The Poker Lab Rat

Recently Poker Professional Gus Hansen announced he was part card player, part businessman and part degenerate gambler – about 60/30/10. In this blog posting, Paul Waskica reckons this resonates with him, right down to the percentages…

Unlike athletes and celebrities, poker players have to risk their own money to make money. In cash games they can only win what they put out there. It’s a little different with tournaments, but tournaments require a lot more luck since one misstep and their run can be done. This high degree of risk makes diversifying really important, if they can swing it. I know my primary job, the thing I’m best at, is playing poker. But I have other interests that help balance out the emotional and financial swings inherent in the game.

I’ve locked most of my money up, where even I can’t get to it. But I’ve also put energy, and in some cases money, into an endorsement deal, a poker school, a book project, real estate, the stock market and, yes, a little sports betting.

As I’ve branched out, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how to make sure I’m part of that first group, the group that invested wisely, not the group that fell from grace in extraordinary fashion.

The hard part is knowing when to keep a hands on approach and when to let professionals handle some of it. In general I believe you should know as much as possible about what you’re getting into. The more you know about taxes, the better conversation you can have in April.

I also believe the absolute most important thing you can do is surround yourself with good people, people you absolutely trust. In addition to trusted family members and friends, it’s crucial to have a good lawyer, accountant and financial adviser. Scrimp on these and your decision might bite you hand. Just ask Martha Stewart.

The other thing that’s held me in good stead is instinct. I’ve made some mistakes, but generally when something feels like a bad idea, even if you can’t pinpoint exactly what the concern is. You should probably walk away. I’ve had guys come to me with deals that have to be done immediately or the “opportunity” would disappear. I decided a long time ago never to allow myself to be pressured into making a financial move, and that has saved me money more times than I care to count.

As for the degenerate gambler part, I’ll never get the feeling of wanting that rush completely out of my system. The key is to keep it under control. But as my life changes, I don’t ever want to lose that 10%. After all, that’s what got me here in the first place.

Paul Wasicka is a member of Team FullTilt. Join Full Tilt Poker to play in May and they’ll give you a bonus of up to $600. (Players from around the World including the USA are welcome)

For more info on playing online at Full Tilt Poker and how they compare with other top rating online poker sites, check out the latest poker room review on FullTiltPoker.com here.

For other poker tips and advice, including more from Paul Wasicka, check out the PokerLabRat.com archive of Tips from Professional Poker Players

Frequently tournament players bet an improper amount and often make the mistake of giving their opponents the correct odds to draw out on them. (In online poker, that’s about the time you get the banter in the chat box about calling with bottom pair…)

When was the last time you witnessed a bet of $300 into a pot of $2,000? I’d think your opponent was hoping to get action with his top pair, but as a seasoned poker player you know he’s making a big mistake. Even with bottom pair, your opponent is being given the right price to draw with five outs. If there’s a straight or a flush possibility, the bet size is way too low to expect a fold from anybody with one of those draws. You want to bet an amount that makes it a mistake for your opponent to call.

I also see inappropriate bets like $3,000 into a $600 pot. By making such a drastic overbet, this player is just guaranteeing that he will not get paid off by a worse hand, but instead get a call by a hand that is beating him. I often see this mistake from players who foolishly limp in with pocket aces. After they receive three or four callers and no one gives them the chance to re-raise pre-flop, they bet huge post-flop thinking “I need to get rid of my opponents now and win the pot before something bad happens”. Unfortunately, something bad has already happened. In this multi-way pot pocket aces aren’t much of a favourite, and after their opponent re-raises they’ll make the mathematically correct all-in call, yet often be behind.

Here’s an example – think what you would bet in this situation:

It’s the first level of a tournament and everyone has $10,000. You raise with KsQs to $300. One opponent makes the call from the button while both blinds fold. With a total of $675 in the pot, the flop comes Qd10s3s. How much would you bet?

Top pair with a good kicker and a flush draw – not a bad flop. I recommend that players bet a fixed percentage of the pot every time they bet. Players ought to have a fixed percentage because too many players tend to have one pattern or another based on the strength of their hand. That % needs to remain consistent to ensure you don’t give anything away based on the size of your bet. Being consistent is the only way to protect yourself in the long run. I’d bet $600.

