Party Star

In poker, the time to hesitate is when you really need more time to resolve a close decision. Often things will occur to you given a little extra time. Or, under the extra pressure, your opponent may provide you with a tell. You might occasionally also hesitate for deception, so that alert opponents can’t determine that your pause always means you have a close decision.

Also, sometimes when you make a final free bet with a big hand, you’ll be more likely to be called if you don’t bet instantly. Well, if you don’t bet ALMOST instantly, I mean. Because both a bet delayed for a few extra seconds and an unreasonably quick one are apt to make your opponents suspicious and more likely to be called.

But, unless there’s a specific reason to hesitate, you should usually make all your free bets, calls, and raises crisply and confidently — because this enhances your image and speeds up the game at Rainbow Riches.

As most of you have probably noticed so far, UB has added a Step Sit and Go program to try and earn your way to this year’s World Series of Poker. In fact you can do it for as little as .10 cents. Starting with Step 1, you try and finish in the top 2 to earn your step 2 ticket. From there on every step is the same.

Get in the top 2, move on to the next step. Finish in the top 3 or 4, and you get to retry the step you were currently playing. The best way to put it is finish in the top 4 of any step, and you lose nothing. Sometimes when you finish 5th or 6th, you just get bumped down a step. So if you are playing a Step 6 and finish 5th out 9 people which is pretty easy to do, you just get bumped down to step 5 and just have to work to get back to step 6. The Step Program is as follows:

Step 1=.10
Step 2=.30
Step 3=$1
Step 4=$3
Step 5=$10
Step 6=$30
Step 7=$90
Step 8=$250
Step 9=$750
Step 10=$2250

When you win Step 10 you win a $12k WSOP Package, and if you finish 2-4th you get a good amount of cash back.

It is important to remember when playing these steps that you aren’t playing to win, and that getting 2nd place is the same as 1st. It is not your job to take people out, just to move on to the next step. If you hold 55 in the Big Blind, with 6 k in chips, blinds are 200 400, and someone with 4600 shoves; you might consider folding if its 3 handed, depending on the other stack size. I’d much rather make someone make a tough call, than make one myself.

There is definitely a flow to these steps. Almost everyone at the table can see that finishing 5th or better is going to get them some kind of ticket, so therefore you can assume that in a 9 handed SNG, the bubble begins at 6 handed!!! Because of this, a lot of people are playing tight.

Rightfully so as the blinds mean nothing. The other side of the coin though is noticing this and exploiting it. Get a feel for who you can 3 bet light. For me it’s normally the guy who has chipped up a little, as he feels he is the most likely to move on to the next step. Anyone who has played SNG’s knows what I’m talking about, when it comes to exploiting the bubble. It’s just in these steps that the bubble occurs so much faster.

In addition to this exciting new way to try and make it to the WSOP, you can also make it to Aruba, by winning Step 1 through Step 10. Start at Step 1 and work your way all the way to Step 10 and win Step 10 and you will get a $8,500 package to Aruba. This promotion is only available to the first 10 people who accomplish this. Good luck everyone, and I will definitely see you at these Steps.

There are few better situations in poker than to enter final table play as the big stack. However, there’s a big difference in coming to the final table with the chip lead and in knowing how to use your stack to take control of the final stages of a tournament.

There are many players who don’t slow down once they reach the final table with a big stack. I’m not one of them. By the time I reach the final table, I’ll have already played a number of hands against about half of the other remaining players. I’ll have developed reads on their games, and they will have done the same with me, which makes this a good time to switch gears. If I’ve been hammering away aggressively before the final table, I’ll often slow things down and go back to playing a more tight-aggressive style than I had been just a short time earlier.

Even more important to my success here, however, is that I begin paying very close attention to the size of my opponents’ stacks. I want to know who’s likely to be playing conservatively in order to try and move up a few spots, and who is short-stacked and looking to get their chips in the middle with any two cards. I’m more likely to play pots against the conservative players and avoid the gamblers.

Let’s says the majority of the players are sitting on somewhere between 40 and 50 big blinds each, but the short stack only has about 15 blinds in front of him. He’s going to be looking for any chance he can to double up, which means I’m not going to raise his blinds unless I’m holding a hand where I can comfortably call his all-in re-raise. While doubling the short stack up probably doesn’t hurt me in the long run, the reward I get for knocking him out of the tournament may not justify risking chips that I can put to better use against other opponents.

When there’s a log-jam of players who all have about equal size stacks, I’m willing to play a fairly wide range of hands against them, so long as I’m in position. For example, say I’m chip leader with about 100 blinds and a smaller stack with about 40 blinds open raises for 3x the big blind. I’ll call this raise from the button or from late position with hands like 4-5 suited, 7-9 suited, or J-10 suited if I think I can pick up the pot after the flop.

I know that I’m not often going to flop anything better than a single pair – if I connect at all - when I call with these kinds of hands, but I’m still comfortable making this play because I know my opponent will miss often enough that I can steal the pot with a post-flop bet. This is especially true against players who completely shut down their games if they miss the flop, because you can use your big stack to force them to commit a sizeable portion of their stack if they want to contest the pot.

When I do decide to play against the short stacks on the final table, I’m looking to do so from position and with hands that aren’t going to be easily dominated. If I don’t have to worry about someone entering the pot behind me, I’ll play coin-flips against the short stack all day long because I know I’ll win enough of these hands over the long run to be profitable.

The times I won’t make this play with my big stack are when I think someone else may try to squeeze me out of the pot by raising all-in behind me, or when doubling up the short stack could drop me from being the chip leader back down to an average size chip stack. In these cases, I’ll look for better spots and let the shorter stacks fight amongst themselves.

