Being prepared and ready to play your tournament/local game is very important.  If your playing later in the evening and your tired, attempt to get in a quick nap, or make sure that you have a good meal.  Just tonight during my Wednesday night game, I went in very tired and not willing to have the great dinner that dad had made.  We started playing poker and I was winning my share of pots, and took out a couple people, but I wasn’t into the game because I wanted to go to sleep.  The blinds were 50/100 and everyone folded to me and I was in the small blind.  I went all in, hoping that the big blind wouldn’t have a hand, but when I looked down, I couldn’t have swore that I had pocket 9s, but I actually had 36 off suit.  The big blind called with AQ off suit, and the big blind won with two pairs.  When I looked down and thought about it, I mentioned that I wasn’t into the game, and should not have played.  Things might have been different if I had dinner, but I was more worried about chilling out before everyone sat down and played.

Now back to some ideas to help you win your game, and continuation betting.

Continuation betting is in a sense, betting after the flop when you do not hit anything.  If you have raised pre-flop, and it is your turn, putting in a bet will many times allow you to win the hand.  I like to put in a bet of roughly 70% of the pot.  If someone makes the call or raises allows you to learn who has something, or someone who is going to bluff you too.  Most times this continuation bet will eliminate anyone who doesn’t have top pair or better, only because you are the first person to act. You’ll get that person here and there that will stay in with bottom pair or an ace, but you still must put in another bet after the turn.  This is the hardest thing to do, especially when you are bluffing and could be loosing a lot, but it’s a must.  You have to be confident and not make or do something that shows your weakness.  Talking at this point in the hand about your cards is stupid, and shows that you do not have anything. Sit on your hands, look down and sit back like your comfortable.  Don’t give off any signs!

Local tournament games with small buy-ins are great ways in improve your game, and with the correct tactics you can put yourself onto the final table and better. Talking, learning, reading and playing your opponents will help you gain chips and better yourself for your final run at winning your local game.

Many times local tournament games you will find my distinct games plans and players. From your beginner, who needs to know what beats what, to the more advanced player, to the slop player. (One high card and one slop card.) It’s a good time when you sit down to find out about the other players and watch how they tell you how long they have played and what they do for a living. If you have a beginner, you can guarantee that he/she is going to play any pair that they hit on the flop, and betting a large amount when you hit top pair sometimes backfires when they get lucky and hit two pairs on the river. I have found that beginners will also stick with their ace-slop until the end, and will get lucky here and there. You might have the best hand until that ace shows up, so I will most of the time just throw in a small raise, or check to see if I still have the best hand before they get lucky. Another quick thing that I like to do it is to find out who doesn’t really care about the small buy-in. This helps you realize who might have no problem going all in with not the best hand, and these people usually play loosely, and will play the high card-slop card more than normal. You should be able to take advantage of these people too. They will stay with their king and queens until the end hoping to get lucky, and these people will normally play every starting hand. These types of players want to see a flop, so a continuation bet will show you where you are in the hand, even when you have not hit anything. Watch these players for quick raises where nothing on the board scares them. This is usually a huge sign that the player has trips.

Just last night I played in a $10 buy-in at DeBary Golf and Country Club. Each table had six people and everyone was given 2500 chips, and you had the option to purchase another buy-in immediately. When I sat down, 4 out of 6 people had made the extra purchase. Since we had some time, I did my normal talk and found out that the player in seat 4 was a seasoned pro and was playing tournaments 6 nights a week, but he said that he wasn’t targeting the people with the double chips but was going to come after me. I found this odd, especially since I did not tell him that I knew a little about the game. The other players were there for fun, but all played regularly and at least once a week. Since I wanted to find out more about seat 4, when he was in the big and small blinds, I raised 4 times the blind to see if he was a defender. When he gave up his blinds so easy, I made it a regular thing, and the other players defended a little more often. Player 4 also made a couple other mistakes while playing heads-up against me by talking about how big his hand was. This is usually an automatic tell that his hand isn’t big at all. He also took some time on a few hands and rocked back and forth as to make it seem like he had a huge decision on making the call or not. When he would do this, and then raise, I knew that I was beat, especially when I only had a few chips to make the call and see his cards. I just had to trust my gut and wait my time out. After taking a huge loss in chips when I hit trips and another player showed higher trips, I went back to stealing blinds from the wanna-be pro. By the time of the first break, no one on our table had been lost, while the other 12+ tables had 2-3 each. We chipped out and moved around everyone but our table stayed and then caught pocket aces in early position. I raised 3x the blinds and everyone came in with me. The flop came out AQ8 rainbow. I quickly checked, and the player next to me moved all in. The wanna-be pro check, double checked, and triple checked his cards, did his hollywood, and called. The others folded and I pushed all in and had the wanna be covered. He instantly knew that he was beat, but still called. The player next to me showed 83clubs, and the wanna-be was on a draw with k10 and needing a jack. Turn card out another queen, and I had tripled up. From there we moved to a different table, and when it was all said and done I finished in the money with a third place finish, only to have my pocket kings beat by A3 with a river ace. That’s poker!

