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| This site was updated on May 16, 2008 |
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Poker is a game of
people. That's the most important lesson you should learn from my book. I'll be teaching you
guidelines and concepts you'll be able to use with great success, and you'll
quickly become a very good player. But, if your ambition is to become a great
player, a top flight Pro, a superstar ... you'll need to really understand your
opponents. You'll need to get inside your opponent's head and be able to
estimate with a high degree of certainty what his check, bet or raise really
means ... and what hand he's likely to be playing. Being able to do that
accurately isn't easy. But you can do it if you're alert, observant,
disciplined and if you concentrate whenever you play (whether or not you're
involved in the pot). Using my advice and the advice of my expert
collaborators, you'll find that the "task" of unmasking your Poker
faced opponents will become easier and easier. When you're able to put
your opponent on exactly the hand he's playing (because you know him almost as
well as he knows himself) you can select the best strategy possible for that
particular Poker situation. When you reach that level of skill, you'll be a
complete player. That's what Poker's all
about. People...and the strategy you use against them. More than any other
game, Poker depends on your understanding your opponent. You've got to know
what makes him tick. More importantly, you've got to know what makes him tick
at the moment you're involved in a pot with him. What's his mood ... his
feeling? What's his apparent psychological frame of mind right now? Is he in
the Mood to gamble ... or is he just sitting there waiting for the nuts? Is he
a loser and on tilt (playing far below his normal capability) ... or has he
screwed down (despite his being loser) and begun playing his best possible
game? Is he a cocky winner who's now playing carelessly and throwing off most
of his winnings...or is he a winner who's started to play very tight so he can
protect his gains? When you can accurately
answer questions like those (and there are many more like them) ... and employ
the other ideas, principles, rules, techniques and strategies I'll teach you in
this book you'll be one super tough Poker player. Put all of it together
and your playing ability will border on being World Class. It takes a lot to play
winning Poker at a World Class level because Poker is such a complex game more
complex than any other game ... or any other form of gambling. For example, the
difference between playing good Poker and playing good Blackjack is as vast as
the difference between squad tactics and grand strategy in warfare. You can
beat a Blackjack game by knowing exactly what to do in every situation...and
doing it. That's tactics. But in Poker you may face an identical situation
twice against the same opponent, handle it two different ways, and be right
both times. That's strategy. And that's why there's
never going to be a computer that will play World Class Poker. It's a people
game. A computer could be
programmed to handle the extensive mathematics of a Poker game. But the
psychological complexities are another matter. A system figured out by computer
can beat Blackjack because there the dealer has no options. He has to stand on
17, he has to hit 16. A computer could play
fair to middling Poker. But no computer could ever stand face to face with a
table full of people it had never met before, and make quality, high profit decisions
based on psychology. To do that requires
perception and judgement. It requires a human mind. The way I accumulate
knowledge of a particular player is by listening to him, and looking at him,
instead of talking. PAY ATTENTION...and
it will pay you Concentrate on
everything when you're playing. Watch and listen ... remember you have to do
both, and relate the two. You listen to what your opponent says, but you watch
what he's doing independently of what he says because a lot of players talk
loose and play tight, and a little later they'll reverse it on you. So you look
at a man every time he's involved in a hand. You judge him every time. That's
the way you get to know him and his moves. If you aren't learning
what you want to know just by watching and listening, create your own
opportunity. Try to bluff at him the first good opportunity, and see if he'll
call you or not what kind of hand he'll call with, and what kind he'll throw
away. Of course, anybody with a lick of sense is trying to keep you from
reading him. But you can still figure him because it is very, very difficult
for any man to conceal his character. A man's true feelings
come out in a Poker game
You'll see smart lawyers
playing Poker and giggling and carrying on like school kids. And a man's
hostilities can boil over after a while, too. Watch a ballgame with a
man when he's betting a lot of money on it. You'll learn what kind of
temperament he's got, how well he can take disappointment. That's the way it is
with Poker. If you wanted to use
Poker just for a test of character, solely to learn about the men you'll have
to deal with away from the Poker table, it would be a telling test. As a matter
of fact, isn't that what a lot of Friday night Poker games between business
acquaintances are really all about? Size them up at the Friday night Poker
sessions ... and then take advantage of them during the next business week. This brings us to
another subtlety of Poker: Not everybody you're going to play against thinks
the way you do. Almost everybody wants to win, but they expect to win in
different ways. PLAY AGGRESSIVELY,
it's the winning way
There's a very well
known Poker player, a man who enters the World Series of Poker every
year, who has a talent for figuring out exactly what your hand is. But when he
decides that you're holding a Pair of Jacks (in Hold 'em)
and his own hand will not beat the Jacks, he'll try to make you throw your hand
away. To me, that's not being
aggressive ... that's being stupid. It works sometimes, but should you
jeopardize your money when you think your opponent's got a good hand? Let him
win the pot and wait till you think he doesn't have much of anything. That's
when you can try to bluff him out of the pot. Or wait until you think you have
him beat. Everybody in Poker
thinks he knows what a tight player is, but I'm going to define it again
because so many people confuse the term "tight" with
"solid". "Tight" means
conservative. A tight player is a player that is tight pretty much all the
time. But a "solid"
player is a player who's tight about entering a pot in the first place ... but
after he enters the pot he becomes aggressive. Most good players, by
the way, are solid. The opposite of the
tight player, as you would imagine from the name, is the loose player. He'll
play most of the pots. Often he'll be drunk. You need patience to play him, and
you require a good hand to bet because he'll call you with extremely weak
hands. The perfect opponent to
face is the Calling Station. He's similar to a loose drunk player, but
he rarely bets. Most of the time, he just checks and calls.
