Keeping your emotions in check

One of the most important attributes of a true poker professional is that he never lets his emotions get the better of him. Letting emotions rule his actions is the most counterproductive thing that can happen to a poker player.

Texas Holdem features an extremely jerky short-term variance. That means that you will sometimes lose on hands in which you have a huge edge. Despite all that, if you continue to make good decisions and play only EV+ situations, you will walk away a winner in the long-run.

Many people have a tough time dealing with the short-term variance. Most of the reasons behind the adverse reaction can be traced back to human nature which was in turn shaped by the way we were brought up. In an increasingly bi-polar world, the concept of right and wrong, good and evil, positive and negative are more and more prevalent.

Even though, theoretically speaking, there is no such thing as good or evil in life (what might be the best thing for one person may be another man’s worst nightmare), we continue to believe that if we are 90% favorites for winning a hand, there has to be something unfair about us losing it. We start to blame different things (most frequently the poker software) for dealing a board which defeats our 90% favorite. We never ponder that being a 90% favorite also means that we are in fact 10% underdogs, nor do we ever consider that despite losing one particular hand with such odds, we did in fact do the right thing strategy-wise.

If you continue to play another 99 hands after the one you lost on a 90-10% match-up, you will lose exactly 9 more times and win 90 times, which means you’ll walk away with a huge stack.

Interestingly enough it’s not just the beginners who have problems keeping their emotions in check. Some of the biggest pros lose control sometimes too, and let a glimpse of human nature shine through the iron masks they don every time they belly up to the green felt.

Take a look at the following video:

if you need proof of that.

Dave “Devilfish” Ulliott takes Phil Hellmuth Jr on in a hand in which his aces eventually fall to Helmuth’s pocket 9s. Out of all poker professionals, Uliott should probably be the one to know the most about right and wrong, yet he blows up in a rather shameful display of suburban aggression, first targeting Hellmuth then the dealer, then the person (organizer?) who threatens to disqualify him for his behavior.

Sure it must have been tough to see your aces succumb to pocket 9s heads-up, especially after waiting around for such a redeeming hand to come by for quite a while. That however doesn’t justify the misdirected anger that the British pro cast out in every direction. That’s one of the problems with turning emotional in poker: regardless of whom you blame for your bad beat, your anger will always be misdirected, and you’ll always end up looking like a bully, a donk or both.

Now then, with all the respect due to Dave Ulliott, who definitely cannot be branded as a donk, he does come through as a bully and as a whiner especially when he attacks the dealer and the tournament director. Not only does language like that have no place at the poker table, such behavior doesn’t do anyone any favors either. At the end of the day, both players made the right move: Ulliott got Hellmuth all in with rockets against 9s, and he got slapped by Lady Luck. I don’t think the dealer had anything to do with it, or anyone else for that matter. Ulliott should have been pleased with himself for making the right call. Whatever happened to the good old Sklansky dollars…what’s that? They don’t really matter in a tournament, huh?

How to beat $1/$2 NL Holdem tables

While most poker news usually go on about high stakes games between established professionals on Full Tilt or PokerStars, the majority of online poker action takes place at much lower limits. I’m not talking about the micro limits most beginners play at once they outgrow the play money tables. I’m talking about low limit games which offer players the possibility to make some serious money indeed. I’m talking about $1/$2 NL Holdem.

The minimum buy-in for such a table is usually $40, the maximum buy-in is $200. That means you’ll actually be able to make some pretty good money as players need to come to the table with more than a couple of bucks and some cents on the side.
$1/$2 NL Holdem cash tables are some of the most popular in every poker room. This means that while some of the players you’ll meet here will be skilled, the majority of them will be fish. Whether you personally like to play against fish or not is your problem, I can tell you one thing though: complaints about how difficult it is to play against bad players because all they ever do is call and they never seem to pick up tells you want them to, doesn’t make any sense at all. I know that here’s schooling at these tables, and I know that sometimes it can be frustrating to be outdrawn by the same clueless newbie for the third consecutive time, but believe me: you want to play against such players much rather than against skilled professionals.

This is where the money is, these players make mistakes all the time (they call too many of your preflop raises, they take their losing hands too far, they play way too many starting hands etc), and that’s exactly what you’ll make your money off of.

