Free rules for poker

Rule 38: Since poker is a game of positioning oneself to win (but with no guarantee of winning), there are going to be times when doing exactly

2008-03-12T12:02:00.000-07:00

Since poker is a game of positioning oneself to win (but with no guarantee of winning), there are going to be times when doing exactly the right thing leads to losses.
There aren't many sports or games where you can have a lifetime of experience, make every play exactly right, and lose. But poker is one of them. This tells us something it tells us not to approach it like other games.
This is a difficult concept for some players to understand. They ask. «What am I doing wrong?» And if the answer is «Nothing», it leaves no rational explanation. Yet this situation is common in poker. Coolness must prevail. Clinical detachment and composure need to be embraced.

Rule 37: It's a mistake to use experience alone to determine what good poker play is.

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Long-time experience can be deceptive. Our memory can be selective. It can mislead us, overemphasizing some things that occurred and underemphasizing others. A big win may shine brightly in our memory, yet if looked at closer, it might not be backed up by good play. Always make sure you are playing right first, and then get a lot of experience at it.
Don't do it in reverse. Don't reference your many years of experience
as proof that you mast be playing right. This kind of self-referential
argument is capable of containing numerous errors.
Similar card situations occur again and again, thousands of times. And some players have been playing them wrong – for years. Worse, such a player often learns to do so expertly! In fact, many of them become
excellent players, amazingly adept at «working around» their own flaws and weaknesses. They become experts at starting out with their own self-
imposed handicaps and overcoming them. They are like track stars who
become very proficient at finding ever newer and more innovative ways to
get over the hurdles that they themselves have put in their own way.

Rule 36: One of the main ways we improve in the game of poker is by getting certain lessons pounded into our heads.

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Books, seminars, and other kinds of advice are all well and good, but
nothing instructs us in certain lessons like experience. Lessons learned
through painful experience tend to form a deep groove in the brain.

«You can close your eyes to reality, but not to memory». – Stanislaw J. Lec

Free rules for poker 35: If you're doing a lot of folding, won't this look odd to the other players?

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You might sometimes get the feeling that all this folding you're doing looks
pretty obvious to the other players. You can almost feel their watchful eyes
on you вЂ“ and hear them thinking: «Boy, he sure plays tight. He must be
waiting for the perfect hand to come along».
If you took a survey, though, you would find this is not what most low-
level opponents are thinking at all. Here is what they are really thinking
when you are doing a lot of folding:

1. Nothing.
2. You're a player who must be getting pretty lousy cards.
3. Great “you're out of the way“ let the action commence without
you.
4. They really don't care (or even notice). Frankly, there are enough
other opponents in the game to worry about, and the fewer
opponents, the better.
5. You must be a fairly «tight» player may be a «rock».

Notice that the thing you were most worried about came in last вЂ“
which it probably would in a real survey.

Free rules for poker 34: In the best players there is a streak of simple common sense.

2008-03-06T15:27:00.001-08:00

If we put things in these terms, the game seems pretty simple.
Strategies are somewhat different than this at higher, more sophisticated
levels of play, of course, but for most players this common sense aspect is
something to keep in mind. It is possible for a player to get lost in
convoluted scheming and overlook this simple truth вЂ“ that a good portion of
the game is simply common sense. And this trait is also present in the great
players. In fact, the vast majority of plays in the game of poker are not
fancy, sophisticated plays, but obvious ones. But these have to be done right
too.

Free rules for poker 33: Don't go on the offense against a large field of players with a weak hand.

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Here's a poker secret: When you don't have good cards, someone else
usually does. Don't go into the aggressive/offense mode in a situation where
you're weak and they are a mystery. Remember, the good cards have to be
somewhere.

Free rules for poker 32: You may as well bet if you intend to call.

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It is a generally accepted idea that if your hand is good enough to call a bet with, then you are better off betting. (And this is a situation that occurs very often in poker.) The thinking is that if you're going to call a bet, you might as well be the one driving the betting. It's going to cost the same amount anyway at least this way you're in the driver's seat. There is an intimidation aspect that also accrues from doing this whether in the individual hand, or cumulatively, over many hands a general aura of aggressiveness.