And if you cant beat a man who always checks to you
... you can't beat anyone. Timid players don't
win in high stakes Poker.
As you'll learn, I don't
fit into any of the classic categories. I have the reputation of being a very
aggressive player with a definite tendency to be on the loose side. But,
despite my aggressiveness and looseness, I exercise a considerable amount of
judgement whenever I play
TELLS - look for
them...and you'll find them
Once you've pegged a
player's basic style, don't make the mistake of assuming he's going to play
that same way every day of his life. Sometimes a player makes a conscious
effort to change his manner of play. More often, however, his current mood
affects his play. Some days
people have more of a playing spirit than on other days. If a man doesn't feel
like playing, and has become involved in a game anyway, he'll throw his hand
away very easily. He can be bluffed. But if you see another
guy sitting there chewing gum, and bouncing his leg up and down, you know he's
anxious to get into action. He came to play. You have to handle him with
caution. It's not safe to bluff him, at least not to start with. Almost all players have
Tells ... those giveaway moves that are almost as revealing, to a rival who has
spotted them, as actually showing him your hand. The most common Tell is
the pulse in a man's neck. On a lot of people, the pulse in the neck is visible.
If so, a man can't hide it, since nobody can control their heartbeat in stress
situations. When you see a man's neck just throbbing away, you know he's
excited, and usually he's excited because he is bluffing. You may have heard
someone ask another player: "How deep are you?" That question is
sometimes an attempt to establish a Tell. (The question means: How much money
do you have in front of you?) It's worth knowing. I don't think a player should
be obligated to tell you, even though I have heard it argued both ways. Questions like that are
worth asking for psychological reasons. When a man's under pressure, his voice
may break, and then you know something about his current attitude. When I'm playing in a
big pot, I won't let anyone involve me in conversation. Even real Pros are
susceptible. Once I had a Tell on Puggy Pearson.
Every time he put his chips in the rack and bet them, he was bluffing. He must
have been doing that six months before somebody else
discovered it and told him. Another time, Amarillo
Slim Preston pointed out to me that I was counting my chips off and betting
them when I had a hand, and when I was bluffing I would just push them in
without counting. That's the only Tell anyone had on me that I know about, but
I'm sure there have been others. All top Professionals
have a defense against people using Tells against
them. Sometimes when I'm bluffing I say some particular thing, like "gee
whiz", so that people will connect that with bluff. But the next time I say
"gee whiz", I won't be bluffing. With a great deal of
experience, you may learn not only whether a man is bluffing or has a quality
hand, but the actual cards he holds. This is what people mean when they say a
particular player can "put a man on a hand". My natural ability along
these lines has contributed a lot to my success. I remember playing in a
game where you could almost tell what Jimmy Cassella
had by the amount he would raise. That's the only thing you had to know. With
an A 10 in Hold 'em, he'd raise about $100; with an A
J, he'd raise $125, and so forth. Other players have
patterns that, while less pronounced, are definitely visible to a Poker
Professional. You take into account the way they are sitting, their previous
playing habits, how they bet, and often even the tone of their voices. It's the
totality of everything about them rather than any one particular thing.
ESP - it's a
Jellyroll This book will deal
scientifically with Tells and with psychology, but sometimes you don't even
know how you know ... only that you're sure of what your opponent has. I believe some good
Poker players actually employ a degree of extrasensory perception (ESP). While
I've never studied the subject in depth, it seems to me there's too much
evidence to ignore that ESP exists or that most people have it to some degree.
Everybody has had the experience of riding with someone else in an automobile
and thinking of a song, then being surprised to hear his companion start
singing that very song. You can't imagine how
often I've called a player's exact hand to myself and been proven right.
There's even a plausible, though completely unproven, explanation how a person
could know what cards another player is holding. The brain's functions involve
electrical impulses. In this electronic age we're becoming more familiar every
day with Appliances which broadcast, purely as an unintentional by product,
energy impulses which are picked up on dissimilar appliances at considerable
distances. Is it really too
unreasonable to suspect that such a highly sophisticated electrical device as
the human brain, during the intensity of concentration in a big pot, could
broadcast a simple message like a "pair of Jacks" a mere eight feet? I hope I live to see
that question answered, and not merely asked. I like to think of ESP as a
Jellyroll anyway. In the meantime, use all
the sophisticated techniques and strategies presented in this book in
determining whether or not to call, bet or raise. But
in the rare situations when all your card knowledge and best judgement leave
you in doubt, go with your strong feeling ... and not against it.
Superstitions - There
Are Bigger Faults
I don't believe in the
traditional superstitions, but there are a couple that I still honor. Like most Poker players, I don't like to be paid in
$50 bills. But there's also a reason for that. It's easy to mistake a $50 bill
for a $5 bill. And I don't eat peanuts
at a card table. There's no reason in the world eating peanuts should affect
the outcome of the game, but it doesn't cost me anything to observe the taboo
against it, so I observe it. That's a jellyroll, too. And ... there are bigger
faults a player can have. When I lose a pot, I
sometimes get up and walk around the chair. Some Poker players do that to
change their luck. I do it just to cool off. Nor do I like to see
women at a Poker table. That's not superstition, either. I was brought up to
respect women, and I just don't feel comfortable in high stakes warfare against
women. I've never met a woman
who was a really top player. Maybe that's because there aren't a lot of women
players. I have, however, seen some who were pretty good, even by Professional
standards. I doubt that any of my
children will decide to play professionally. It can be a very good life, and it
has been for me, but my children haven't come from the background that produces
good Poker players. You try to make life a little easier for your kids than it was
for you (and rightfully so), but the other side of that coin is that they're
not forced to be so competitive when they're young, and are unlikely to develop
the instinct it takes to be a good player.