Betting the pot or close to it is the correct amount to bet. However, if the correct bet is more than a third of either your stack or your opponent’s stack, perhaps going all-in is  better.

Early in a tournament if I flop a pair and flush draw and know that this pot might get very big, I’ll size my initial bet or raise so that I can make the last all-in push. If my opponent has A-Q, it’s a virtual coin flip; and rather than flipping a coin for all the chips, I’d rather get him to fold by re-raising. If he has a set, we aren’t going to get him to fold no matter what we do, but there are plenty of hands like A-Q or K-K where putting enough pressure on our opponents might persuade them to fold. Remember that if our opponent has a hand with which he is really willing to get all his chips in the pot, then he is the favourite in this case. But the majority of the time, our constant pressure will do the trick.

Using this example above, let’s try to incorporate the method I mentioned. There is $675 in the pot, and normally you might bet between $550 and $650, which is a good bet size right now. If your opponent re-raises to $1,500, instead of your normal re-raise to $4,500, you’d push all your chips into the pot (as $4,500 is almost half of your chips anyway). That doesn’t tell him what kind of hand you have, but if I’m you opponent and have A-Q, I’m not going to be happy. At this time I’d rationalize that my opponent should have one pair beat or is holding a big draw. If I’m either a small favourite or way behind, why would I want to call all my chips?

Adjusting the pot size in the example, imagine if there were $2,000 in the pot pre-flop. Remember that we’re trying to be the ones who make the last bet, so our typical $1,800 bet would not work in this case. If we made that bet, our opponents would probably re-raise all –in and we’d be stuck calling since we have too much equity to correctly fold.

Given that this is the case, you might want to make a smaller bet to keep with our goal of making the final push. An unusually small bet, like $500 or $1000, would be ideal since when they re-raise $2000 to $3000 you can push all-in.

In this scenario, you’re giving your opponent a chance to fold a hand like A-Q again. Even holding pocket aces, your opponent might contemplate a fold since the betting has told the story that you might have flopped a set. Your opponent will realize that you will have a strong made hand or a strong draw. He might call, but he isn’t correct to do so.

If you’re a solid player, your opponent is in a tough spot and this is the way good solid players will mix it up. They’ll force the action and jam the pot with strong draws in addition to strong made hands. Even if they get called by a strong hand, they’re in good shape, with lots of outs, to win the pot.

 
>>For other poker tips from professional players check out the pro tips directory at PokerLabRat.com
>>For the latest online poker room reviews, ratings and promotional offers with bonus codes visit PokerLabRat.com

 One of the most frequent questions I am asked is about how to play hands like middle pairs against a raise. This comes up when someone raises in front of you and you have the choice of flat calling the raise or re-raising with a hand like 10-10 (this comes up whether or not there are any callers in between you and the raiser).

There are arguments for playing it both slow and fast: Some players prefer the call and some prefer the raise. The justifications I hear have to do with risk and trapping and small-pot poker and the like; but in the end, the decision on whether to raise or not really comes down to math and decision making. I personally have no predetermined preference for either play. Instead I look at the specific situation I am in to determine which play is likely to be more profitable and give me fewer headaches – and that’s the choice I make.

So, let’s look at how you make the most profitable mathematical and game-theoretical choice. Suppose you have a single raiser in front of you and you are playing $10/$20 blinds, the raiser makes it $60 to go and you look down at 10-10. You must analyse the math of the call versus the raise. Basically calling will create some problems. Assuming you are against a reasonably aggressive player, you can suppose the player is going to bet at nearly all the flops. Over 50% of the time, the flop is going to have an overcard in it. Now you have gotten yourself into a guessing situation: You aren’t sure whether your 10-10 is good in the face of the jack, queen, king or ace that just fell on the board.