Free rules for poker 31: Once you commit to a hand, you should play it strong.

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From this rule we can see the problem that occurs if you start a hand with marginal cards. You've already got yourself in the middle of a conundrum, forced to play a bad hand forcefully and aggressively.

Free Rules for poker 30: Staying more frequently in a poker game offers you greatly increased chances of winning here's why it's a mistake.

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One or two players every hand are likely to have a great hand. If you are going to play almost every hand, then you're going to have to beat a great and every hand. If you think about it this way, it becomes obvious why it is foolhardy to «stay» on a large number of hands. The challenge you're giving yourself is insurmountable trying to beat a great hand every time.

Rule 29: The value of starter cards.

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It would be hard to overstate the importance of В«starting cardsВ» in poker. To
the casual observer (or novice), this might not seem to be the case. Indeed,
why would it? After all (they might think), a good hand could develop at any
point during the hand, couldn't it? On the fifth card, or the sixth or seventh,
and so on. So this might not seem logical. (And this is вЂ“ needless to say вЂ“
how bad players play the game.) Furthermore, they might argue, how can a
hand «develop» if you don't give it a chance? How can it, if you keep cutting
it off early, and folding, before it can develop into anything?
The explanation is this: If you operate without regard to your starter
cards, you will often be В«running behindВ» your opponents. For example, a
player who has four low cards (in a low-ball game, say i is В«aheadВ» of you if
you only have three low cards. Over hundreds of hands dealt, his В«better
startВ» will soon manifest itself and make him victorious.
This law can be generally applied throughout life. Go into situations
where advantages lean in your direction at the beginning. While this is still
no guarantee of success, it will mean that you are not being penalized from
the very start of the process fighting an uphill battle from day one.

Rule 28: Luck, good or bad, comes in bunches.

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Any experienced, long-time gambler is familiar with the «bunching» of luck.
Play the same cards one night and they will be losers, while another night
they will be winners.
Both good cards and bad do come in bunches. It's important to realize
the В«typicalityВ» of this. It is within the bounds of probability that this occurs,
not outside of it. Many players think of it as an aberration вЂ“ that such
occurrences are outside the framework of probability. They are not. They are
within the framework of it. (There is a point where they do become an
aberration, but this point is much farther along than most people would
guess.)

Rule 27: Get a bigger bankroll.

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Failure to have a big enough bankroll is a common failing in poker. It can
lead to all types of adverse effects: the feeling that every hand is a В«life or
death matterВ», overly-emotional play, temper tantrums, mood swings and
so on. Having an adequate bankroll allows us to suffer the natural swings of
fortune that take place, and it lets us do so with composure and equanimity.
One ought to try to get one's poker bankroll to a large enough amount so
that the outcome of any one hand (or session) has no effect whatsoever on
one's play.
Without an adequate bankroll, we tend to inject emotion into these
fluctuations that occur. Having our heart and soul riding on each hand
magnifies them and makes them larger in our mind than they should be.
Take away this emotion, and things once again resume their natural place in
the bigger picture.

«Don't fly too high above your bankroll, for that is when you'll live and die
with each pot. or at least with each session. Obviously, when each bad beat
has so much significance to your financial well-being, you can't help but be
affected».

Rule 26: Rebelling against the read has predictable, bad consequences

2008-02-18T09:50:00.001-08:00

As we staled above, the problem is not that players' instincts aren't good but
that we often don't listen to them (or even rebel against them). Thus, we
are not going by what our В«readВ» is telling us.
There are a number of reasons for not listening to this inner voice:

1. «The read is unfairВ».
2. «The same read seems to be going on forever and never changes».
3. «I get tired of hearing В«NoВ» from my read».
4. «I get tired of continually folding based on my read, even if it is
accurate and the correct thing to do».
5. «I he read always seems to favor the other guy never me. It always
seems to be them, them, them».
6. «Every time I make a read, it seems to come up with this: Other-
Guy-Strong, Mc-Weak, and I have to fold».