Honor - A Gambler's Ace in the Hole It is good insurance to
have the reputation and respect that make it possible for you to borrow money,
but borrowing is to be avoided. The first time I came to I was completely broke
when I got home to Don't borrow from
anyone you don't want to loan money to. I could've made a faster
comeback by borrowing money, but you have to be careful whom you borrow from in
the gambling business. And if you make up your mind to use the credit you have,
you may not manage your money so well, or the money you borrow. When you've mismanaged
somebody's money, it is hard to compete against him. It's hard even to play in
the same game. Make it a practice never
to be staked, never to borrow money if you can help it. And if you can't help
borrowing, borrow the minimum, and pay it back on the exact day you
promise...or sooner. You must maintain a
reputation for honor in the gambling business. Your
word must be your bond. It'll be your Ace in the hole.
Be As Competitive As
You Can Be Few people realize how
intensely competitive you must be to become a good Poker player. I couldn't
play Poker just for fun, and I don't think many of the top Professionals could.
I've always played to win, and whenever I could discover any bad habits, I've
tried to eliminate them just as I would try to eliminate mistakes in a business
I might be running. Use your best game
against anybody you play. Many of the top Pros are close friends, but they
almost never give each other a break in a game. Sailor Roberts, for instance,
is one of the best friends I've ever had. He helped pick me up when I was young
and unknown and broke. But when I play cards with Sailor, I do my level best to
cut his throat and he tries to cut mine. It's been like that from the time we
met. In fact, the first time we played he broke me. In the trade, this
characteristic is called Alligator Blood, and it is highly valued and
respected. It means you'll do anything within the rules to win. You try to have
special moves, such as making a slow, hesitant call in place of a fast call,
when a man might bet at you again (after the next card is turned up in Hold 'em). You might set a trap for him by leading him to believe
you're betting a hand which is a slight favorite,
when you actually have a hand that's practically unbeatable. I go into a Poker
game with the idea of completely destroying it. Changing gears is one of
the most important parts of playing Poker. It means shifting from loose to
tight play and vice versa. Don't do it gradually...it works better to switch
suddenly. Once they catch on, change gears again. If you're playing with a
lineup of people who have played you before, do this
even more often. When you really think they know you, change gears several
times in one game. In a No Limit game, the
gear to stay in most of the time is the one that most people at the table are
not using. In other words: Play mostly
tight in a loose game, and mostly loose in a tight game. I also vary my play
according to how I'm going. If I am losing badly, I play tighter. If I'm
winning, I try to play looser. Players are more apt to be intimidated by me
when I'm winning. When I'm playing a No
Limit game like Hold 'em or Deuce to Seven
Lowball, if I win a pot, I nearly always play the next pot as well, within
reason. Although the cards will break even in the long run, card rushes
do happen. A card rush means more than that you're winning a lot of pots. It
also means that you have temporary command of the game. Your momentum is clear
to all the players. On occasions like this you're going to make correct
decisions and your opponents may make errors because they are psychologically
affected by your rush. Make the most of these opportunities and give
yourself the chance to enjoy them to the fullest. Art and Science:
Playing Great Poker Takes Both Poker is more art than
science, and that's what makes it so difficult to master. Knowing what
to do the science is about 10% of the game. Knowing how to do it the art is the
other 90%. You not only have to know when to bet, when to raise, and when to
fold...you also have to be able to do those things with a
certain finesse. But one has to start
with the basics. There are certain things about probabilities that you
absolutely must know. The first is that the cards
break even. If you turn over 13 cards from a deck, then reshuffle, and do this
again and again, the Ac will show up just as many times (one out of four) if
I'm shuffling them or if you're shuffling them yourself. Over a long period of
time, the worst player in the world is going to catch just as many good cards
as the best player in the world. We'll have the same
cards to play, but I'll beat him sooner or later because I'm a better player. That's universally true.
It applies to all forms of Poker. But...as you'll soon
discover...there are certain games that involve a lot more skill than others.
You have to know what to do with your cards in all types of Poker, but the
relative importance of that knowledge varies with the kind of Poker you're
playing.
Another thing you should
understand is that Poker is set up in a fashion that is not entirely logical. A
Royal Flush is the highest hand. But it's just as hard to be dealt exactly Jd 9c 6s 4h 2d as Ah Kh Qh Jh
10h, but the first hand is worthless. A Flush is better than a Straight because
it's harder to make than a Straight. But the ranking of the
cards themselves is arbitrary. There's no real reason a King should be worth
more than a Deuce. (And that's a very good justification for playing high
cards, particularly in games where winning hands often consist of a mere Pair.