Holdem is a high short term variance game: the luck factor has a huge impact in the short haul. In the long-run however, skill will always win out over luck and you will make money if you keep your mistakes to a minimum.
Beating $1/$2 NL Holdem tables should be a simple enough task. All you have to do is play good old “healthy” poker, that is be tight about your starting hands, play extremely tight past the flop and value bet the monsters you get all the way.

This may sound overly simplistic but trust me: the players you’ll go up against at these low stakes NL tables won’t give a damn about the fact that you folded your last 20 hands, nor will they ever acknowledge the table image you so painstakingly build. There’s absolutely no need for you to venture into such complicated strategic shenanigans. Sticking to rock-solid tight-aggressive play will be enough to make you money.
Play starting hands like high pocket pairs (10,10 – A,A) because these are already made hands, low pocket pairs (like 2,2 – 9,9) because these are excellent implied odds hands and if they happen to hit a set on the flop they’ll take down a huge pot for you.

A,K, K,Q, Q,J are also relatively good starting hands because they carry the potential for a top pair good kicker, which too is likely to earn you money from calling stations. The kicker becomes extremely important at these NL tables and many a hands will be decided by the kicker you have for your top pair.

Make sure you do not get drawn into playing all sorts of starting hands like K,5 by the other players. If they want to play such hands, let them do it: every time they make such a move they generate value for you.

Playing suited connectors and even suited one-gappers is also a good idea, mainly because these hands carry excellent implied odds as well.

Remember, cash games place no pressure on you whatsoever. Don’t feel awkward if you have to wait around for that good hand to come. This is not a tournament and the blinds will not escalate. Be patient and disciplined and you shall prevail.

The big laydown

Over the long-run, every player is dealt the same quality cards. Because the luck factor only makes its presence felt through the starting hands (and the ones dealt onto the board) I suppose it’s safe to say that the difference between good and bad players is made by the way they play their hands.
Good players can make more money on the same hands than bad players. Give two guys A,A two or three times during a session, and track how they play it. You’ll see that there are radical differences between how good players make their monsters pay and how bad players do.

One of the biggest mistakes beginners make is that they get married to the good starting hands they pick up and they refuse to let go of them, even when it becomes obvious that they’re beat. An A,A is therefore extremely dangerous for a rookie, who knows he’s going to commit a large amount of money on it.
Even experienced players often fall victim to such hands, which are monsters preflop, but may end up to be tame pets after it. These guys often shove a lot of money in before the flop and after it, only to say they’re pot-committed anyway when it becomes suspicious they may be riding the second best hand at the table.
Bear one thing in mind in this respect: regardless how big a percentage of your stack you’ve shoved into the pot, you’re NOT pot committed if you’re fairly sure you’re going to lose.
Folding a hand like pocket rockets when faced with the solid suspicion of having been outdrawn is the mark of the greats.

Allen Cunningham is definitely one of the greats, and after taking a look at this video:

You too will probably nurture a healthy respect for his skills.
Faced with Phil Ivey in a Million Dollar Cash Game hand, Cunningham is dealt a pair of rockets. Ivey gets a pair of 2s (which is one of the best hands you can wish for in a cash game, especially when you’re deep-stacked like he is here), and Mike Matusow picks up a K,Qo.

Things are going smoothly till the flop lands (there’s not much preflop action), but that’s where things precipitate. The flop comes 2,9,6, just the kind of cards Ivey is looking for. Not only does it hit him for the set, it doesn’t land any high cards which might endanger his hand. Thus he is in a perfect position to exploit the implied odds he got for his low pocket pair before the flop. He fires out a bet on the flop to push Matusow out and to build up the pot. Cunningham calls him, and they go to the turn which lands a 4. Ivey is obviously still in the saddle and he knows it. He leads out with a 15k bet which gets Cunningham thinking. I suspect he already smells that Ivey is out to build the pot, which means his aces are probably no good, whatever Ivey is holding. In the same time, he’s aware that the call he made on the flop has probably clued Ivey in that he has an overpair.
He makes the call nonetheless, and the flop comes the 10s. That card represents a clear sign to Cunningham that the hand is effectively over and that he lost all the money he shoved into the pot.