The thing is, you are beating the game (in the long run) if you go by
your read and your read is accurate вЂ“ even if it involves a lot of folding.
One of the secrets of poker is this ability to hear the word over
and over“ without it bothering you. You'll hear В«YesВ» only infrequently, but
it will be enough to win.

Rule 25: We need to listen to our instincts in poker.

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One possible reason we don't listen to them is because the answers we keep
getting always seem unfair. It's always В«them, them, themВ» (and В«fold, fold,
foldВ» for us). So we often rebel against the answers that our instincts are
giving us. Yet if we stop and think, statistically, most of the time it is going
to be them, them, them.
This is true for a couple of reasons. First, there are more of В«themВ»
than us, and second, because the majority of situations won't favor us. After
all, you're only one hand out of four or five players as you look around the
table. It's more likely that one of these other hands is going to В«helpВ» than
yours, hence your В«readВ» is simply going to be more often. In fact,
you might get ten or twelve В«no'sВ» in a row from your read, one after the
other“ or even three or four В«no'sВ» in a row in the same hand.
The point is, you're going to hear В«noВ» a lot in the game of poker. The
secret is to keep listening to the correct answer and acting on it even if it
is not the answer you want to hear. Because it is not about getting the
answer you want to hear, it's about continuing to make correct decisions.

Rule 24: Playing correctly without being rewarded for it is a concept the player must get used to.

2008-02-18T09:49:00.001-08:00

The player must get used to the idea of playing correctly without being
rewarded for it. This will often mean playing correctly while going nowhere,
and even losing. You simply do it because you do it. You do it without any
expectations.

Rule 23: We should want to lose if we play badly.

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There are some times when we are better off failing in life, even if it's more painful at the time: shoplifting, betting a hundred dollars a hand in blackjack, making romantic advances to the boss's wife, and so on. Getting away with these things temporarily would actually lead to worse things for us in the long run. So maybe it's better if we fail at them right away. We need wrong decisions to have bad consequences. We shouldn't want to be insulated from our mistakes, for they will guide us in the right direction and in the long run this will be to our benefit. Similarly, making mistakes in poker, and then winning by this means, while momentarily pleasing, is very bad in the long run.

Rule 22: Make correct decisions (Part III).

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We have all heard it said of a player, В«It just kills him to loseВ». But have you ever heard it said of a player: В«It just kills him to play his cards wrong?В» Well, this is the way it should be. Because this is where the money goes вЂ“ the leak, the fissure in the dike where the money seeps away. Be the player about whom they say: В«It just kills him to play his cards wrongВ».

Rule 21: Make correct decisions (Part II).

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As noted above, it is by making correct decisions that you beat the game.
Here's an example. Let's say you make a straight, and then a possible flush
appears on the last card (either on the board or in an opponent's up-cards).
An opponent who you know only bets when he has a good hand suddenly
lights up with joy at this turn of events. He fires in a bet, and you fold. Now
let's say this happens again. And again. And again. In fact, let's say it
happens six or seven times in a row, and you fold each time. You are
beating the game by doing this вЂ“ even though you're losing. Why? Because
you are making correct decisions. A series of correct decisions, carried on
long enough. will eventually В«turn the tideВ» in your favor.
All you can ever do in poker is make correct decisions, moment by
moment, in each specific situation you find yourself in.

Rule 20: Concentrate on how you are playing, not on whether you are winning.