It's just as easy to make a Pair of Kings as it is to make a Pair of Deuces ...
but the Kings will get the money.) In any Poker game you're
in ... remember that it takes a stronger hand to call a raise than it takes to
raise it yourself. Also,
remember that in Limit Poker, you must show down the best hand most of the time
to win. In No Limit, on the other hand, you more often than not take a pot
without ever showing your hand. If
you've never had the opportunity to see a real No Limit game, you'd be very
surprised how much bluffing there is. Good No Limit players bluff four or five
times as often as good players in Limit games. You have to pick your
players to bluff. You can hardly bluff a Sucker at all, whereas any good
player can be bluffed. But always bear in mind the player's mood that
particular day ... if he's anxious to play, you handle him more cautiously than
you would otherwise. Bluffing is the main
reason I believe No Limit Poker requires more skill thin Limit. Bluffing in No
Limit requires real strategy, and the ability to size up your opponents every
time you sit down to play. Yet, paradoxically,
Poker becomes easier the higher the stakes of the game, at least in games where
Professionals are involved. Down in the low Limit
games, the Professionals who are involved don't have much money,
and what they do have they're trying to keep for a stake and to live on. So they're
playing the best Poker they know how to play. But tip in the high
stakes games you encounter big businessmen, bookies, hotel owners,
millionaires...and they're playing for entertainment. And they are not playing
hard.
I've never been as
conservative about money management as most successful people are. I don't
think your bankroll is the only factor you should consider in deciding whether
or not to play in a high limit game. If the game cries out to
be played, in if it's a good game, you feel good, and if you aren't tired, you
should try that game even if it is higher than you normally would play. And you
should stay in it until the game becomes bad or you grow tired. Of course, you make that
decision within reason. Any time you extend your bankroll so far that if you
lost, it would really distress you, you probably will lose. It's tough to play
your best under that much pressure. I prefer using judgement
on individual games rather than hard rules, but if you want such a rule, I
would suggest you not play $10 limit until you have at least a $1000 bankroll
(not the buy in). In No Limit, you'll
usually want a bigger bankroll for a game of the same general size. In a No
Limit game with two Blinds of $5 and $10, I'd say you need at least $2,500. To play No Limit $5,
$10, $25 and $50 (Four Blinds), you'd need about $10,000. It's been a long time
since I was broke, but the way I always got broke was by playing with
desperation money. I let myself get into too much of a hurry, and played in
games I didn't have the bankroll for. If you have a limited
bankroll, be very certain to get the maximum amount of gamble you can for your
money. That's an important factor to consider in picking your games. If you
have only a Small amount of money to invest in a game, and if you have a wide
choice of games (like you do in Las Vegas), you may be better off playing a
small No Limit game than a high Limit game. If you have $10,000 you can afford
to lose in one game, you might be better off risking it in a No Limit game,
simply because if you do get lucky, you can win real big and your bankroll
might get healthy fast. When I buy into a No
Limit game, I want to have as many checks in front of me as anybody else at the
table, or more. I'm not afraid, and you shouldn't be afraid, of getting drawn
out on a hand and going through the whole stack. All your efforts in Poker are
directed toward getting in a position to bet the maximum amount you can on the
hands that are worth it. When those opportunities do occur, you don't want to
be limited in the amount of action you can accept. Always play for Chips, rather than cash. Chips are easier to win.
A $5 chip is the same size as a $500 chip it's just not the same color. If you bet a man $20,000 in $500 chips, that's only
forty chips, two stacks. But if you bet him $20,000 in $100 bills, it would be
a big pile of money, and would tend to freeze him up. The way to get a person
to convert to chips is to point out to him that it takes too long to count out
the bills. It's the truth, and a legitimate reason to change to chips, though
not really the reason you're doing it. It's also to your own
advantage to think of chips as units, and not as money. You may consider your
money status before the game and after the game, but while the game is in
progress it is only a game, and the chips are just
units. You're trying to win as many units as you can. This concept is not
really unique to Poker, when you think about it. All good businessmen realize
that they have to have different standards of what constitutes extravagance in
business, and what constitutes extravagance in their lives outside of business.
And the standard they set for business is often more liberal. They realize that
the house, or the car they buy for their private use
has to be paid for out of profits, rather than out of operating capital. So when they need a new
piece of equipment to make a few more dollars of profit, or just to maintain
their competitive edge, Poker Professionals don't say to themselves: "I
could buy a new house with this money what am I doing risking it in a Poker
game?" They realize that it's operating capital, and not profit, and
therefore not really available to buy that new house or car, anyway. All I'm telling you to
do is apply the same sound principles to the business of playing Poker and that
reminds me of a story. LOWBALL PETE This guy named Lowball
Pete went over to his friend Shorty's house and Pete
said to Shorty: "I've got to have some money,
the baby don't have any food, the rent's due and they're going to throw me out
of my house." So Shorty, who was a good friend
of Pete's said "well I understand, here's
$100." Pete said "thanks Shorty, I'll pay
you back as soon as I can." Shorty said:
"well, I know that. Where are you going now?" And Pete said "I'm
going over to Al's house, they have a $200 limit Lowball game going right
now." Shorty said: "well what difference
does that make, how are you going to play?" And Pete said "Oh...I've
got money for THAT." The factor that really
determines what kind of game it's going to be is not the limit itself, but the
size of the ante in relation to the limit. If you're playing $10 limit and
anteing a dollar, you'll have to play more liberally than if the ante is only a
quarter. This is very important
information because it's something you can ascertain before you ever sit
down and risk any of your money. That information, and all the other pre game data you can collect
(such as the kind of players your opponents are) should be weighed against the
following consideration: How much do you stand to win in this game? Suppose
the ante is so high, and the players are such that you'll have to involve
$8,000 or $9,000 of your own money to win, but the players have only about
$30,000 among them on the table, and you know that they probably won't bring
any more money into the game if they lose that. It's pretty hard to get more
than about half the money in a game, so $15,000 would be a big win. To go into that game
you'd be risking $8,000 or $9,000 to win a maximum of $15,000, even if you got
the best hands of your life and played them jam up. That's probably too much
risk for that much money, since there's usually a better game down the street. I can remember losing
$98,000 in a game that didn't warrant losing $10,000. I could have only won
$30,000 or $40,000 ... and to do that, I'd have had to break everybody there. So this advice amounts
to telling you to do as I say, and not as I do. I believe a person should try
to learn from watching another man's mistakes. It's so much cheaper than
learning from his own. You have to set a
stricter limit on your losses if you're playing Limit Poker than if you're
playing No Limit, because it's harder to win money back in a game where the
size of the pot's limited. In a Limit game, if you
find yourself losing consistently over a significant period of time and you
feel that the cards have been breaking close to even the game may be too tough
for you. Walk away from it, and don't come back until something has changed to
make you more of a favorite - like the absence of a
few very good players who were there before, or the feeling that you have
improved your own play.
