re in the big blind and it’s folded to the cutoff, who raises. You see 9-T-J-Q. With all but one player folding, you can be pretty sure that almost everyone else held a number of medium and high cards. So the deck is ripe with low cards, which will probably help your lone opponent’s hand. Your best move is to fold this hand pre-flop and wait for a better spot.

Of course, the better your position, the more information you’ll have. So you shouldn’t even consider playing certain hands in early position. Something like 2-3-4-5 might be playable from the button or the big blind if there hasn’t been a lot of action. The lack of raising would show that the Aces haven’t been distributed and are still in the deck. But in early position, you just don’t know what’s out, so you need to muck the hand. The same goes for hands like T-T-J-Q and T-J-Q-K. There are times when prior action will show you that these hands are worthy of a three-bet or four-bet. But in early position, it’s best to just let these kinds of hands go.

Being able to predict a flop is part of what makes Omaha Hi/Lo so much fun. You really can’t do these sorts of things in Hold ’em. If you hone these skills, you’re sure to be a tough Omaha Hi/Lo player.

Mike Matusow

usa_OKIf you’re USA-based, like Mike, you can play some great online at Bookmaker Poker or BetOnline Poker.

Doyle Brunson says “Sacrifice Marginal Hands When Playing Multiple Games At Once”

AN ONLINE POKER TIP FROM POKER LEGEND DOYLE BRUNSON 

There is more than one theory about how to play early in an online tournament. But I believe there’s just no reason to risk getting knocked out in the first round.

I’ll usually take a few stabs at a pot, maybe leveraging a hand or even bluffing, but in either case, I won’t get much money involved. I think this philosophy is especially wise online, because many players move all-in too recklessly. This all-in tactic might sound like an easy road to profit, but in truth, you’re going to be tempted to move all-in yourself with only a small advantage – which is not a good idea. Yes, it can be profitable, but you risk getting busted out with a hand that just didn’t warrant that kind of risk. There’s more profit in letting the loosest players attack each other and reduce the field. Early in a tournament, you can afford to wait for a major advantage before committing a large share of your chips or even all of them.

What usually happens early in an online tournament is that some weak players will double up or even increase their chip stacks by more than that, while many other reckless players get eliminated early. I try to survive and build gradually during the early rounds. If I get a hand to go to war with, I will. But, unless that happens, I’m not just willing to get knocked out early.

The most successful strategy I know is to survive and to build gradually through small pots until the cards give you the opportunity to win big. There’s no rush – in online or in real – world tournaments.

Later in the tournament, the stakes will get so big in comparison to the chips on the table that you’ll have to gamble. You’ll have to take chances sometimes, even be a little reckless and hope for the best. But my advice is not to do that until you must.

US Players welcome at Doyles Room PokerTOP POKER ROOMS FOR USA RESIDENTS – Safe, reputable poker rooms that welcome American players

 

Can you tame the Poker Bonus Beast?

BEWARE THE POKER BONUS TRAP
The Poker Bonus is a tricky beast to lock down. Most players wanting to maximise their start into online poker’s money making potential should try to avoid the poker room bonus trap.

Despite an accelerated ‘bonus war’ resulting from the introduction of the US Unlawful Internet Gambling Act, poker room bonuses do not mean instant cash, or even necessarily a free bankroll to start to play.
In reality, most poker bonuses only pay out if you play a lot of poker – and I mean a LOT of poker – those players that can and do play at the level required for successful bonus releases are generally not that inspired by the bonus! They’re already capable of making good money just by playing and usually have the time and resources to do so.

We concur with industry commentator, Kishan Nielsen, who recently questioned the integrity of poker room promoters who claim it is “possible for someone with enough time, and the ability to play break-even poker, to make over $100,000 in their first year just by Bonus Whoring”.

COMPARING POKER BONUSES – AN ARTFORM NOT A SCIENCE
Incentives offered to new customers by online poker rooms vary considerably between card rooms and should all be taken with the proverbial pinch of salt. Do your homework or you will be disappointed.

At PokerLabRat.com we compare poker rooms for a living and still struggle at times to fully understand the terms and conditions imposed on customers when they sign up for certain poker room promotions. In general however, a bonus takes the form of a matching amount of ‘free money’ credited to a players account in proportion to the initial deposit the player makes.