2008-02-13T10:02:00.000-08:00

I he idea of winning money, as we have seen, is a false goal. You can
actually be playing quite poorly and be winning quite handily. This is not the
victory it feels like, however, for eventually this bad play will catch up to
you. And while it might be momentarily pleasing to win money, it is
disastrous if you are achieving this by playing wrong. (Probably the thing we
should hope for is to lose when we are playing wrong, for this will steer us
toward the correct path.)
Money, as a measure of poker expertise, is quite unreliable. Here is an
example. Suppose you are winning $200 in a poker game. Going by this
measure alone, this would mean you've been playing very good poker
indeed. But suppose a better player, dealt the same cards as you've been
getting, would be up $600? Now a different picture emerges. We see by this
example that money alone is not a good measure of poker play.
You should go home from a poker game on some nights losing $250
and be proud of the way you played. And you should go home on other
nights a $300 winner and be disgusted at the way you played.
Be as proud of yourself for playing well with bad cards as you are for
playing well and winning. Achieve your sense of satisfaction by this path
also. Actually he proud of yourself for doing this.
The process must always be kept uppermost, because it is what will
win you money over the long run. Give yourself a pat on the back every time
you make a correct play, not every time you rake in a pot.

Rule 19: The goal of poker is not to win money, it is to play your

2008-02-13T10:01:00.002-08:00

Many players believe that the goal in poker is to win money. Actually, the goal is to make a series of correct decisions. This is the real goal. Keep your focus on (his and the rest will follow naturally. Correct play on each card and each hand is your real goal as a poker player.
«Winning isn't your job. Making good decisions is your job».

– Mike Caro

Rule 18: Take the long view.

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While you'd like to win in the short term in poker (in other words, today), what you really want is to win over the long term. Ideally, you want to end up with a poker history that includes both wins and losses, with the wins dominating. The worst thing that can befall you in poker is to be winning in today's game using a strategy that fails over the long-term.
«You are rewarded for correct play in the long run; in the short run, anything can happen».

– Tom McEvoy, champion poker player

Rule 17: Navigate around in the game.

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Good players may look like confrontational types to the casual observer – they may give this outward appearance – but in fact, if you watch them for any length of time, you discover that the thing they are really good at is navigating around problems instead of confronting them. «Navigating around» goes with «pick your spots» in the conceptual galaxy of poker ideas – these two are very near one another.

And the player should think in these terms too. You should navigate around in the game (especially around dangerous opponents) rather than thinking in terms of going «up against» them. It's not a «battle of the gladiators» when you sit down at a poker table – a better image is of a boat trying to navigate the shoals carefully in shallow water. Changing your thinking to this approach will put you closer to the true reality of the situation. Here's another way of phrasing this: One of the great secrets to poker is staying out of trouble.

And this is a secret the pros use. They navigate around the obstacles in the game.

«I view each tournament as a gigantic minefield that I must navigate my way through without getting blown up. I'm likely to be wounded several times along the way, but as long as none are fatal, I'll get to the other side». Richard Tatalovich (States Poker Championship winner)

Rule 16: Poker is a tango.

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Poker is a tango. The good player pushes right up as the other backpedals, and he does so perfectly as the other moves forward or backward. Perfectly done, there is no light in between, no space. This is the mark of the great players – there is no space in between. They are pushed and push absolutely as far as they can go forward in each instance, each case. This is probably true at the top level of all sports and games.

Rule 15: Grab the momentum.

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In a game between highly skilled poker players, there is a certain «momentum» aspect to the game – and an alternating attempt to take control of this momentum. From hand to hand as the game progresses, this momentum is often up for grabs. It's a little like tennis, where one player charges the net while the other is forced to back up. Or perhaps you could compare it to a football team that starts «deep in its own territory» and never seems to get out of this spot, constantly backed up to its own goal line by the opponent.

Such use of momentum by skilled players is used to get (and keep) other players down. This grabbing of the momentum is sometimes called «taking control of the game». (This can happen over longer time spans, too. Player A may grab the momentum for hours, days, perhaps even weeks, then something will change and Player В will take control for a period of time.) To survive in this type of game, if the chance to grab this momentum offers itself, you must take it.

Rule 14: Don't pick the best hands to play – pick your spots.

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Look for the right combination of probability, weakness, hesitation (by opponents), body language, position, past tendencies, who is «short- stacked», and your hand's value in the overall scheme of things. Look for all of these things, and then play. This is called «picking your spots». Less skilled players simply «wait for a good hand». This is something quite different. The picking-your-spots approach considers ail things before making a play. It is the one used by successful top players.

Rule 13: Think of your poker game like driving a car.