Courage: The Heart of
the Matter I'm asking you to walk a
very thin line between wisdom and courage, and keep a tight rein on both. The
line gets thinner the more you excel at Poker. The reason it's so
narrow a line is that courage is one of the outstanding characteristics of a
really top player. It's important because some people completely break down
when they lose a big pot, and they play very badly after that. Whereas other men play just that much harder. If I could give you a
single player to take as a shining example of true courage, it would be Puggy Pearson. Puggy at his best
is really, really good, but he has suffered long losing streaks. Yet even
during such dismal streaks, his play doesn't rise and fall with the way he's
doing in a particular game. He just keeps trying. Nothing stops him. One of the elements in a
player's courage is the realization that money you have already bet is no
longer yours regardless of how much is involved. You no longer own any money
you've already put in the pot. It belongs to the pot. Your decision must be
based on the current situation. If you feel that large bet is now necessary to
win the pot, then that's what you should do. If you think that there's no way
for you to win the pot, then you have to give it up even if you've already
committed a large amount of money. It's a cliché, but true anyway, don't
throw good money after bad. Another element which
demands courage and judgement is dealing with implied odds. It's a
concept you'll be dealing with in other sections of this book. It means you
have to weigh your bet against not only the present size of the pot, but the
anticipated size of the pot when all psychological and mathematical factors are
evaluated. It takes a lot of courage to risk your money against a profit you
can't see. And it takes courage to move all in with a bluff when you suspect an
opponent is weak, They say courage is invisible, but I never knew a top player
who didn't have it written all over his face - clear as day. The important Twins
of Poker - Come to the table with
enough time to stay and play awhile. While sitting down and trying to destroy a
game by firing from the start is my favorite
strategy, it doesn't always work. There are games that demand staying power. Limit games take lots of
patience because the best hands are usually shown down that means it's harder
to bluff successfully. So you have to wait for the best hand, and you have to
recognize the best hand when you get it. Or suppose you sit down
at a game that includes two drunks who are calling every bet. It will be
impossible to simply take charge of that game, so you'll have to wait until you
get hands that will beat them. OTHER IMPORTANT Alertness Whenever you're in a
game...you have to stay alert the whole time concentrate during the entire
session. And it can be a very long time indeed. The ability to stay
alert for long sessions can be a major factor contributing to your earning
power, and it has been a key to my own success. Once, when I was in my middle
twenties, I played five days and five nights without any breaks except to go to
the bathroom or to eat meals which were brought in. I never left the table for
more than five minutes. I
wouldn't do it again, and I wouldn't recommend anyone else do
it. I never again had the stamina I did before that session. But it
demonstrates how long it's humanly possible to stay awake and alert when you
have the resolve and the courage. Today,
at the age of 44, I suspect I could and would play three days in a game where I
could make a great deal of money. But I don't like to play that long now, not
only because it's gruelling and not particularly healthy, but because it's bad
policy to play anything but the best you can. (And that's simply not possible
much beyond the first day.) I can play at my best
for about 36 hours now, but after that the drop off becomes noticeable to me,
if not to my opponents. The reason I have more staying power than other players
is just discipline. Discipline I don't drink much, and
neither do most good Poker players. And,
I NEVER drink when I play. No top player drinks while playing. Nor do
we let our minds dwell on personal problems when we're playing. You should make a
conscious and constant effort to discover any leaks in your play and...then eliminate them. If you discover you're playing too many
pots...tighten up. Other times you may need to play more pots. One form of discipline
is to learn to play all Poker games, profitably...even those you don't like.
Keep yourself alert and conditioned by playing some of the games you're not
best at. Besides...it'll enable you to give the other guy a little action at
his game if he wants it. Try to keep a mental
record of the kinds of games in which you do well, as opposed to those in which
you don't. (I know, for example, that Limit Ace to Five is my worst
game, because I've won the least money at it.) Constant self discipline
will pay off in those long. drawn out sessions because
any bad habits you have will become exaggerated as you grow tired. The fewer
bad habits you have, the less risky it is to play longer sessions. Discipline will also
help your general confidence after three or four losing sessions. If I lose a
few times, I will re examine my game and ask, "Am I playing bad?"
Sometimes I'll ask somebody else's opinion as well. If the answer is "No,
you're not playing badly, you're just playing unlucky", I can believe the
answer because I know I've done everything I could to keep my game at its best.
