Getting Started in Hold'em

I recently read another poker book. It was Getting Started in Hold'em by Ed Miller. It was pretty good.

At 200 pages with no equations it was an easier read than most 2+2 books. Which is what you would expect from a book targeting starting players. The content was good. Miller covers the key points while providing a good jumping off point to the more advanced 2+2 texts. Like many 2+2 titles the theme was more around live play which is fine with me. The section on limit hold'em was good. Also the collection of short essays in the miscellaneous topics at the end was a good read for pretty much any level of player.

So why would I read a starters book today after playing for a few years with at least break even success. Well there was a specific section in this book that I wanted to read. That was the part about short stack no limit. Miller describes this strategy well. So now I know a bit more about it. I thought it would be useful to know, it does fit into my plans around live play.

I've got a number of poker books lined up that I want to read. I'll be starting a new 2+2 title shortly.

Rounders

I saw Rounders on Netflix this week. It was really good. I quite enjoyed a movie about poker life. The poker scenes were very accurate and well shot.

There was a lot of great poker advice in that movie such as

• never lend to a degen
• never vouch for someone else's debts
• play within your bankroll
• do not borrow from gangsters
• don't let others play on your bankroll or credit
• pay attention to your opponents you can pick up tells

There was definitely a cautionary tale element to it. I think everyone who plays poker to some extent dreams of playing high stakes, taking a shot, being in the world series main event.

I enjoyed the use of the Socratic dialog technique in the film. The villain Worm expresses contempt for the quiet conservative tight players, ridiculing them as "grinders", "leatherass". Hero Mike is himself a grinder, content to grind 1 BB / hour long term profit - that is until he takes a shot and loses his entire bankroll on the first hand early in the film.

I love that saying "three stacks of high society".  Who knows maybe some day I will be able to use stack of high society as a unit in a real way.

sup bro

Since around September I've been playing more live, around once a week on average. I don't play online much. Still a bit busy with projects for online. Also since black Friday the $25 NL games just aren't as good as before on PokerStars. Interestingly LHE is looking a bit better but I don't have the time to play online.

So last Saturday I was at the local card room playing $1/$2 NL. The guy to my left was in town from BC with two friends on vacation. He had lived in Halifax in the past. A chatty likeable fellow. He knew how to play but had been drinking and relaxing and dropped a couple of buyins and was pretty unconcerned about it.

I was a bit card dead and he took a notice in the lack of hands I'd been playing. Then he announced something like while folding I was thinking of elaborate strategies and such. He pestered me if I'd read Sklansky and that. I said something like "I don't read no poker books or nuthin". Then he asked if I was on 2+2 and I couldn't help but smirk. So I gave him a sup bro and it was funny at least between us. I said I have fewer than 1000 posts and I'm more a lurker than a poster.

Sometimes I wish I was better at conversation. I'm just not very good at it. I should have told him my screen name and to shoot me a pm when he gets back to BC. He also commented on my plain green shirt for some reason and I should have told the story about the green over black combo being lucky. I'm not unfriendly there and answer if spoken to but I just don't talk much.

mia

It's been a while. I haven't been playing much. I cut back to once a month at the casino and hardly ever online.

I've been working on other projects and I decided to focus on those projects. For a while I was feeling that I was losing interest in poker and that troubled me. As poker has been such an important part of my own psychology and self identity for several years now.

I did play this week. My in laws were in town and my dad and brother in law mentioned they were going to the casino. They asked if I wanted to go. This was on a Wednesday but I had Thursday and Friday off work.

So we went. I wasn't sure how long the others would last at slots so I was expecting a short session. I ended up playing a couple hours which was nice. It was a good session. I felt good playing. Alert and rested. Not distracted with texting on and off again girlfriend. I'm single now and free of that distraction from good play.

The table was pretty good and I enjoyed myself. I feel I played well and ended up booking a $17 profit. It was good to have a winning session for the first time in three months.

So those projects I mentioned are starting to get finished up so I'm looking forward to getting back into live and online play.

No Limit Hold 'em Theory And Practice

I just finished reading another poker book. It was a reread actually. I read again No Limit Hold 'em Theory And Practice by David Sklansky and Ed Miller. I've read a few of my poker books more than once and this one was worth reading again.

I originally read it around a couple of years ago around the time I started playing live $1/$2. I felt it would be a good time to look at it again with the perspective of the live experience since. As well at the time I was dealing with a live downswing so I thought it might help me focus on good play. Well the downswing ended as downswings will do; that was nice but I did want to complete the reading.

It is a challenging book. Not as hard as Theory of Poker but still not a quick read. There is a fair bit to work through and grasp and like deep stack no limit it's difficult in parts. Still it was worth getting through. I think I picked up some stuff I missed or didn't appreciate the first time around.

So that's done. I've got some other projects and reading to do before I get back to poker books. There are about 5-6 poker books at least I still want to read. So I've still got lots to get to. I want to get through at least two more this year so I will be ordering them soon.