2008-02-13T09:59:00.001-08:00

Driving a car produces a similar «flow» of events as the game of poker, in which you have to find a way to merge with the flow. You've noticed those signs on the highway that say «Speed Limit 65». But do you also notice those other signs, the ones that say: «Minimum Speed 45?» This tells us that there is a «flow» – and that «in between» is a pretty good place to be. It's a rhythm – where things operate at their best.

And poker is similar to driving in traffic. You see other cars move over, so you move over; you notice a certain lane is open, you take it; a bunch of cars move one way as a group, you move the other; a major tangle appears to be forming, you look for a way to navigate around it. You try to pass someone in traffic, they speed up, you back off. A parking spot appears, you move toward it, someone gets there ahead of you, you back off. And so on. It is the drivers who refuse to merge with the flow – who try to «go outside the lines» – who usually have the bad things happen to them.

Rule 12: If you find that playing poker is thrilling, adventurous, and exciting, there's a good chance you may be playing it wrong.

2008-02-13T09:58:00.001-08:00

One little-mentioned aspect of poker is that, when played correctly, it can be slightly boring. Not boring in the usual sense of the word, but in the choice of one's responses. These responses are pretty scripted. You get a certain hand, you do a certain thing. Stray too far outside this predictable «script» and the odds will turn against you. For this reason, if the game is adventurous, chancy, and exciting, you may be playing it wrong. It's when the game has a certain dreary predictability that you are beginning to play it correctly. Poker is fun; winning at poker can sometimes be rather tedious.

"Everything the middle course is best; all things in excess bring trouble". – Platus

Rule 11: Discipline must be kept up until the end.

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Here is another idea that we sometimes lose sight of. Play like a pro for seven hours, then play like an amateur for the last 1/2 hour, and you can undo al the good play you achieved earlier. Your grade? An A+ in four courses and an «FВ» on the final. You scored high at first, then fell apart “ lost it all back.

Don't start out strong, then gradually fall apart as the night wears on. Play a consistent game the whole night through. Remember, we get no points for professional play in the first 90% of the game if we unravel later.

Rule 10: How difficult is it to play tight?

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Is playing tight in poker hard to do? Sitting there all day without playing very many hands? Folding hands hour after hour? Let's put this issue in perspective. We're talking about free money here. (We're talking, generally, about low-limit games here.) If you do this (and keep doing it), you will often get free money in return. Remember that there are people who are toiling from dawn to dusk in disagreeable jobs for money “ digging ditches, doing roadwork in the hot sun, washing dishes in restaurants fourteen hours a day “ the worst possible jobs imaginable.
Are these things hard to do? All we're being asked to do “ the great sacrifice we're being asked to make“ is to sit in a comfortable card-room
and play tight, doing nothing when we get bad cards. How hard is this in comparison? So we need to keep this issue in perspective. People do any number of disagreeable things in the workaday world for money, but when it comes to poker, we can't just sit there and fold marginal hands?

Rule 9: Don't arrive over-eager to play.

2008-02-12T00:32:00.000-08:00

Many players arrive at a poker game a little too eager to play. You can see it in their body language. They are rubbing their hands together, leaning forward in anticipation. They've В«come to playВ», and they will tell you so.

This is an awful lot of eagerness when you consider that poker is basically a slow game that goes on for hours and hours, in which good hands occur only infrequently. Sit back. Relax. This isn't the hundred-yard dash. Cross your arms and settle in for the long haul. Approach the game for what it is: infrequently appearing good cards in a turtle-paced game. В«Back awayВ» from the game, and from any feelings of over-eagerness. See how many hands you can fold. Make each hand В«proveВ» that it is good enough to play. Such an approach will keep you out of trouble. Will doing this make you miss a good hand when it comes along? Or cause you to overlook it? It's doubtful. You'll still know when you have a good hand. Don't arrive at the game champing at the bit to play.

«Lying in wait is the secret of success in poker».

R. A. Proctor, Poker Principles and Chance Laws

Rule 7: The money you don't lose from...