Even worse, if the board does come all undercards to 10-10, you are still in a guessing situation if your opponent puts any amount of pressure on you. You are likely to end up committing a lot of chips in that kind of spot. The only card you can be really happy to see on the flop is a ten – and you are 7.5 to 1 dog to flop a set. Since you are only against one guy at this point, he is going to have to sail off to you for 7.5 times your initial call or $420 bucks just for you to break even to the original call, assuming you break even to all other boards – which might be stretching it since you don’t have the lead.

The take away is that in poker, it is generally a good idea to avoid situations that are likely to present you with headaches down the road. When the overcard flops to your 10-10, you are scratching your head wondering why you played the hand so soft. When the board comes up nine-high and your opponent puts pressure on you, you’re left wondering what on Earth you can beat besides a complete bluff and are in danger of either folding to the worst hand or losing your stack to the best one. Trouble.

But that does not mean that raising is always correct, because raising is not always the most profitable choice. When is it correct? When you believe that you will win the pot over 50% of the time from the moment of the raise. Why? Because in order to justify putting in the extra chips beyond the call, those chips have to be earning and serving a real and describable purpose. Let’s looks at the earn first.

You know that at a minimum you’re going to call with the 10-10. That means that the $60 call is already part of the pot. But now you are considering a raise, trying to decide whether putting the extra chips in the pot will do something good for you. The price you get on the raise will be about even money. With blinds of $10 and $20, the original raise of $60, and your call of $60, you should be raising the pot, which is $150. That means you will be putting in a total of $210 or so ($150 beyond the $60 call you were going to make anyway). So you are risking an extra $150 to win $150. That means your break even point on the raise is 50/50. If you think there is a greater than 50/50 chance that you will win the pot by raising, either right there or down the road, then you should go ahead and make the raise. Mathematically, 50/50 is going to be your break even point (this holds true even if there are other callers in the hand, since you will be raising the pot then as well).

But there are also compelling decision-making and game-theory reasons for choosing the raise instead of the call. First, you can knock out the rest of the field even if your original raiser doesn’t fold. And with a hand like 10-10, which you would really like to win without improvement, narrowing the field is super important. Second, you can take the lead away from the raiser so, when the overcards come, your decision becomes less difficult; since your opponent will check you, you can bet and find out right there where your hand is (you will usually just win it right there). Third, when the raiser does call, you can determine a very, very narrow range of hands he can have. You have much more information about his holdings and that will help you make better decisions after the flop.

Most importantly though, you are avoiding the tougher decisions you will be put to when you leave the lead to the other guy. This means that if you conclude the raise will be profitable, you should generally take that choice to make things easier on yourself. The reason I have no overall preference on the play is that there are lots of games where the raise doesn’t really buy you anything. It doesn’t increase your chances of winning enough. When your opponents are playing loose, they are going to call with too many hands, so you don’t really buy any information. And they are not laying down when they catch part of the flop, so you aren’t buying much of a lead. This kind of game comes up a lot in the early stages of online poker tournaments, for example. In those kinds of games I strongly lead towards the flat call.

Poker is totally situational. Once you understand the implications of the choice you make, like raising or calling, you can adjust your choices effortlessly to the type of game you are in.

For more poker tips from professional players check out the tips directory at PokerLabRat.com

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Know your poker math?

In my opinion the most under utilized form of learning in poker is simple algebra. I’m not talking about anything complicated like Bill Chen’s calculus in his “The Mathematics of Poker” book, but simple eighth grade algebra that you can use in all kinds of poker situations.

Here’s a quick example:
You have a draw. Your opponent bets on the flop, and you think calling is a bad option because you don’t think this particular opponent will pay you off if the draw hits, but he will put you all-in if it doesn’t. Your options are to raise all-in or to fold. There is $150 in the pot, and your opponent bets $100. If you were to move all-in, it would be an additional $200 for your opponent to call. You estimate that you would win approximately a third of the time when you are called.

Q. How often does your opponent need to fold for raising all-in to be better than folding?

Let’s split it up into two situations: x% of the time your opponent will fold, and you will win $250; y% of the time your opponent will call. Of that y%, 2/3 of the time, you will lose your entire stack of $300. The other 1/3 of the time, you will win $450 (your opponent’s stack + the pot).