Ivey bets 35k and what follows is something quite remarkable: Cunningham tells him that’s exactly the kind of money he figured he was supposed to bet. He then goes on to fold his rockets and dodge a bullet in a hand in which few players would ever have been able to make the same sort of laydown. This video captures the game of poker at its best here, and even if you’re a Phil Ivey fan, you must admit Cunningham took him to school here.
The true skill is not in the fact hat he makes the laydown, rather, it’s in how manages to read one of the best cash game players in the world.

Tom Dwan vs Patrik Antonius

Tom Dwan’s million dollar challenge appears to have found an adversary for the most active high stakes online player in the world. Long time foe and friend Patrik Antonius will apparently pick up the gauntlet and attempt to take advantage of the favorable odds offered by Dwan to his opponent in the $1 million challenge he’s announced a while ago.
It’s not like the two of them haven’t had any high stakes tussles before: they know each other quite well, and that might act as a cooler for those who were hoping for something truly unique and out of the ordinary.
Experts have pointed it out the day durrrr has launched his challenge that even though the challenge was theoretically addressed to poker players all over the world, practically it was directed at a small selection of poker pros Patrik Antonius is actually part of.

Here are a few high stakes hands in which the two have locked horns before and their outcomes.
In one of the biggest pots the two have fought over, durrrr took a $74,697 stack from Antonius on a hand in which he did indeed have plenty of luck on his side and hit a perfect hand situation. Heads-up, durrrr made a preflop raise with his 5d,4d and got a call from Antonius who had 6,6 in his pocket. The turn came 8,4,7 (no flush draw for either player involved), and Antonius made a pot sized bet. Durrrr called him, with Antonius slightly ahead in the hand. The turn card was the one that sealed Antonius’ fate as it landed a 6 which not only gave durrrr a straight, but more importantly gave Antonius a set which he rightfully believed to be the best hand at the table. All the money went in on the turn, and the river landed a Q which was irrelevant for the outcome.

In the very next hand, Antonius reloaded to 50k and got a pair of Qs in the pocket. That meant a preflop all-in for him, but little did he know that Dwan had picked up a couple of Ks and was all too eager to call him. To add insult to injury, the flop landed a third K to give Dwan a set and to felt Antonius once again. This pot was a $102,999 one.

The third largest pot the two have played for was a $180,390 one, and saw durrrr relieve Antonius of a further $90,195. Both players started with pocket pairs, with durrrr in the BB and Antonius in the SB. Durr had a couple of 6s against Antonius’ pocket 10s, and following a preflop raise and a call, the flop landed 4,6,2. All the money went in on the flop, and the A, and 8 that followed on the turn and the river couldn’t help Antonius out.

The second largest pot ever played between these two heavy-weights was a $306,384 one and resulted in Antonius yielding more than $100k to Dwan. Initially a 3-way hand with LarsLuzak, it quickly turned into a 2-man show, right after the flop. Dwan had a pair of 7s in the BB and Antonius had a suited one gapper in the SB (8,6s). The flop fell 5,4,5 and saw some quick action from both players as LarsLuzak folded. The 7 on the turn put Dwan in the driver seat and Antonius shoved all-in after the river brought about a K. The rest as they say is history.

Although it’s quite obvious that durrrr dominated Antonius in almost all the big pots they disputed, the biggest one, a $320,000 monster went the latter’s way. It was a preflop all in with Dwan holding A,Kh and Antonius a pair of Js. The board improved none of the hands and Antonius managed to exact some sweet revenge, taking back $158,283, but remaining behind overall.
Now then, these hands may not mean much as far as the challenge is concerned, especially in light of the fact that these were all NL Holdem hands and they’ll be playing PLO at the challenge table. Regardless, there are bound to be some extreme hands there and railbirds will probably be treated to much more than they can chew up and digest for some time to come.

A quick heads-up lesson

If you need a quick lesson in heads-up poker, spare yourself all the reading about and take a look at the following Youtube video:

This is high stakes heads-up poker at its best, and if you were wondering why Phil Ivey is considered one of the best heads-up players in the worlds, it will also answer that question.
As you probably know, the keyword in heads-up poker is aggression. It has been proven statistically over millions of hands that out of two similarly skilled players, the one with the more aggressive attitude wins a higher percentage of the time.
In heads-up poker, starting hand values plummet (that is also wonderfully illustrated in this video) and change radically. The 7,2o is no longer the worst possible starting hand as the nominal values of the cards gain importance over how good drawing hands they are. This way, in heads-up, the 2,3o is the worst possible starting hand.