So my confidence is unshaken. I can continue to play the way I know I should. Maintaining confidence
is your strongest defense against "going
bad". When you start to go bad, or just start to think you're going bad, you become hesitant. And that oft quoted rule that your
first instinct is the right one is more true in Poker
than in any other game. When you act hesitantly, you often go against your
first (and best) judgement. Allowing
your confidence to be shaken can turn a simple losing streak into a terrible
case of going bad.
At the
same time, you still have to remain open to the idea that you may need to shape
up your play. You know about how often you can expect to lose, just on the
basis of luck, and if you have a streak of many straight losses, you must admit
(to yourself) that something might be wrong. If so, try to correct it. For instance, if I lost
five straight sessions at one of my better forms of Poker. I'd suspect
something basic was wrong. If I lost ten straight, there would be no doubt
whatever that I was doing something wrong, and that luck was not the main
thing. You may also be
fortunate enough to have the unforgettable experience of going good. But
that's no more a matter of luck than going bad. There are reasons for
it. Controlling Your
Emotions Romantic problems have
the biggest effects, of course. I have seen very good, solid players (even by
Professional standards) thrown into second childhood by their wives or girl
friends. Emotional entanglements affect their judgement at everything.
And, at the Poker table, of course, it costs them money. They divert their
interest to their love affairs. They don't concentrate. They have trouble
sitting and they want to get up and walk around. Poker doesn't really interest
them. I'm sure that any kind
of trauma involving my wife or children would affect me much the same way. But,
I wouldn't be playing at such a time. It's hard to give
anybody advice about this, but I believe that if something happens that is so
upsetting that it really affects your ability to play, you should consider
quitting entirely at least for a time, until you regain your emotional balance.
I've been fortunate
enough not to go through any traumas of that sort, but it seems to me that
taking a long break because of a big problem is a logical extension of the
proven practice of taking a short break because of a little problem. So, you'll
be doing yourself a service, if you follow this rule: Never play when you're upset It's not my disposition
to get upset very easily, but I have saved a great deal of money over the years
by quitting whenever I have lost enough money to bother me, And that is an even
more important principle in Limit Poker than in No Limit...because it takes you
so much longer to grind it out at Limit. About once every three
or four months something will happen (like a fight at home, or an argument with
a friend) that will get me upset. On those days I go see a movie or play golf.
I'll pass a game up on those days, regardless of how good it is, because I know
I'll probably lose if I play.
Actually SCHEDULE
VACATIONS And if you're playing
Professionally, remember to take some vacations. You've got to give your mind a
rest. Once, my friend Jack
Straus had come by a game just to watch me play, and he told me "Doyle,
you're playing terrible." I had been under the
impression I was playing pretty well, but I hadn't been winning as often as
usual. Jack pointed out to me that I had been playing almost every day for a
year. So I went to Hawaii for
two weeks, and when I came back I not only played better, but dramatically
better, than I had before leaving. Looking back, it's worth
noting that even though I do a lot more self examining than most Poker players,
I had failed to recognize how badly my game was Off, and why it was off, until
jack pointed it out to me. Because it's so
difficult to recognize when you're going stale, I think it's best to take some
vacations even when you think you don't need them. Schedule them. There's such a great
difference in the makeup of people that I can't tell you how often you should
go. But it seems to me that it would be better to err on the side of too many
vacations than too few. They don't have to be lengthy. But there should be
three or four days in which you're having fun and not thinking about Poker at
all. Hunt, fish, or just lie on the beach you'll be a better player afterward. The occasional break
makes it easier to get a perspective on how you're doing, and what your
abilities are. That's very important. Sure,
you want to study the emotional makeup of your opponents. But of all the
players at the Poker table, the one whose capabilities and limitations are
going to affect you most, is the one sitting in your chair.
BE VERSATILE Having recognized those
capabilities and limitations, it's best to test them occasionally, not only to
see if your assessments are still valid, but also to maintain a reputation of
being willing to give action. I know very well that I
play any kind of No Limit Poker better than almost any kind of Limit Poker. And
I know that Hold 'em is my best game, and Ace to Five
my worst. But that doesn't mean I
won't play anything but No Limit Hold 'em. I've seen
too many players who won't play unless everything is in their favor won't play unless the game is right, won't play
unless it's their game, and then won't bet unless they have the nuts. I reject their
philosophy for what I consider the best of reasons ... none of those players
has any real money. If you get a reputation for playing only when you have
the best of it, you'll get very few people to play against you. So I end up playing a
lot of games in which I'm not a big favorite, just to
stimulate action, and keep Poker going. Even if you lose money
by doing that, at least you have put it back into the Poker economy of which
you are a part, which isn't the case if you blow it in the casino on Craps or
spend it on a trip to Europe or anything else. By playing the other
man's game, you may get him to agree to play yours in return. By participating in the game of
the day, you make it hard for others to shut you out with a game you don't
play. (If you're an all around player, you do play his game.) Once they've
decided that you'll play whatever the game is, most players will go back to
lobbying for the game at which they think they're the best. That may well be
your own strongest game. By playing games like
High Low Split, Razz, Seven Card Stud, and Draw Poker, I may get a weaker player
to face me, because I don't have a great reputation at those games. Finally, by playing
those games I maintain a reputation as a man who will bet on something at which
he has no real advantage. A reputation for giving action. Don't worry that you might
get a reputation for being a Sucker if you follow this advice. That's the best
thing that could possibly happen to you. (To have the reputation of being a
Sucker, with everybody in the world throwing their money at me trying to win
mine, would be my idea of earthly paradise!) YOUR REPUTATION can be a two edged sword The opposite kind of
reputation is, of course, a two edged sword. It cuts both ways. After winning
the World Hold 'em Championship two years in a row,
it is understandably hard for me to get a lot of high Hold 'em
action Ideally, you want a
reputation (particularly in Hold 'em) that will make
other players just a little afraid of you. Not so afraid they won't play... but
afraid enough to respect you. There isn't really any
good way of establishing your credentials as a top Poker player except to get
to the top and stay there. Playing head up against
another good player, for instance, is not a realistic test of who's the best
player because it happens that some people who are very good at head up play
are not very good in a Ring game ... and vice versa. The perfect test would
probably be to have the same line up (set of players), playing against each
other five nights a week for a year. There would be no extraneous factors (like
the introduction of new players), and almost no amount of luck could keep the
best player from winning the most money over a period of a year (providing
there was a real difference in the quality of play between the best and the
second best player).