While having a large chip stack is a weapon in itself, you’ll get better results if you know how and when to use your stack to your best advantage. Apply pressure to the conservative players while avoiding unnecessary confrontations with the short stacks, and you’ll turn your chips into something much valuable when the tournament is over.

Say you’re playing in a low-stakes ring game. The blinds are $.50 and $1, and it’s folded to you in middle position. You find a nice hand - pocket Tens - and bring it in for a standard raise of three times the big blind. It’s folded around to a player in late position, who re-raises the minimum amount, making it $5 to go.

I’ve seen this sort of play repeatedly in the past few months while researching my next No-Limit Hold ‘em book by playing in low-stakes games. Every time I’ve been faced with a minimum re-raise, I’ve been up against a monster - pocket Kings or Aces.

A player who opts for the small raise may think he’s being crafty by getting me to put a little extra money in

the pot while he holds a big hand. But this is not a profitable play. There are two major problems with the minimum raise.

I’ve already mentioned the first problem: My opponent has telegraphed his hand. And making good decisions is pretty easy when you know exactly what your opponent holds. The second problem is mathematical. My opponent is giving me 5 to 1 to call the additional raise. (In this example, my extra $2 will give me a chance win $10.) When I make the call, I know that I stand to win a very big pot. My implied odds - the money I stand to make if I hit my hand - more than justify the call. If my opponent started the hand with a $100 stack, I could get paid at a rate of 50 to 1.

So I call and see a flop. If there’s no Ten on the board, I’m done with the hand. And if there is a Ten, I’m going to wipe my opponent out. As I said, poker is a pretty easy when you know what your opponent holds.

What’s the proper play when you hold Aces and a player has raised in front of you? Find the “Bet Pot” button and click it. Put pressure on a player who you know is starting with a second-best hand. Who knows, if he’s got pocket Queens or A-K, he may be willing to put his entire stack in pre-flop. If he holds something like Jacks or Tens, your big raise will minimize your opponent’s implied odds.

You should be wary of minimum raises at other stages of a hand, as well. Say you raised pre-flop with A-K and one player called. You hit top pair top kicker on a K-8-4 board. You bet out the size of the pot and your opponent min-raises you. At this point, you need to be very concerned that your opponent has hit a set. You have to wonder why he’d be raising an amount that almost begs for your call.

My advice here is twofold: first is that you should all but eliminate the minimum raise from your game. In some rare circumstances when you hit a full house or quads, it might be appropriate, but that’s about it. Second is that alarm bells should go off whenever you see a min raise. Your opponent probably has a big hand and you need to proceed accordingly.

A day of poker can be seen as a long, drawn out battle. In that battle are many short confrontations that set the tone for future battles. After all the smaller battles have been completed, someone will be broke and going home. Keeping a cool head throughout every single individual battle is the only way to be victorious in the long run. Once you lose your patience and focus, it’s all but over.

What I’m talking about is tilt, but really, it’s more than that. Going on tilt is the ultimate way to lose your money. Nobody I know will claim they play better when they are on tilt. If they say so, use some of Joe Navarro’s insight to figure out if they’re telling the truth. Going on tilt affects your thought process, gets your adrenaline going and will eventually force you to make a mistake, if you don’t control it.

Just as a quick example, you have just been two-outed on the river. The guy across from you smirks, claps, jumps up and down; he just rubs it in your face. The very next hand you have K-10 under the gun. That same player reraises you, so you decide that you want revenge and push all-in. He insta-calls and shows pocket kings, which of course hold up.

Now, if you weren’t on tilt you would not have:
(1) Raised under the gun with K-10,
(2) Reraised him all-in with K-10,
(3) Let your emotions affect your decisions
Clearly, this is an exaggeration, but I promise you that players whom you have played with have felt angered by a beat you have put on them and have wanted to get their chips back instead of finding a better source.

Admit it. We’ve all done it. The guy at the table whom you just don’t like has taken a pot from you. Instead of looking at one of the weaker players to steal and slowly grind back up, you go right back after your “enemy.” And, instead of winning the next pot, just give him more of your lifeline. Part of avoiding tilt comes from the experience. You’ve been there before, the beat will happen, and when it does, you have to move on. If you feel that you aren’t ready to move on, don’t play another hand. Take a break. Walk away from the table or even get up to go. Nobody is forcing you to play that next hand and of all people, you need to convince yourself that you are in no shape to ante up.

If this is a tournament, you need to think differently; you can’t just leave, but you can walk away. You risk missing an opportunity to pick up a big hand, but even then, what’s to say that the hand will hold up? Getting blinded away is a better decision than playing while steaming.

So how do you keep a cool head?

One strategy to use is to remember that each hand is only that, one hand. After each hand, mentally, start over. Give yourself a check list. Count your chips, take a deep breath, get dealt your cards, act on them.

When it comes to a “rival” player, you need to take this out of the equation. You do not have a rival player. The only time you need to focus on defeating one player is when you are heads up. Besides that, everyone else at your table is trying to take your money, and if you aren’t paying attention, they will.

Every player should be deemed as the same. Yes, some will be more talented than others and there will be some that you know you can take advantage of. Quite simply, that is an informed decision. For that reason, you should pick on this player if you know you have an advantage. If you don’t feel that you have an advantage and are going after a certain player out of spite, you are making a mistake.

Don’t let your emotions get the best of you. If you really want to get back at your opponent, make sure you’re the one who takes home the most money. After all, isn’t the best way to get revenge to have someone else take care of your dirty work? Let the action on the table dictate itself. If you happen to end up knocking out your hated rival, great. If not, hopefully you enjoyed watching him sulk as he walked away from the table.