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Well I guess everyone around poker would have seen by now what happened with Stars, Tilt, UB and the US government. I play on Stars and UB and while my bankroll is modest these sites and real money online poker have been good to me personally.

Perhaps this day was inevitable. Going back to before I played online first it was paypal cut off, then couldn't withdraw to a credit card, then uigea, party poker exiting the US, neteller going away, and so on, and now this today.

But instead of just bailing on UB and Stars I will stick it out. I logged in and played last night. Luckily here in Canada everything seems fine, just smaller. Still there were 90,000 people on Stars last night and 15,000 on UB. I lost some playing $25 NL on Stars there was a fish from Russia but I didn't quite catch enough. On UB I lost a $1 husng.

So life after USA goes on in online poker. I just realized today I'm tired of all this American drama around poker so whatever. I feel bad for the American players screwed over by their government but it's their issue not mine. Maybe now we can finally just move on.

It seemed crazy those years ago when Party exited the US leaving it to Stars and Tilt to dominate. But now it looks like they just realized the inevitable and chose to focus on the international future.

dealing with a big gambler

Last time I was out at the casino, about two hours before close. A new player joins our $1/$2 table. Sits down smiling, buys in full and says he's here to gamble.

Friendly guy, chatty and likeable. I would have guessed he was a businessman. First hand he's UTG and blind raises to $20. Then every time after that when UTG same thing. Blind raise $20. Blind bet $30 on the flop. Yep he's put $50 in and hasn't looked at his cards yet.

He was getting lots of action. Most flops with him were 4 or 5 way. Alas I was direct to his left and had nothing to work with so I was just a spectator to all this action. I've been thinking about how to deal with this type of opponent.

I realized that the place to be is not to his left but to his right. You want to be in the big blind when a big gambler is UTG. That way when it comes around you'll be closing the action with the most information.

This is much better than being to his left. What are you going to do in UTG+1 with TT or AQ? Call 10% of effective stacks hoping to not get squeezed and then hit a miracle flop? 3 bet to $65 and end up in any type of squeeze or gross spot on the flop? The options all pretty much suck. Whatever you have, to his left you will end up both winning the least on your winning hands, while losing the max on your losers, and folding the winning hand most often.

Now in the BB it's much better. By the time it comes around there will be around $60-$100 in the pot. Opponents tend to have medium-weakish hands hoping to hit the flop, leaving dead money in the pot. Effective stacks are 10bb. This means you can just profitably shove preflop a moderately strong range. With the dead money you will have pretty good equity even if called by a slightly stronger range on average. But you can end up benefiting on both sides. Some hands that should call against your range like JJ or AK may fold instead of play for 100bb. At the same time some will also see the dead money and convince themselves to call with hands your range crushes like 66 or ATs.

Another benefit to being in the BB is that you can actually set mine your small to mid pairs.  Let's say there are 4 callers of the $20 raise. Discounting the blinds and including the $30 flop blind bet you are getting 6.5:1 odds. The thing is anyone with any piece will call the flop bet since the gambler hasn't looked at his cards and most likely has nothing. So again with relative position on UTG you can crai or slow play if you flop a set and it will be profitable overall.

Playing heads up

I'm trying out a new form of poker. Heads up sit n go (husng). It's something different, a change of pace from the tedious folding and set mining at full ring games.

I'm starting out at the bottom. $1.10 on UB. So far I'm off to an ok start with a few wins. With the reg fee the break even point is 55% so that should be attainable. Plus on UltimateBet I get 30% rakeback so that's a bonus. With the max rake at low stakes I figured if you want to play HU then husng is the best way to.

It's different. You have to think more about things like bluffing, bluff catching, thin value, floating, hand ranges, blind stealing, blind defence, balancing, strategy in general, opponent specific strategy, and making in game adjustments.

It's an interesting level. Believe it or not some opponents I at least would describe as tough and tricky. Some not so tough just having fun playing wild putting their stack in they don't care about a dollar. Or play properly for a few minutes and then start shoving every hand. More than once I've benefited from someone leaving after the match started then just blinding out.

That said I shouldn't overthink the $1 level. But it is good to create a base to move up with. I'll see how the $1 level goes and maybe have more to report.

Egypt

As you would expect not much to say about Egypt here on a poker site. Just this one little story.

Around a month ago I was playing $1/$2 at the local casino. Late at night and down to 6 handed. Table was pretty friendly a couple of regulars there I'd played with a few times in the past. I was totally card dead and facing raises pretty much every hand.

At this point pretty much every hand was straddled. ok except I was down on the evening and not feeling like straddling. I would have done a token straddle if I'd been up at least $100 but I was down. So I'm UTG and one of the others is telling me to straddle. I kind of shrug I don't want to. Then 2 spots to my right this regular Vincent chimes up in a deadpan voice "that guy would go to Egypt before he straddled." It was funny at the time and still funny now thinking about it.

So now once or twice a day with Egypt always on the news I think of Vincent and have a little smile.