TOURNAMENTS: But in the absence of
games like that, about the only way for a man to establish a reputation quickly
is to enter and win (or perform well in) a Poker tournament. But, that's not the only
motivation for entering a tournament. By the time I won the World Hold 'em Championship, the title of champion didn't mean much to
me. There are only a very few people who are good enough players themselves
that I value their opinion that I'm a good one. Since all of these men are also
Professionals, they know who is the best player without having to hold a
tournament to decide it. Believe me, the main
motivation was the $220,000 it paid me in 1976, the first year I won, and the $340,000
in 1977 the second year. (I also won $90,000 in the Deuce-to-Seven World
Championship in 1976 and in 1977 I won $55,000 in the High Low Split
World Championship.) But, you don't have to
win the tournament to profit by it ... even a winner take all tournament. The
tournament itself will generate other games which can make the buy in price of
the tournament even the $10,000 buy in Hold 'em
Championship a bargain for a good player. After people start
getting eliminated from the Hold 'em Championship,
there's a solid week of the best Poker action to be found anywhere. Everybody
is still in a mood to gamble, and most of them have the money to do it. Not only do you get a
chance at that money by being at the tournament, but you get to know these
people, and because they're from all over the country, you develop contacts
that can get you a game almost anywhere. The contacts and side
games at the World Series of Poker* are so valuable that a lot of
players who could afford to enter don't bother to. They show up for the side
games and contacts alone. I think that's often a
mistake. Playing in the tournament itself helps you establish a reputation as
an action man who's willing to risk a significant amount of money in a game,
even if he doesn't have any substantial advantage. And action is the most
important aspect of the reputation a Professional Poker player has to maintain.
Furthermore, the people
who actually play in the tournaments are the ones who get the chances at the
best action surrounding the tournaments. If you force another player out of a
pot in a tournament, and break him because you're both playing on artificially
limited bankrolls, he may get a little sore about it and invite you to try him
in a regular game. There's nothing like playing somebody who is mad at you to
increase your earnings for the year. *The World Series of
Poker Is a registered trademark of the HORSESHOE HOTEL CASINO In Las Vegas,
Nevada. This brings up one of
the most significant points about tournaments -- the strategy of tournament
play differs from the strategy of ordinary play. It took me longer than
it should have to learn this. I played in the Hold 'em
Tournament for seven years before I won it. Of course, I wanted to win the
money, but another way I'd justify entering the tournament year after year and
it was a legitimate justification rather than a rationalization was on my
general principle of investing money just to promote gambling, and to keep a
reputation for being an action man. Since I felt the need to
be there anyway, I kept pondering how to win. And I noticed that Johnny Moss
always seemed to do very well in the tournaments. I've always been an apostle
of John's at No Limit. I used to observe and watch him in each Poker game I
went to, and it seemed he was always there. Slim, Sailor and I used to joke
about how crazy we were, wearing our automobiles out chasing John all across
Texas. The truth was, John was usually the big winner in the games ... with
myself a close second. As the years passed, the margin between us got closer
and closer because I was watching and picking up his favorite
plays as any young apprentice might watch and learn from the master in his
field. Much of my No Limit strategy comes from those times. I have much more respect
for Johnny than a lot of younger players do. In his prime, he was the best No
Limit player I've ever seen, and a lot of people don't believe that because
they're too young to have seen Johnny play at his best. They fail to take into
account the fact that he's some 70 years old now, and that is 20 years past the
point at which most men's play begins to deteriorate. just because the years
have affected your circulation and the speed at which you think, and may have
softened your ability to play, does not mean you know any less about how to
play. And Johnny's success in those tournaments indicated he knew a great deal
about how to play. (He's the only man besides myself who has won the World
Series more than once.) So I studied Johnny's
strategy and saw that he didn't try to win early in the tournament. He
just tried to exist, and to keep from losing his money. Now, as you may
remember from the earlier part of this section, this is exactly the opposite of
my normal strategy in ordinary games. And I had been trying to win the
tournament the same way I have always won at ordinary games. That was wrong for
tournaments. I had been jeopardizing
my chips on even money situations, which can be a very good strategy in the
early stage of an ordinary Poker game, but is not good in a tournament,
where you can't pull another few thousand out of your pocket and buy more
chips. In my new strategy, I
tried to avoid playing big pots until the field had been narrowed
substantially. Then later, after the field had been cut to a few players, I
played more aggressively, and tried to get players to jeopardize all their
checks at every opportunity. Using this strategy
designed specifically for tournaments, I've won the World Championship the last
two years in a row. It should go without
saying that you should mentally train for a Poker tournament, but there, I said
it anyway because it's so important. You wouldn't go into a Basketball or Golf
tournament without working on your game first and you should give the same
consideration to a Poker tournament. You sit down alone, you concentrate, and
when the first tournament hand is dealt ... you're playing for keeps. One of the things I like