FREE MONEY?
Free money you say? Ah, no, just hold on there cowboy …

  • Some poker rooms lock in your deposits for 90 days as you attempt to meet bonus play requirements. This means you can’t withdraw even if you want to – not even if you no longer care about the bonus!
  • Avoid sites with no easy way for you to monitor your progress of ‘poker points, comp points, action points’ – call them what you will. You will just end up having seemingly endless dialogue with poker room support staff.
  • Release of most bonuses requires that you play a SIGNIFICANT number of RAKED hands of a certain value to the poker room. This number ranges considerably between rooms but can be in the tens of thousands for a relatively small payout.
  • Even between poker rooms the definition of a raked hand differs –
    “a raked hand is any hand in which you were dealt cards that has a rake taken from the pot”, sounds easy? Some rooms require that you contribute to the pot, others require that the pot is of a certain amount. Low limit and tournament players often find meeting raked hand requirements particularly tough based on the bonus release criteria.
  • Some card rooms do not release any bonus until you meet their play through IN FULL and in the limited time stipulated (like 30 days – yeah, that’s a happening thing). Generally we consider a poker room to have higher integrity if they at least incrementally release a bonus and make it easy to translate between ‘poker points required’ and raked hands to play.

YOU’VE GOTTA DO IT
Read the fine print, no matter how boring and how deeply buried within the web site it is. I know it’s a smarmy thing to say – but you gotta read it!

At PokerLabRat.com we try to keep things simple and consider that a bonus is only one aspect you should consider when looking to join a poker room.

Here’s a link to our Poker Room assessment criteria so you can see how we assess and rate poker rooms. We do not recommend any card room that has not passed our tests – and almost as important – members of our team continue to play poker on a regular basis at all sites we rate.

Here’s a link to the Online Poker Room Review Directory so you can suss out the best poker site for your location and style of play.

Mike

Successful Poker Professionals Take Advantage of the Training Ground

THE ROAD GAME ROUTE TO PROFIT
Everyone starts somewhere, and it’s never at the top. If you don’t like the idea of beginning at the bottom and working your way up the poker ladder, let me present the alternative. It’s beginning at the top and working your way down. Now that’s not a pleasant prospect, but I’ve lived enough years to see it happen to young players again and again.

Great musicians didn’t begin by picking up a violin, taking a seat in the London Symphony Orchestra within a week, and becoming legends. They need to train. You don’t wake up one day, decide you’d like to run long distances, enter the Boston Marathon at noon, and conquer the world’s best-conditioned athletes. You need to train. You need to experience running, learn when to accelerate and when to cruise, how to finesse, and how to get the most out of yourself. I know. I was a star athlete in college, but I didn’t get that way overnight. I had to start somewhere.

SIPHON ALL THE MONEY
At poker, you don’t decide you have a flair for the game, take a seat at the biggest limit table in Las Vegas and siphon all the money away from top pros the first week, remaining a superstar for years. Sure, it’s a fantasy, but it never happened that way.
I learned poker on the road along the dusty trails of Texas. There were some great players, and I learned from them. But, I never would have survived without facing weak opponents, too. It took me years before I was ready and my bankroll was suitable for the big games in Las Vegas. I learned on the road. I got better.

I still remember a conversation I had in the sixties with Carl, a proficient player who seemed impressed with my poker and thought I was ready to try Las Vegas. “In Vegas, there are some fair games. Pretty tough, but worth your while if you can hold a few hands. You gotta pay your dues on the road and, Doyle, I think you’ve paid yours.”
I didn’t heed Carl’s advice for a couple years and then I found his words to be correct. Vegas was tough and it broke me a couple times before I got the hang of it and then never looked back.

INSTANT STARDOM
Today, I see young players take fortunes to the big tables, reaching for instant stardom on their first poker excursions, only to fall flat. Soon their dreams fail and are forgotten. And you never see them again. I wonder how many of those players might have succeeded had they walked up the ladder cautiously, learning comfortably at easier and smaller games, rather than racing to the unfamiliar top rung and loosing their balance.

What I call “road games” might not actually be distant games, as they were for me in Texas. Maybe you can find the equivalent of your road games on the Internet or at your friend Fred’s house on Friday night. Wherever you find it, take advantage of the training ground.

Poker is no different from other worthwhile endeavors. Short-term luck abounds in poker and it creates the illusion that anyone can win. It’s an illusion that makes some folks believe they can start at the top. They can’t.

In Carl’s words, “You gotta pay your dues on the road.”

— Doyle Brunson

AceKing2There’s lots of choice when it comes to poker networks including the iPoker Network, Microgaming Poker, Chico Poker and WPN Poker Networks. Check out the latest poker room reviews before you decide where to play your next hand of poker.