What this video is about though is more important than any of the above described factors. It illustrates wonderfully that blind aggression is nothing when confronted by a player who knows how to read his opponent. At the end of the day this is the main lesson in heads-up poker strategy: Be aggressive, but do it wisely. Sheer aggression has little to do with poker skill, reading your opponent has everything to do with it.

In the video presented above, you’ll see Phil Ivey square off against Paul Jackson at the Monte Carlo millions heads-up table. The deal hits both players with subpar hands, with Ivey holding a slight advantage, and they limp along to see the flop. As it usually happens in heads-up poker, the flop (which comes 7,J,J) missies both players. This is where the real action begins. Owner of the larger stack, Ivey has to keep the pressure up, so he fires out a probe-bet to gather information on his opponent. Jackson however is not a buyer for such bullying techniques, and he fires a re-raise right back at Ivey, holding a less than modest 6,5o. This is where Ivey picks up his first tell, and decides to dig for some more info before making the decisive move. The flop looks indeed like it has missed both players, and Ivey is fairy certain that his opponent doesn’t hold the third J in his pocket. He re-raises Jackson again to see the move that he makes in response. Jackson does the unthinkable and re-raises him a second time. In my opinion this is where Ivey picks up the tell that he needs. Jackson commits the mistake of trying too hard to represent something which he obviously doesn’t have. Ivey concludes that if Jackson had had the third J, he would’ve gone all-in after his second re-raise. Instead, trying not to burn all bridges behind him, Jackson chose to protect his tournament life while trying to keep the pressure up. His second re-raise is this way a sign of weakness which Ivey pounces on without a second thought. Even though the commentators of the hand and us regular poker grunts thought it impossible for Ivey to stay in the hand, he saw things clearly, analyzed the data for a while then fairly sure of himself he announced he was all-in.

With hind-sight, it’s relatively easy to look for causes behind Ivey’s brilliance, in a real live situation though, I suspect there are very few players in the world who would’ve made the call Ivey did. Being aggressive yet paying cool attention to your opponent’s moves and analyzing the available data with a cool head is what it takes to be successful heads-up. Sure, be aggressive, play a radically wider starting hand selection, but never forget: reading your opponent accurately is where the real skill element comes into the equation.

Scotty Nguyen – The donk bluff

Bluffing has always been one of the main elements of poker. Beyond being a card game, poker is a betting game, and bluffing plays a huge role in the betting part.
One of the most common mistakes beginners commit in poker is that they think bluffing is equally accessible to anyone at the table and that it doesn’t take any special skills. Well, I’ve got news for you: bluffing, just like any other aspect of poker strategy needs to be learned, and perfected over hours upon hours of play. No, it is not something you can just decide to apply any minute and yes, recognizing the right set of circumstances for firing out a bluff does take some special skills.

A professional poker player never fires out a blind bluff. Remember that. Even if it often looks to you like he’s being reckless at the table and that he couldn’t care less where he throws his chips, believe me that it isn’t so.

It is part of the job of a poker pro to create a table image (preferably a reckless one), and every such player has a variety of tools at his/her disposal to achieve the right results in this sense. A poker pro however never tosses his chips around thoughtlessly.
Check out this little Youtube video for instance:

Scotty Nguyen, notorious not only for winning a WSOP Main Event and God knows how many bracelets and smaller live events, but also for his bluffing abilities, is firing out what appears to be a donk-bluff in the direction of Humberto Brennes who didn’t start playing poker yesterday either.

All elements suggesting a donk-bluff are there: Nguyen’s hand is something that – according to the commentator – even the Salvation Army would probably refuse. He doesn’t really let the hand proceed to gain additional reads and to possible transmit some misleading ones to Brennes. He just fires the bluff blindly, and sure enough takes the pot down on it, making Brennes fold the much better hand.
Now, before we all go on to marvel at how recklessly spunky Scotty is, while still managing to take down pot after pot and be successful, let’s analyze the situation a tad deeper. Don’t let Scotty’s apparent calm and apparent slight intoxication confuse you. The guy is a veteran of the green felt, and regardless of how incapable he looks to make a decision, he’s always on top of his game.