Your raise equity is x(250) - 2/3(y)(300) + 1/3(y)(450) if you move all-in. That is the same as 250x - 200y + 150y = 250x - 50y. Since x and y add up to 100% of the time. (x = when he folds, y = when he calls), we can say that x+y = 1. That is the same as x=1-y.

So we now substitute for x: 250x-50y = 250(1-y)-50y = 250-250y-50y = 250-300y.

Re= 250-300y. Let’s set Re to 0 to find out when a raise is break even: 0=250-300y. 300y=250; y=250/300=5/6; x=1/6.

That means that if our opponent folds just 1/6th of the time, we have a break even play. Any more than that and we will show a profit. Let’s check our work to make sure it’s right.

So if 1/6 of the time we win 250 and 10/18 of the time [5/6 x 1/3] we lose 300; 5/18 [1/6 x 1/3] we win 450. Let’s see if that adds up to 0.

(1/6)(250) + (10/18)(-300) + (5/18)(450) = 41.667 – 166.667 + 125 = 0. That math is correct.

To some people, that answer may seem extreme. There is enough money in the pot that, with just a 33% chance of winning, our opponent has to fold only 1/6 for an all-in semi bluff to be the correct play.

Generally this math is too complicated to do at the table, but I like to do a simple calculation like this every now and then when I am curious about a situation. The math may seem hard if you haven’t done it in a while, but it’s straight out of your eighth or ninth grad algebra text book.

I figure that if a 14 year old is responsible for knowing this math, a successful professional poker player should be responsible for the same math if he wants to be able to claim that he knows the fundamentals.

Professional Poker player Justin “ZeeJustin” Bonomo has held sponsorship deals with two top US-friendly online poker rooms: Bodog Poker and Full Tilt Poker.

For more information on these top rating online poker rooms check out PokerLabRat.com for the latest reviews and comparisions.

Justin was the unfortunate pro who got caught with multiple entries and publicly outed for cheating in major online poker tournaments, but he also can claim fame as the youngest player (at that time) to have ever made a televised final table at 19 years, 5 months, and 20 days at the French Open in Deavuille, France, where he finished 4th.

Despite financial institutions admitting that implementing measures required under the new American ‘anti online gambling’ legislation are verging on impossible, especially without further definition and clarification, some USA based poker players are still struggling to deposit and cash out from their favorite online poker rooms.

The team at PokerLabRat.com understands that a number of previously viable poker deposit methods such as ePassporte are now no longer options for US players. We have therefore developed a summary of poker deposit options at each of the US Player-friendly poker sites that we review and recommend. It may be of assistance to you when you’re deciding which site to join to build that bankroll!

Carbon Poker
With it’s friendly support team in Australia, Carbon Poker offers a couple of reliable payment methods that may suit you, namely: Fonelinx (pre-paid phonecard poker deposits), eWalletExpress (a US-friendly online wallet) and EcoCard Poker Deposits (another branded e-Wallet that takes US customers). Visa and mastercard deposit options are also available for US Players at Carbon Poker - but it really depends on your bank. Prepaid Visa cards are also a viable option for US online poker deposits if your bank does not play ball and let you use your usual Visa account for poker.

Carbon Poker has a good reputation for efficient, no B.S. processing of cash outs to American poker players. If you’re not a member yet at Carbon Poker, use the bonus code FIRST1K for a 200% to $500 join bonus.

Full Tilt Poker
This serious-money poker room requires some serious-money deposit solutions for its huge contingent of US-based players.

Moneygram is apparently the easiest (and cheapest) way to make large deposits at FullTiltPoker.com. Players just need to set up an account then e-mail the Full Tilt Poker customer suppoert team who’ll send instructions to make each deposit a nice discrete, hassle free transaction. Pre-paid visa cards are recommended by Full Tilt Poker for smaller deposits. If you reference the referral code GOG when you sign-up you’re eligible for the maximum deposit bonus available of $600.

