Cash games tend to be relatively static. The blinds don’t change. The stack sizes can vary, but they tend to vary from fairly deep to really deep. And after any hand you can get up from the table and cash your chips in for dollars. So each chip is always The Three Stages Of A [...]

Blind stealing and blind defense. What hands should I do it with? Should I do it more short-handed? What factors affect whether I try a blind steal or whether I defend my blind. These questions are extremely common. I get asked them in many forms. Unfortunately, a complete answer could Does Short-Handed Play Affect Blind [...]

Having position bestows an enormous advantage. But to make the most of the advantage, you have to employ what I call tactics of ambiguous aggression. You make plenty of bets and raises in position. Sometimes those bets and raises imply a strong hand, and they signify more bets and raises Introduction To The Free Showdown [...]

Value betting well on the end is a critical skill in nearly every form of poker. It’s also one of the skills that players tend to pick up later on in their learning process. I know many players who otherwise play a decent game, but who check down too many Q&A #104: What Is A [...]

This week I’ve been reading The Mathematics of Poker by Bill Chen and Jerrod Ankenman. It’s quite a piece of work. The bulk of the book focuses on finding game theoretically optimal (GTO) solutions to simplified “toy” poker games. Blocking Bets and The Mathematics Of Poker|418|3.95|USD|| The purpose of these exercises is clearly twofold: To [...]

Everyone has warning bells go off in their heads when three to a straight are on board and they don’t have a reasonable shot at making a straight. But you might not know exactly how dangerous these boards can be. As it turns out, if you have top pair with Holding Top Pair On A [...]

This post is crossposted from the Stoxpoker blog. If you aren’t a regular at Stoxpoker, you should definitely head over there because it’s a real bonanza of high-quality poker discussion. I’ve got some blog posts lined up that are about things I see some online players do wrong. It’s Avoiding Multitabling Syndrome|405|3.95|USD|| not technical stuff [...]

Playing aggressively isn’t natural. Consequently, students of the game are often trying to work in more aggression. It’s a good thing, with the usual caveat that they should use “selective” aggression. But what does “selective” mean, exactly? What situations do you select? A lot of players who are trying to become …Login/Register for more.

The free card play is an old limit hold’em standby. Raise the flop with position and a draw, and then if you miss on the turn, check it behind when they check to you. It can be a valuable play, but it also has a few downsides. It gives away that Q&A #99: Taking A [...]

Check out all the StoxPoker demo videos at YouTube. Currently over 100 demos are available, which should give you an excellent idea of what to expect when you sign up at StoxPoker. Check out …Login/Register for more.