First of all, he drops a bit of information about his hand Brennes’ way, something which probably confuses the latter who thinks he’s actually talking about his hand (he actually has the equivalent of a blackjack 21 in his pocket). That makes him hesitate just a little bit before raising, well enough for Scotty to pick up a slight scent of weakness. Don’t you for a second believe that Scotty’s table talk is just conversation for the sake of conversation: he’s looking to pick up tells in his opponent’s reactions. That’s why he makes certain Brennes hears him by telling him again about his 21 (the 8,3 he holds only needs a face-card to improve to 21 in BJ). Watch his eyes after he’s certain Brennes heard him.

That slight message of weakness is what makes Scotty believe he can take that pot down right there before the flop. While it may look like a perfect example of a donk bet, Nguyen already knows it’s going to be his “greatest move ever”.
He’s probably also aided in his bluff by the table image he’s created, by the fact that he is Scotty Nguyen, and by the large sum involved which Brennes probably cannot afford to risk on a coin-flip.
Somebody posted a comment under the clip about what had to be going on in Brennes’ head. I’ll tell you what I think: “how the hell does he know that?”

Firing the second bullet

Bluffing is an important element of poker, and yes, most high profile professionals are adept at it. Why is it then that bluffs never seem to work for you, or for other beginners? After all, isn’t bluffing what poker’s supposed to be about? Well, the answer to that question is yes and no. Yes, bluffing is an integral part of winning poker and no, it is not something you should build your strategy around. It is more of a way to pick up a pot or two when the opportunity presents itself. As to why professionals seem to be much more successful with their bluffs than beginners, the answer is simple: they don’t just fire out their bluffs blindly.
A good poker player knows when the circumstances are right for a bluff, and when they aren’t. Donk bluffs are not based on elaborate circumstances. They’re just let loose, more often than not costing the bluffer a lot of money.
You have to have a read on your opponent, because while it is the aim of the bluff to make your foes fold the better hand, you will never succeed against someone who’s holding the nuts.
The c-bet (continuation bet) is a great example which illustrates the intricate mechanism at work behind a successful bluff. The c-bet is statistically recognized as a high success rate move. The player who fires the second bullet basically takes advantage of the situation he’s created through his preflop aggression. The preflop raise sends a clear message to the other players: I have a hand I like and I want to play it for more chips. The c-bet then comes to re-enforce the initial message, hammering home the advantage and taking down the pot.
C-betting is best done from late position (it can be done from early position as well, but things get extremely complicated that way), and there have to be a number of circumstances clicking in order for a good player to consider it. Opponents have to show weakness (through checking), the board has to look like it has hit the bluffer’s hand, or that it absolutely missed the victim’s etc.
A perfect example of a second bullet being fired for full effect is provided by the following clip:

The hand played between two of poker’s heavy weights, Robert Varkonyi and Scotty Nguyen, both WSOP Main Event Champions, illustrates all too well the intricacies behind a pro’s bluff.
Varkonyi’s bet on the flop can be called a probe bet because it was probably meant as one. The fact that Scotty Nguyen called didn’t unsettle Varkonyi though. He learned that Scotty did have something, and that proved to be precious information later on in the hand. The turning point of the hand was the turn. It fell a Q, a dangerous card for Nguyen, who felt himself threatened enough to just check after Varkonyi had checked to him. At that point Scotty probably saw a trap being built by Varkonyi, a check-raise which he decided to avoid if possible. I suspect he put Varkonyi on a pair of Ks at that point. It was then that Varkonyi received the first sign of weakness from Nguyen, and a read which coupled with the information he had gathered on the flop, probably gave him a pretty good idea of what Scotty was holding. As the river bricked out, Varkonyi obviously felt that everything was coming together for his second bullet to be fired, which he promptly did too. He knew the 4 on the river had missed Scotty who probably got stuck with the hand he had flopped. Nguyen on the other hand saw that second bullet as a confirmation of his fears regarding a check-raise on the turn.
The rest as they say is history.