2008-02-11T11:15:00.000-08:00

The money you don't lose from staying too long in a hand and the money another player does lose from doing this is often the profit you go home with. Maybe you got yourself «trapped» a few times on fairly good hands and found yourself staying longer than you wanted, but soon after that you came to your senses and folded. A less experienced player, however, got trapped on some similar hands and stayed until the very end with them.

The money difference in these two cases is often. The difference at the end of the game- the profit the better player goes home with. Profit at lower levels of poker is often nothing more than a matter of getting «paid off» by bad players when the good players have a good hand. (And limiting your own mistakes so you don't give the money back.)

Rule 6: It's important that a player starts seeing...

2008-02-11T11:14:00.004-08:00

It's important that a player starts seeing «staying too long on marginal hands» as where the money goes. This is a rule for less experienced players, but even long-time players are guilty of this at times. And make no mistake, this is where the money goes. It's where the actual leakage takes place. In fact, it's a money «leak» of such proportions that it can bring down the entire rest of our game – a major avenue of seepage. If this were a house and we were looking for thermal-heating leaks, it would be the equivalent of having the front door open.

A good deal of the money lost in poker games is lost when players continue past the point in a hand when they should be out. Yet they are still in, still hoping for a miracle, still «donating». Not only is this «where the money goes», it is also where the winners get most of their money «from». The money that «fuels» most low-level poker games comes from this source.

Rule 5: If you do make a mistake, correct it as soon as you can.

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If you do make a mistake, correct yourself at the next available opportunity in the hand. Don't just keep throwing in good money after bad. There's no reason you have lo follow your original mistake with additional bets. Some players feel, having made the original bad call, that they are now obligated to stay until (he end in order «to be consistent», so they continue to put in more and more money behind it. Get out.

Rule 4: If you don't think your hand is good enough, it probably isn't.

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Notice how many times you think your hand is not good enough, and how many times it turns out that you were right. Your hand wasn't good enough – and it lost. It's a pretty high percentage. The suspicion that your hand may not be good enough can often reliably be taken as proof that it isn't. Listen to your gut.

Rule 3: Start with premium hands. When you get them, bet them.

2008-02-11T11:11:00.000-08:00

Start with premium hands. When you get them, bet them. If the hand starts to deteriorate, get away from the hand. This is only common sense, but it is surprising how easy it is to drift away from this basic concept. Have brakes and an accelerator. Use both.

Rule 2: If you think you're beat, gel out.

2008-02-11T11:08:00.000-08:00

This is one of the basic rules of poker, but one that is – for some reason easily overlooked or forgotten. If you're beat, fold. And listen to that little voice telling you that you are beat. (We often hear players at the table tell us, «I know I'm beat» – as they continue to toss in the chips.) Hanging on (and on, and on) in a hand is where a lot of the money goes.
"You always told me this was ... rule number one: Throw away your cards the minute you know you can't win. «Fold the f––hand...»

Also, forget the idea that they're bluffing or trying to «run you out.» You're almost always better off folding. Most of the time they do have something. (Or at least this is true enough of the time to justify folding on your part.) Generally speaking, when things start to go wrong in your hand, you're better off exiting the hand. Don't hang around hoping and wishing

Rule 1: Don't dig yourself into a hole when you first sit down.

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If we had to pick a number one rule in poker, this might be a good candidate. It might not be the most important rule in poker, but it is a good first one. Try not to get way down, money-wise, right from the outset of the game. It is a lot less fun if you have to spend several hours digging yourself out of a hole you got yourself into in the early rounds of play. Start slow. Observe for awhile. Give yourself time to watch the texture of the game unfold and see how players are playing in order to get yourself into the feel of it and the rhythm of it. The notion of avoiding doing anything flashy until you get into the flow of things is not limited to poker; it's an idea we see in all sports. There is a cautious feeling-out process that takes place in the early going. Play conservatively until a rhythm develops that you can recognize and exploit, and then join in. Ease into the game. Don't get yourself stuck early.
«It is important in poker that when you catch a $2,000 rush, you are not stuck $3,000 at the start of it».