 

Professional Poker Play Must Consider the Long Term

 

Looking at the Long Term – Erik Seidel

Tournament poker can be a very tough business. No matter how good you are, you’re bound to encounter long periods where things don’t go well. On the tournament circuit, even the best players can go several months – or even a couple of years – between significant cashes. These dry spells can be tough to deal with if you don’t develop a solid mental approach to the game.

I think the down times are particularly difficult for younger players who have some success early in their careers. They come to expect great results and can become overwhelmed when things go badly in a long string of tournaments. They may grow frustrated and are apt to assume they’re making mistakes. They make changes in their games that aren’t well thought out, and they suffer because of it.

To endure the long, tough stretches, serious players need to understand that bad runs are inevitable. They’re part of this business. And while there’s something to be said for going into every tournament with a positive attitude, it’s also important to be realistic. If you expect to win every tournament you enter, the disappointment that accompanies repeated bust outs could be very damaging to your psyche. I know that early in my career, my confidence suffered when I went through a rough stretch.

Over time, however, I learned to focus my attention in productive ways. Now, when I’m playing in a tournament, I concentrate on making the best decisions I can. I try to approach every hand in a thorough and effective manner. If my focus is good at the table, I can be honest with myself as I assess what I’m doing well and where I need improvement. I’m not likely to fall into the traps that ensnare other players. Many refuse to admit mistakes and insist that a bad run is due to bad luck alone. Others believe they’re playing well when their results are good, even though they’re playing poorly and are benefiting from a great run of cards.

After a tournament is over, I’m quick to remember that tournament poker requires the temperament of a marathoner, not a sprinter. If I play well and consistently make good decisions, I’ll be rewarded, though it may be a long time before I see the results I’m looking for.

Erik Seidel

USOK_1If you’re USA-based, like Erik, you can play some great online at Bookmaker Poker or BetOnline Poker.

 

Fancy 7-card Stud? Here’s the latest tip from the pros at Full Tilt Poker

 

AcesPlaying Small and Medium Pairs in Seven-Card Stud  –  Perry Friedman

Small and medium pairs are among the trickiest hands you’ll encounter in Seven-Card Stud. Frequently you’ll get into situations where it seems that a modest pair might be the best starting hand, but you don’t really know. Even if that pair is ahead on third street, it’s not a big favorite over much of anything. So you need to be cautious with your smaller pairs in Seven-Card Stud, both on third street and on later betting rounds.

There are a few factors you should think about before putting your money in the pot on third street with a small or medium pair. The primary consideration is the previous action. If you’re sitting with a pair of 7s and there’s a completion and a re-raise before the action gets to you, you shouldn’t even consider playing them. You’re almost certainly up against a bigger pair and there’s no good reason for you to draw. Similarly, if a very tight players completes with a Queen showing while sitting to the immediate left of the bring-in, you may want to give him credit for a big pair. Get rid of your small pair and wait for a better opportunity.

You should be more willing to play a small or medium pair if there’s only a completion before the action gets to you. But even then, you need to look at a few factors before deciding whether or not you should continue with your hand. First, determine if your cards are live. If you’ve got split 7s with a King kicker, you can muck the hand if both a 7 and King are out. You’d like every card that would improve your hand to be live.

Another factor to consider is the size of your kicker. When starting with something like a pair of 6s, you’d like your kicker to be higher than the door card of the person who completed the bet.

If you play a small or medium pair on third street and are against a single opponent, you’ll usually call a bet on fourth street as well. Of course, you’d most likely want to fold if your opponent pairs his door card.

The tougher decision is likely to come on fifth street. This is where the bet sizes double. If you call on fifth, you’re pretty much committing yourself to calling the rest of the way. When deciding whether or not to call on fifth street, you need to look at the cards your opponent has caught on the previous two streets. If he started with a Queen up and caught two cards that are higher than your pair – say a Jack and a 10 – you should fold to a bet. Even if your small pair is best at this point, your hand is very vulnerable; you’ll win a showdown only about 50 percent of the time. And if your opponent does hold a higher pair, you’re in serious trouble. But if he catches rags and your cards remain live, then you’ll want to play the hand to showdown and hope your pair holds.

There’s no question that small and medium pairs are among the most challenging hands in Seven-Card Stud. But if you look carefully at your situation on third street and consider the previous action, the size of your kicker and how live your cards are, you’re more likely to play the hand well.

Perry Friedman

AceKing2Two sites we all rate and recommend however are UK’s bet365 Poker (top site on the iPoker network – Europe’s busiest and best) and Bookmaker Poker, a savvy Costa Rica based poker room on the WPN Network that offers US-based players excellent tournament opportunities.