In our last episode we focused on flop construction, but if you were reading closely you came away with, or had reinforced, one of the most profound aspects of no-limit strategy, one which can buoy your play across any street of action: Wagering and sizing choice have a direct correspondence[…]
Category: strategy
Construction and its Discontents, Part I
In one sense, the day someone becomes my student is the day they should fire me. Why? Because I supply them with the question that ultimately answers all poker questions:What is a bet?Not just any bet, mind you – although we start with that – but a bet in poker.[…]
Ten Nine, Off and On
I’ve found an unusual game at a small cardroom previously unknown to me. Worn out by emotional fatigue and the stress, frustration, and guilt of spending down my bankroll on various relaxations, I’ve wanted to warm up to the bigger games – 5/10 with our old friends such as the[…]
Toward Your Own Poker Strategy
One of the most confusing concepts the aspiring poker player will encounter is the notion of an overall Strategy. Perhaps surprisingly, it is counter-intuitive to many that a relational game of information can have a strategy that is not merely reactionary and essentially reciprocal. For instance, even very smart people[…]
Tadas Peckaitis, Poker Coach
While I was sweating out my tournament blogging gig back in November, I received an email from Tadas Peckaitis, online low stakes poker coach. He had apparently stumbled onto my blog and was wondering if there was anything we could do to promote each other’s work. (It’s worth noting that[…]
Gargamel: Dodging Coolers
New post from Gargamel, where he thinks through seemingly reciprocal spots. – P.Today I’m going to talk about hero folding and being able to put your opponent on a very narrow range of hands or even a single hand.First, what is a cooler? My definition of a cooler is a hand[…]
Hand Histories: Why and How
Hand histories are both overrated and underrated, but if done correctly, can be entirely useful for the writer, reader, and all participants. Critics of hand histories or of poker forums, such as Matt Berkey, and no doubt others, have suggested, correctly, that concepts and questions are more important, but what that side of[…]
Capped Game Spots, Part II
Differing from the first installment of this slightly dull series of posts, aimed specifically at the die-hards (including myself) and the cubicle grinders who read my pieces on smartphones between hands or on the toilet at work, these spots were part of two adjacent but brutal sessions where very little went my[…]
Capped Game Spots, Part I
Over the course of two consecutive sessions, both entirely profitable and generally satisfactory, I was involved in hands that had me second guessing myself then and now. What makes them worth commenting on is, oddly, even if I was right to act as I did, I’m wishing, in a combination of poker[…]