Hidden hands

In poker, you’re supposed to make your money on the mistakes your opponents make. David Sklansky’s definition of successful poker does indeed say that every time you fail to play a hand the way you would if you could see your opponent’s hole cards, you commit a mistake. The same goes for your opponent as well. Every time you manage to mislead him into playing his hand differently than he would if he could see your cards, you gain value. Your ultimate goal is to make your opponent commit mistakes and misread your hand as often as possible. That’s what winning poker really comes down to. Bear in mind though that you will not be able to deceive your opponents a 100% of the time: successfully exercising deceit in hands that really matter and achieving a high percentage of successfully hidden hands will be enough.

In poker there are two kinds of hidden hands. The better kind is the naturally hidden one. Naturally hidden hands come in all shapes and sizes, some better than the others, however they all have as a common feature the fact that they’re quite impossible to read by your opponents. Naturally hidden hands all make wonderful implied odds opportunities. A classic example in this sense would be low pocket pairs. It is worth to take them to the flop time and time again, even though you know you are going to lose money on these flops, because most of the time they will not give you your set. The few times they do fill you up though, you will take down some giant pots, because of the very fact that your hand is extremely well concealed. Naturally hidden hands use both hole cards most of the time. Always remember: every time you use both your hole cards in your 5-card showdown hand, you stand a much better chance to keep your hand hidden than otherwise.

Suited one gappers are the preferred hand of many a poker pro. This hand offers several benefits. First of all, by playing such hands aggressively, one will almost certainly create a reckless image. Going on to exploit this image afterwards is what most poker pros build their bankrolls on. Suited one gappers appear to be junk to most players, and a person willing to shove that much money in on them must be a reckless character. At a closer look though, you’ll see that the suited one-gapper is not really that bad a hand odds-wise. So in addition to building a very useful table image, our pro doesn’t even make a mathematically incorrect decision.

On top of all that, the suited one gapper offers excellent implied odds, because when it does hit a hand, it becomes impossible to read.
Suited one-gappers make hands like flushes (which are readable) and straights (which are not).

Another way to wake up with a naturally disguised hand is through a redraw. Let’s see an example in order to make this clear. You see the flop with a Kh,Ah and the flop comes Kc, 3h, 6h. In this situation, you already have a made hand on the flop (Top pair, Top kicker) which is quite probably the best hand at the table in that moment. That’s only part of the strength of your hand though as it stands a pretty good chance of hitting the nut flush on the turn or the river. Redraws are extremely important in Holdem and in Omaha as well.

If you fail to get lucky and secure a hand which is unreadable by nature, you’ll have to work to make your hand unreadable. In order to be able to successfully manipulate your opponents though, you have to be adept at reading them.
Against some players, fancy play pays off, against others adopting a more straightforward approach is the key. Always use moderation when attempting to disguise your hands, and start from the premise that you’ll never be completely unreadable anyway.

Multi tabling

If you’re a low to medium stakes cash game player, sooner or later you’ll have to learn to put your edges to work at multiple tables in order to squeeze the most out of the time you spend playing online. In these games, the edges are so small, and so little can be done as far as optimizing your production at a single table is concerned that you need to look for alternative solutions. Fortunately, online poker offers us all the possibility to play at several tables at the same time. Not only will you efficiently maximize your small cash game edges this way, you’ll also make bonus redemption much easier and you’ll generate rakeback at a much faster rate as well.
As you probably know, if you manage to exploit your EV+ situations, you’ll make money in the long-run in any cash game. The true measure of just how efficient you are is given by your hourly rate. This is where multi-tabling comes in: it gives your hourly rate a huge boost. How big that boost is depends on how many tables you’re able to play while maintaining your initial focus and thus preserving your edges.
Playing several tables involves distributed attention, but don’t hit yourself with exaggerated expectations strategy-wise: you won’t be able to pull several fancy moves at the same time. Your strategy will come down to the good old tight aggressive “healthy” approach and that’s about it. The good news is that’s about as fancy as you need to get at most of the tables you play at to make money.
Despite the relatively simple task that you have to fulfill at every table while multi-tabling, the undertaking can be overwhelming for many a player. Here are a few tips to help you cope with the rigors of multi-tabling and thus to make you a more efficient low to medium stakes cash game player:

Use the simplest possible setup for your user interface. Most modern online poker rooms offer fully customizable interfaces. While using all the extra little perks and visual enhancements may improve your gaming experience, drop them when multi-tabling. Take PokerStars’ simplistic interface as an example: the last thing you need when multi tabling are distractions.

