Tag Archives: hands
Playing Too Many Hands Is A Mistake For Many Poker Players.
Many poker players find themselves stuck in a rut in terms of playing poker; making the same mistakes over and over again. This is especially true of beginning poker players.
Thus, this article will provide several poker traps that new players commonly get stuck in when playing. Especially, the trap of playing too many hands!
Playing too many hands before the flop is what I consider to be the biggest mistake made by most poker players. However, it is especially a big mistake for new poker players. You should be playing only 20-25% of all your hands and folding the rest. I suggest that when choosing a hand to play before the flop, you should make sure that your cards meet certain requirements.
Many poker players take any pair or any draw to the river. As a general rule, you should be continuing with only top pair or better or a strong draw.
In addition, many poker players play by feeling rather than by cards, situations and numbers. Many poker players, especially new poker players, play hands because they have a “feeling” about them. One word, DON’T! Remember, poker is a mathematical game: everything that can possibly happen boils down to odds.
Therefore, you should only play a hand because it has good odds of winning – not because you feel lucky or you feel you are due. You play a hand because the situation dictates that in the long term, by playing that hand, you will make money. Poker, in my opinion, is not gambling, IT IS A SKILLED GAME based on math!
In addition, many poker players take hands too far past the flop – they go too far with them.
The reason for poker players playing too many hands can be also be blamed on their emotions getting the best of them. Poker, remember, can be a stressful game. Thus, many poker players who lose a couple of hands will start to let their emotions get the better of them. When this happens. they start making bad decisions. A winning poker player must make the best possible decisions by approaching decision making with a clear frame of mind and not be afraid of playing fewer hands.
Just remember, poker is a long-term game and do not be afraid of the flop.
In summary: Do not play too many hands before the flop, base your decisions on concrete factors, and keep your emotions in check. Once again, remember to take the long view when you assess potential action.
The Winning Strategy for Poker Tournaments.
Poker Tournaments both live and online give players a wonderful opportunity to pay a relatively little amount of buy-in and win a big payout. All poker tournaments are exciting and fun events that give you a lot of play for your money. There is nothing like a thrill of the competition to get the excitement going and no winnings in a ring-table can be compared to battling your way to the top position and walking away as the winner of the day.
Playing in poker tournaments however requires different strategy to one used in ring-games and a lot of good players who fail to adapt to such changes leave the tournaments empty handed. To begin with there are three distinctly different tournament periods, each requires different tactic of play. At the early stages of the tournament there will be plenty of fish around, towards the middle stage most fish will be gone a part of a few very lucky ones and at the end of the tournament you will be left with some very good players and occasionally with one very lucky average player. So tournament strategy requires changing gears as you progress through the tournament.
At the early stage of the tournament your best bet would be to play extremely tight. Do not be tempted to try to increase your chip count with marginal or weal hands while the blinds are cheap. You should only be playing the best starting hands and never attempt to bluff at this stage. Your goal for now is to wait for the fish to hit the rail and with cheap blinds you can afford to be very selective. Although this stage can be very frustrating as you will not taking part in a lot of action and folding many hands.
At the middle stage of the tournament you can start to loosening up a bit. It is a good time to take a few risks and bluff a few hands to turn your hard earned reputation of a tight, conservative player to your advantage. Your bet or a raise will hopefully be taken on with care and consideration. So take a little gamble. At this stage you should be looking for every opportunity to steal blinds, so if you have a good hand, you are on the button, players before you folded, you should be aggressive and raise. Your goal at this stage is to increase your chip count to enter the last stage of the tournament with at least average amount of chips. You dont want to be short stacked at the last stage and get blinded out just before you make it into the money.
Hopefully you made it to the final table and have a fair number of chips. Now it is time to loosen up even more. You need to play like maniac though! Just be brave, aggressive and flex your strength. It is all about chip power now. This is a good time to push short stacked players all-in but be careful with big stacks as they will want to the same to you. If you are short stacked at this stage you must consider going all in when you have a reasonable hand as with blinds being so high you cant afford to sit and wait for the next opportunity to arise, you will bleed your chips too fast and leave with nothing.
To sum it up: play very tight at the beginning, loosen up a bit and aggressive in the middle and get extremely aggressive at the end. This is a proven winning poker tournaments strategy.
Before you pay your first $10,000 buy-in for WSOP Main Event, it is a good idea to practice playing online poker tournaments. Online poker rooms offer a huge choice of different level buy-in tournaments, including some with guaranteed minimum prize pool. Many players have built up their bankroll through playing online poker tournaments and you can even qualify to big live poker events through online poker promotions and take your seat in the next WSOP, EPT or WPT to hopefully win millions of dollars in prize money.