Bodog Poker
Bodog offers an amazing online digital entertainment site specifically targeted at USA residents. Formerly Canadian based, Bodog’s popular sportsbook is focused on US-sports betting, their online poker has $5 Million in guaranteed tournament prizes a month and the Bodog Casino has excellent blackjack, video poker and even some slots worth a look if you’re that way inclined…
 
Deposit Methods at Bodog Poker that work well for US based players include eWalletExpress (an online wallet that takes USA residents) and Instant Check/eCheck (instant bank transfers). Depositing a Check by mail is also an option. Apparently Bodog is currently one of the easiest poker sites (and Sportsbooks and Casinos) for Americans to deposit with and they take cash outs pretty seriously with a great team onboard to process these ASAP. Bodog Poker’s latest bonus for new players is 110% to $550.

For more information on each of these Poker rooms for American players use the links above to visit them directly or:

Read the latest detailed poker room reviews of each of these US-friendly sites: 
>>Review of Carbon Poker
>>Review of Full Tilt Poker
>>Review of Bodog Poker

Compare the US friendly poker rooms on one page here at PokerLabRat.com

It doesn’t get much better in poker than to reach the final table play as the big stack. However, there’s a big difference between coming to the final table with the chip lead and knowing how to use your stack to take control of the final stages of a tournament.

There are many players who don’t slow down once they reach the final table with a big stack – I’m not one of them. By the time I reach the final table I’ll have already played a number of hands against about half of the other remaining players. I’ll have developed reads on their games and they’ll have done the same with me, which makes this a good time to switch gears. If I’ve been hammering away aggressively before the final table, I’ll often slow things down and be much more selective as the final table begins. This way, players might bust themselves against me by over-committing their chips in a spot where they think I’m being a bully although I’ve really got a hand.

Even more important to my success here, however, is that I begin paying very close attention to the size of my opponents’ stacks. I want to know who’s likely to be playing conservatively in order to try and move up a few spots, and who is short stacked and looking to get chips in the middle with any two cards. I’m more likely to play against the conservative players and avoid the gamblers.

Let’s say the majority of the players are sitting on somewhere between 40 and 50 big blinds each, but the short stack only has about 15 big blinds in front of him. He’s going to be looking for any chance he can to double up, which means I’m not going to raise his blinds unless I’m holding a hand that allows me to comfortably call his all-in re-raise. While doubling up the short stack probably doesn’t hurt me in the long run, it’s simply not worth risking chips that I can put to better use against other opponents.

When there’s a logjam of players who all have about equal size stacks, I’m willing to play a fairly wide range of hands against them, so long as I’m in position. For example, say I’m chip leader with about 100 blinds, and a smaller stack with about 40 blinds open-raises for 3 times the big blind. I’ll call this raise from the button or from late position with hands like 4-5 suited, 7-9 suited or J-10 suited if I think I can pick up the pot after the flop.

I know that I’m not often going to flop anything better than a single pair – if I connect at all – when I call with these kinds of hands. Yet I’m still comfortable making this play because I know my opponent will miss often enough that I can steal the pot with a post-flop bet. This is especially true against players who completely shut down their games if they miss the flop, because I can use my big stack to force them to commit a sizeable portion of their stack if they want to contest the pot.

When I do decide to play against the short stacks on the final table, I’m looking to do so from position and with hands that aren’t going to be easily dominated. If I don’t have to worry about someone entering the pot behind me, I’ll play coin flips against the short stack all day long because I know I’ll win enough of these hands over the long run to be profitable.

The times I won’t make this play with my big stack are when I think someone else may try to squeeze me out of the pot by raising all-in behind me, or when doubling up the short stack could drop me from being the chip leader back down to an average sized chip stack. In these cases, I’ll look for better spots and let the shorter stacks fight it out among themselves.

While having a large chip stack is a weapon in itself, you’ll get better results if you know how and when to use your stack to your best advantage. Put your stack to good use and apply pressure in the correct situations, and you’ll turn your chips into something much more valuable when the tournament is over.

Jordon plays poker online at FullTiltPoker.com. Join him at a table some time soon.
Full Tilt Poker accepts players from around the world including the USA. Compare the top US-friendly online poker rooms here at PokerLabRat.com.

A US-based Professional Poker player, Jordan has over $1 million in career earnings including 2 WSOP Final Tables and 8 WSOP cash finishes. (So don’t get sucker in with the “lucky” bit in his online moniker!)