Most online poker rooms (if not all of them) offer you the possibility to take notes on your opponents. I know it sounds a little bit of a long-shot to take notes on your opponents while multi tabling but here’s how you should do it: don’t attempt to collect information on people on hands which are not that important to you. You will pay extra attention to the big hands, even if you do not plan on it. Use this momentum to jot your thoughts down: you’ll thank yourself later.

Use the four color deck most online poker rooms offer as an option. It will seem a bit weird in the beginning, but you’ll be able to spot flush draws on the go, and you’ll get used to it sooner than you’d think. This is one feature which is absolutely necessary for multi-tabling.

Sit in the same position at all the tables you play at. Modern online poker software will just rotate the table around you regardless where you sit down, to have you sitting in the same spot. When there’s a split-second decision that needs to be made, you’ll definitely know where to look if you heed this advice.
Arrange your tables in a way that makes it easier for you to jump from one table to another. Online poker rooms which are set on facilitating multi-tabling will offer you several options in this respect. Tile your tables or stack them up: make sure you don’t miss a beat due to the difficulties caused by navigation.

The perfect hand

The perfect hand is equally revered and dreaded by poker players, beginners and experts, professionals and world-class poker celebrities. The perfect hand is a situation which defies strategy. If you happen to get stuck on the receiving end of it, there’s really nothing you can do but shove a lot of money into the pot and see it disappear in your opponent’s pocket. If you happen to get the better of it, all you have to do is get all your money into the pot and watch your defenseless opponent call it right down to his last nickel.

As its name so well depicts, the perfect hand is a lot like the perfect storm: a unique combination of circumstances which come together to give two players monster hands, hands which are both considered the best at the table by their respective owners. The margin between the two hands is usually so small that it is humanly impossible to determine which of them is the winner, even if the tells that the players involved give out are generously informative.

Sometimes, the perfect hand is readable, but people who are betting on the second best hand will still go through and get their money all-in, on one hand because the enormous amount of action that such situations generate gives birth to pot odds which justify the move, or simply because they just cannot believe their opponent does indeed have the hand they suspect he does.
An excellent example for a perfect hand is when there are several suited cards on a board pointing to a possible flush, and one player makes a K-high flush while the other one hits an A-high one. The guy with the K-high flush will have every reason to call the other guy’s all-in, mathematically speaking as well as from just about any other perspective. He is going to make the call, even if he suspects that the other player has the nut flush.
Because – according to the theory of winning poker – every time you make a different call than you would if you could see your opponent’s pocket cards, you commit a mistake, I think it’s safe to affirm that the perfect hand makes even good players play bad.

Take a look at the following video if you need proof of that statement: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5k8mdvx0RWM

You’ll see that not even the great Daniel Negreanu is immune to the effects of the perfect hand.
This example is all the better because it actually features two prefect hand situations, the first one radically turned around by the turn card to give birth to the second one. The flop gives Negreanu a set of 6s over Gus’ set of 5s, both players firmly believing they are in possession of the best hand at the table. Negreanu is quick to set the trap for Gus Hansen by checking the flop, but to his misfortune, the turn lands one of two cards which can shove him right down to the receiving end of a perfect hand setup.

From that point on, his fate is virtually sealed. Gus Hansen sets a nice trap for him by check-raising the river all-in, the success of which is obvious through the disbelief it generates on Negreanu’s end.
Even though Daniel manages to sniff out Hansen’s hand by and large, he is pot committed, he has excellent pot odds and he just cannot lay down a full house after having shoved that much money into the pot.
According to Sklansky’s definition of what optimal play should look like, he commits a mistake despite the fact that his abilities come through for him and ring his alarm bell, a mistake which costs him the largest pot in the history of High Stakes Poker. This is the beauty of the perfect hand: nobody can dodge this bullet, regardless of skill level and experience: the perfect hand remains untamed.

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