about the World Series of Poker is that it brings out the finest in a
lot of players. There's a friend of mine who doesn't play any good Hold 'em the rest of the year, but always plays pretty well in
the World Series. It's been an expensive
lesson to him each year, but I keep hoping that the tournament will make him
realize he could be playing tough the whole year round. Tournaments are not
always won by the best player. You have to be good to win, but you can be the
very best and not win in a tournament. Every year at the World
Series we have half a dozen or so who always make it to the last couple of
tables, but have never won and never will win. Some are very
solid players in ordinary situations, but just not quite good enough to win in
a game against four or five of the best. And some are as solid as they come,
but just don't have the killer instinct they fade at the finish. When you're in a
tournament, and it becomes obvious to you that you're probably going to lose, I
think it's best to die with a bang, rather than a whimper. Go out playing with
courage, instead of playing tight and meekly. For one thing, it gives
you the better of those two famous chances - slim and none to stay alive long
enough to win. If you play conservatively on a low bankroll, the antes, which
increase as the tournament goes on, will eat you up. If you do get eliminated
early, you can get into those very rich side games I mentioned earlier. BE COMPETITIVE with
Class When you do get into
those side games, I hope you'll remember not to kill the goose that laid the
golden egg. A lot of people who come to tournaments don't really have much
chance of going home winner. They're people who like to play high, largely for
the enjoyment, and are willing to pay for the pleasure. A few years ago there
was such a man who played in the World Series. He wasn't a good player,
but he could afford to lose, and besides that, we all liked him. But one of the World
Class players (a big name player) got that man into a side game and made some
kind of Sucker play at him, and the fellow went for it. So instead of just
taking his winnings gracefully, our "big name" player (no name in
this book) showed everybody at the rail what he had done. Then to make matters
worse, one of our local bookmakers made this poor fellow a 100 to 1 shot not to
win the tournament. (Nobody likes to be a 100 to 1 dog.) The guy left, and he
hasn't been back. Each of the Professionals had invested $10,000 every year for
several years, knowing he probably would not win it, but did it anyway to
stimulate action. And then these two guys (the "big name" and the
bookmaker) drove off one of the biggest action men we had ever attracted just
for the sake of a few cruel laughs. That's not only bad
manners ... it's bad business. It's not only conduct unbecoming a gentleman,
but especially conduct unbecoming a Professional Poker player. I don't care if
you're playing $1 ante or $10,000 buy in don't ever be guilty of it. Be highly competitive
... but do it with class. Chapter Two: If you've never played
Hold 'em, you're about to learn about the most fascinating of all the various
forms of Poker. If you have played it, then you know what I'm talking about. Hold 'em has more
variety to it than any other form of Poker. And more complexity. It has
something for everybody ... the mathematicians and psychologists ... the
"loose gooses" and the "hard rocks". Above all, it has action
... more multi way action than any other game. Almost every pot you get
involved in will be tremendously exciting. The thrills and frustrations are
never ending. Once you play Hold 'em ... you may never want to play any other
form of Poker again. It could become your main game. It's converted a lot of
other players. But, of course, it's
Poker...so it's similar in many respects to other Poker games especially Seven
Card Stud. However, there are enough differences in the strategy you use and
the mathematics you apply to Hold 'em - to make it a truly unique game. The
mere fact that it can be played with as many as 23 players is an oddity that
alone distinguishes it from any other form of Poker. (However, Hold 'em is
rarely played with more than 11 players in the Limit version and No Limit Hold
'em is most often played with nine players.) Because Hold 'em may be
unfamiliar to you, it's the only game where I'm going to discuss its simple
mechanics. In both Limit and No Limit, the game is always played with a Blind.
The first player to receive cards is said to be in the Blind and must
make a forced bet to start the action. It's also a live Blind which
means the player in the Blind has the option of raising when the action
gets back to him or he can simply "call" (without putting anymore
money in the pot) if his Blind bet is not raised. In Limit Hold 'em there is
usually a single Blind and each player (including the Blind) must ante. No
Limit Hold 'em is also played that way. Additionally, the No Limit version is
commonly played with multiple Blinds and no ante. In a casino, the game is
dealt by a House dealer and a Button (an object that physically resembles a
small Hockey puck) is placed in front of the last player to receive cards. The
player with the Button is considered to be the dealer and the first player to
his left is considered to be the (first) Blind. A private game may or may not
have a paid dealer. If it doesn't, each player takes turns dealing. In the
casino, the Button is moved from player to player after each pot. The game starts with
each player receiving two hole cards the only ones he personally receives.
Then, there is the first round of betting. Quite often in No Limit play that
bet is also the last round of betting because someone makes a huge bet (or
moves in with all the money he has in front of him) and no one calls him.
That's not an uncommon play. I do it often when I think I can pick up the antes
and when I feel someone has made a weak bet. A pot in Limit Hold 'em seldom ends so quickly. There's a second round of betting after the 'dealer burns (removes from play) the top card,* deals off three cards face down and Flops them over in the |