The Poker Lab Rat

Originally coined by poker pro Phil Gordon, this much-quoted phrase should be considered poker law!

Players have a tendency to express their contempt of poor play, but doing so is a major mistake. It’s totally counter-productive. You want people to make mistakes at the poker table. If nobody ever screwed up, all the skill would be talken out of the game - and the winner would just be decided by the cards.

If a player is making bad calls at your table (online or in-the-flesh), it is almost guaranteed he will suck out on you, or someone else, at some point during the game. When it happens, don’t try to embarrass him or make him feel bad. Why would you want to do that? You want him to stay at the table for as long as possible. If you berate him for making a bad call, it will put and end to his good time, and he may walk away from the game. That is the worst thing that can happen. Instead, do the opposite. Joke around with him, and make him feel as comfortable as possible. This greatly increases the chance that he will stay in the game until he goes broke. If you’ve made him feel especially welcome - he might even buy back in!

For good game fishing, we play and recommend Australian operated Poker.com or Carbon Poker. Both sites operate on the Merge Gaming Network and accept players from around the world - including Americans from all States.

Check out the latest review of Poker.com here.

Find out more about Carbon Poker in a detailed poker room review here.

Read more professional poker play tips from Phil Gordon and other top earning poker pros in our directory, here.