If you’ve always wanted an easy way to relive those poker hands of the past or a more personalised poker experience, check out the latest software release at Doyles Room.

This week popular online poker room, Doyles Room, has upgraded their poker platform with a major revamp. Not just “tweaks” either, this one’s a major coup that in our view positions Doyles Room as one of the very best sites to play poker!

The new feature we like the best is the ability to replay poker hands from your play history. Relive them to analyse, or show off - we don’t care - just check it out.

We also like the new ability to resize and more readily tile tables for multiple table play. Excellent.

Doyles Room also now lets you customize stuff…like, uploading your own avatars, changing the colour of the table felt and even the poker room floor to make a personalized poker room on your own PC.

Other stuff has changed too so check it out.

If you’re already a member at Doyles Room, upgrade to the new poker software by opening your game client and the system will automatically do the rest.

If you’ve not tried Doyles Room poker yet, Download and experience how the game is meant to be played - the software is free.

Mike 

PS: Doyles Room may still not - in your view - offer THE most advanced or even THE BEST PLAY EXPERIENCE on the net, lots of this stuff is subjective - but it is pretty damned good poker software and the 500,000+ active players on the Microgaming Poker Network can’t be all wrong! I personally like what Carbon Poker has going down too…

Doyles Room is a lead member of the Microgaming Poker Network and is endorsed by poker greats like Doyle Brunson and Mike Caro. For more read the latest Doyles Room Poker Review here at PokerLabRat.com.

Poker players from around the world including 39 States of the USA are welcome at Doyles Room 

Last month top Aussie online entertainment site Canbet handed out a £20,000 betting bankroll to one lucky player to place on the Grand National. I did not win :-( , did you?

In April at Canbet Poker you can win a Playstation 3 and 2 of the latest football games!

Three Playstation®3’s are up for grabs, each including FIFA 08™ and FIFA Street™!

Playstation®3 is the most advanced gaming console on the market and the piece de resistance in high-definition entertainment. Blu-ray™ technology enables you to play the latest generation games, as well as watch movies in unparalleled HD quality. You can also listen to music, browse photos and connect to the Internet. Add to the mix two of the hottest football game titles and it doesn’t get better than this!

Three lucky poker players will win a Playstation 3 and 2 of the latest football games just by playing poker!

Register to participate by entering the promotional code: PS3 on the My Account page of the Canbet Poker website between 1 April 2008 and 30 April 2008. (New and existing Canbet customers are eligible to enter)

Earn an entry into the draw every time you:

- Play 50 Poker Raked Hands
- Bet £50 (€65) at Canbet Casino
- Bet £50 (€65) on Sports or Racing

The lucky winners will be announced on Thursday 1 May 2008.

>>Visit Canbet Poker (a member of the Microgaming Poker Network)

>>For more information on this great Australian poker room, check out the latest review of Canbet Poker here at PokerLabRat.com.

It just gets better - Carbon Poker has done it again. They’ve released a cool new feature that no other online poker site has yet to offer… and it’s a good one!

I guess that being a smaller bespoke online poker network without any of the  baggage and hype that some of the more “brand heavy” poker sites suffer means that Carbon Poker can lead, not follow, when it comes to software tweaks and enhancements.  Generally these come in 3 categories: ”Wow, cool”,  ”nice to have” and “we’d better have that too”.

In Carbon Poker’s latest software release (version 4.3) they’re the very first room to offer “Deal it Twice” in online poker!  (And that’s a “Wow, cool” by our standards - and we’re confident that other poker sites will be battling each other in the race to develop this feature ASAP)

Deal it Twice? Huh?

Deal it Twice: You get the chance in 2-player, all-in situations in certain ring games, to deal both turn and river cards twice. Here’s Phil from Carbon Poker with an example:

“Two players can go all-in after the flop - one player with a made hand, and the other with a draw. The players must both agree to deal it twice, with each deal worth half of the pot. The player with the made hand wants to take less risk of being drawn out on (assuming the opponent has a draw), and the drawing player wants more chances to hit”.