The final table to 8 people was exactly what I could have imagined.  Three players played every hand they were dealt and I almost doubled up on the first hand by checking on the flop and turn, then going all in on the river when a king hit, but I didn’t have anything higher than an eight and bluff my way into a huge pot.

It was a lot of fun, and I will play again for sure.

Great card and a slop card! It’s a common mistake amoung beginners that is very easy to take advantage of. When in first position and with a full table, A2, A3, A4, A5, K2, K3, K4 and many others are not good cards to play. As I have seen TO MANY TIMES, a player in beginning position will limp in with K4 or something. (Side note: many times when someone starts out the limping, other players follow with bad hands hoping to hit the flop and get lucky, and a strong player will slow play his monster hand disguising his pocket pair or AK, AQ and many other good starting hands.) If the player with K4 gets lucky and hits his king, this player will follow through to the end only to find out that another player has his 4 beat as a kicker. These types of hands are ones that you should really think about folding, unless your really feeling like gambling and possibly raising in early position.

At the beginning of the year I took a 7-day cruise I told my then girlfriend, now wife, that I would attempt not to go down and play poker in the 5-10 table with a minimum $100 dollar buy-in. We had passed through the casino a couple times, and she insisted that I sign up for the No Hold-Em Tournament on the last day of the cruise, since it was a travel day. While signing up, the banker told me that they had a game going on, and I asked if I could watch the players. My girlfriend said yes and that she wanted to get a massage and that if I wanted to play while she was doing her thing, I could do my thing. I quickly went over and put my name down to play as they only had one table and I sat back and watched the players play. After 20-30 minutes I realized that almost everyone was playing great card-slop card. All of the players were new to the game, and had watched the pro’s, who have ice in their veins play this same way and were able to bluff and win with these hands. Of course, these are the same hands that they show on TV, and if the pros can win with these, so can they. My instant strategy was to play only good starters, hope to catch a good flop and stay with the other players and not bet them out of the pot. If I had AK, I would raise to eliminate a couple players, hope that an AK came out on the flop and let them do the betting for me. When we would turn over our hands, they would show K3 and I would have them out kicked. I played that day for 3 hours, and almost paid for my cruise in one sitting. I picked up a bunch of tells on the players before the game, as one lady would bet $20 on the turn each time she made 2 pairs, so if I couldn’t beat it, I folded only to watch some other person call with top pair and nothing for a kicker.

Raising pre-flop.

There are many times that you want to limp in the pot. One time you do not want to limp in is when your dealt AA, KK, QQ, JJ, 1010, and you are in late position and you have a bunch of players in front of you that have also limped in. If you are in the first position, you are better off making a small 2-3 sized the blind raise to eliminate some of the players with crap cards. If by chance you catch a high pocket pair and you unfortunate to have 5 or more players in the hand with you, your chances of winning that hand drastically decreased. Just last night in the weekly Wednesday night game, Mike, who was in first position saw his pocket aces busted because he slow played them and allowed 7 people to get into the hand. I was in the big blind with 89 suitted, and hit a straight only to have it beat by a higher straight on the flop. Mike slow played the aces, stayed with it, even though there was a possible straight on the board, and stuck it out to have 2 out of the final 3 players in the hand, having his pocket aces crushed. He took an early beating that made his night a very quick one.

Since position is such a huge thing in poker, I tend to raise with good starters about 3 times the blind. I like to make sure that I stick to this trend to not allow others to pick up on anything that might give away my hand. If your are raising 3x the blind and everyone else is folding, I will raise this same way with slop, ONLY when in late position or the small blind. Usually when someone does it in the big blind, they either have the nuts, or nothing. If you continue to show good hands, and have raised pre-flop your opponets will many times fold, so your able to steal blinds here and there. But try not to do it so often that your image goes away for playing only good hands.

The pre-flop raise is meant to get rid of the slop players, but many times the players in the blinds will still add the chips to see the flop and hope to get lucky. If they check to you, you must raise to see where you are at, even if you do not hit anything on the flop.

Continuation betting and others to come next, as well as some comments about the poker on TV and the players. Hope this helps and that you enjoy this, sorry if its rough as I am not a writer.

Online poker is fun and exciting. I personally only play on Full Tilt Poker under two names. I have my stevecgraphics account that I only use for play money, and my full name for real money. I think the online places are a great way to learn the game and how to see how others play the game. You will take your bad beats, and the occassional player who will stay on until the last card and get lucky, but thats poker.

I have sat and watched many professional players online and also watched the 5/10 play money players for hours at a time. The small blinds play money players play like they have nothing to loose, and bluffing isn’t an option. I literally hate when a new player comes in and goes all in on the first hand. Sometimes, but very rarely, the player has something, but I suggest just sitting it out. If they keep doing it, you will at one point catch them with a good hand yourself, and when you make top pair of 10’s or whatever after the flop, you better bet big and hope someone who has two over cards doesn’t call you. Play money is PLAY MONEY, don’t take it badly when that one person gets lucky on the river and beats you, it happens.

Real money - When you have finally graduated into real money, start small. Don’t get into the 1-2 dollar hands right away. I have a lot of fun playing the sit-n-go’s and just winning 1st or 2nd place if I am lucky. Real money you can bluff and play normal poker, but watch how people bet. Continuation bets are a must after the flop when in position. 60-70% of the time you will win these bets and take the pot right away. A good thought is to bet 70% of the pot, but if you get called, your probably already beat, or your in a race. Real money players have all sorts of different styles and game play, from slow playing, to aggressive and bluffing a bunch. It’s a different game, but puts the fun back into it, in my opinion. Recently in a sit-n-go I was called a donkey for calling K8 while in the small blind. I am usually a defender of my blinds, meaning I will usually play almost any two cards if no one raises to see the flop. The flop turned over 8,6,3 and I checked. The other player made a huge raise of more than 4 times the pot and I knew that he either had nothing, or had bottom pair. Since it was putting me all in, I made the call. He turned over nothing, and then made the donkey comment to me. Normally the all-in would have made me fold, but the bet was so big compared to the pot, it had me wondering. I doubled up, and ended up coming in second because I wasn’t going to be able to play in the next round on another date.

Play with respect. Just because you see others on TV like Phil Hellmuth mouthing off and disrespecting the players and the game doesn’t mean that you should do what he does. Learn the game and play the right cards and you will do well. Playing K3 and other slop might get you lucky here and there, but in the long run the patient player is going to take advantage of your play.

Good card, slop card play is next….

Hope that people enjoy this. Again, I am not a professional, but play weekly, and have a good reputation for winning a lot of the home games that I play, so I am just trying to help other play better and hopfully win more.

I had a comment that my stuff was outdated, and I apologize, again I am just trying to help the new guys learn about the game, and how others might be playing against you.

Thanks for checking out my poker blog.

The Wednesday night game was moved to Thursday because of a funeral in the family, but Thursday I was more than ready to see my friends for the weekly poker game. Last nights game, October 23rd, brought in the normal players and also one new player to the game. First and foremost, I ask the normal questions to find out his skill level. He is a regular player, and liked to talk and brag about his skills, and remembers the hands with precise descriptions…..WE HAVE A PLAYA!!!!

The cards were not good to me in the first couple blinds, but I was able to buff at quite a few hands and when the blinds were at 20/40 I was in pretty good shape. The new player Mike received a bad beat, and quickly started in talking smack to the winner by saying ‘river runner’ or ’suck out king’. I personally do not like that kind of banter, but I myself have done it when on tilt.  I believe that sometimes you get unlucky, and you must handle it the best way that you can.

Enter one week later…..  with the normal group of people playing the Wednesday night game, a problem occurred.  With three people left, myself, dad and another player, and my game being on full lock down mode and playing great cards, my dad and I got into a pot.  Dad and I limped in, with my hand being pocket fives.  The flop came out 9h, 6s, 6c, and dad bet 80 chips into a 160 chip pot.  I took this as a leak movement, and called all in.  At this point in time, dad said “you can have it” and the delaer instantly moved the chips my direction and I threw my cards in the muck.  Suddenly, he asked what I had, and I quickly grabbed one card back and turned over the 5h.  At this point in time, dad said that he wanted to make the call, and that he was saying “yes I call and I am all in too”, but it didn’t come out the way that he intended.  This wasn’t a good thing for the group, certain people heard one thing, others heard another, but the dealer made the correct call.  It was a mistake, because dad was either tired, or simply didn’t think about what he was saying.  I made some rude remarks, like an immature idiot, and stormed out, only to come back and we settled it by giving some of dads chips back.  After that, I was on a tear and quickly won the game because I was more focussed than anything.

I learned a lesson about poker that night and taking your bad beats, they are going to happen.  To the best players, people suck out, but you have to be a man and just suck it up and enjoy the game.  Let’s face it, we all have done it, and we will do it again, you can’t always go in with the best hand, it’s impossible.