He says “This technique is becoming very popular, and you can see it employed in many live high stakes cash games”.  (So it’s great for budding late night high stakes television poker fans…)

Oh, yeah, what else is new at Carbon Poker?

They’ve added or enhanced features associated with Bounty Tournaments, their Bad Beat Jackpot, and Shootout Tournaments.

For a detailed review and rating of Carbon Poker check our PokerLabRat.com or visit them via any of the links on this page for the latest join bonuses and promotional offers.

In my last poker tip, I talked about the necessity of loosening up your pre-flop game, especially in the late stages of a tournament. This week, I’m going to provide you with some more specific examples of the kinds of hands you may want to play when you’re under the gun or on the button, and the ways you may want to play them as you get closer to the money.

For each example, I want you to assume that antes have come into play, which makes stealing the blinds not only more profitable, but also more of a necessity if you want to maintain a playable stack. If you’re not willing to raise with anything but “premium” hands at this point in a tournament, you’ll find your stack becoming noticeably shorter with each hand and orbit of the table.

With that in mind, let’s say I’m under the gun; I’m going to be raising pre-flop with almost every pair, depending on how aggressive I think my opponents are. I’ll also play suited Aces all the way down to A-8 and unsuited Aces all the way down to A-10. I’m also likely to play any two suited cards that are 8-9 or better. As far as off-suit hands go, K-Q or K-J are probably the worst hands I’ll consider; I’ll play both of these hands from under the gun when there are antes, but I won’t play K-J from this position when there are no antes.

By the same token, I’ll play a lot looser when I’m on the button and it’s folded to me: any Ace, any King, any suited Queen, basically any two suited cards 4 or higher, and usually any two unsuited cards that are 8 or higher. This puts 59% of the hands into play, which are just about how many you should play in that spot.

Of course, you’ll need to adjust your starting hands based on the make-up of the table. If you’re seated with a loose-aggressive player, you’re going to play fewer hands because they’ll call or re-raise you a lot more often than more passive opponents. On the other hand, if the table’s playing tight, the player in the Big Blind is playing tight, or you’re on the bubble, it’s a great opportunity to open up your game and steal more often. This is especially true if you’ve got a huge stack and everyone else is just looking to survive.

Remember, this is a baseline strategy - deviate from it based on your opponents, the stage of the tournament, who is in each blind, and your position. What do you do when you’re facing a pre-flop raise? Think about how you would play in your opponent’s spot and that should give you an idea of what cards they might be holding. If you don’t know anything about your opponent, assume that he’s varying his strategy based on his position; playing tight under the gun and raising with less than 10 percent of his hands (tighter than I recommend) and looser on the button, raising with about half of his hands.

For example, say your opponent raises under the gun and you’re next to act, holding A-10o. You’ve got to respect the raise from under the gun because your opponent is probably only playing about a third of the hands he’d play from the button. Not only that, but the rest of the table is still left to act and any one of these players could easily have a big hand with which they’ll call or re-raise. Since you’re clearly out of position here, you need to lay your hand down and look for a better spot.

If you do call with A-10o in this situation and everyone else folds, you’re probably going to be a 45 percent underdog to any of the hands that your opponent should have been raising with from under the gun. Even in this “ideal” situation, you’re still risking chips when you don’t have to.

If you’re holding A-10o in the Big Blind when someone raises from under the gun, that’s a different story altogether. You’ve already got money in the pot and you’ve seen who’s still in the hand. Similarly, if your opponent raises on the button and you’re in one of the blinds with A-10o, your hand is actually the favorite because he’s likely raising with any Ace in that spot.

There are also some players who don’t take their position into account before they decide to play a hand – they just play with Aces through Jacks and AK no matter where they are at the table. You need to tighten up against these players as you know they’re only putting their chips in the pot with big hands.

All of this is just a framework for playing on the button and from under the gun. Use it to help figure out which hands you should play in these spots and which hands you should be playing when your opponents are in these spots.

Andy Bloch

Andy is a member of team FullTilt, he plays exclusively online at FullTiltPoker.com - so you can join him at a table someday.

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