Mad World of Poker

Now that we have talked about two of the main points that you need to remember in poker, let’s talk about another one – practice.  Most people, as soon as they learn the game think that they are done and do not have to practice, they can just enroll in games and practice that way.  That is not true – when you want to get serious about poker, you want to make sure that you truly practice a heck of a lot – after all, practice truly does make perfect in a lot of cases.

Practicing poker does not just consist of playing with your friends either, however that is something that you should be doing a lot of – practice is also going to consist of you reading up on poker as well.  You always want to make sure that you are constantly thinking about poker and what it is all about – that is the only way that you can truly become a better player and eventually – unbeatable!

In the next blog, we are going to talk about your position and just why you – of all people need to be aware of it!

Poker is a game that is all about psychology – most poker players, the good ones know that but if you are just starting out, you probably don’t.  Poker is a game that is played by people, not a people played game.  That is how people become winners in it, they gather their information about the other poker players via psychology.  There are many questions that you need to ask yourself when you are playing against other people in poker.

What cards to they think I have?  Why did they make that bet?  Where do they think their position is on the table?  What are they thinking?  Getting inside the other poker player’s heads is something that a very good and very smooth poker player knows all about – you want to make sure that you put yourself in their position and truly figure out where they are coming from.

That is what every good tournament player does and if you want to be a good poker player … get yourself in the game and truly get your head in the game!

One thing that many poker players do not know anything about is patience.  To be frank, patience is something that you need to have in order to win and become very good at poker.  Poker is a waiting game and it is something that you need to learn early on if you intend to go far in the poker world.  You have to wait for a good hand, you have to wait for your turn, you have to wait to bet, you have wait to get the right cards – all of this is going to take some patience.

Even if you are an aggressive poker player, you still need to learn that you will not win every single hand and you will not lose every hand either.  Patience is key also when it comes to the other players – if someone is taking too long on their turn, you do not want to rush them, rather you want to take this into consideration … maybe they are unsure of their hand and you can take advantage of that.

Patience is something that truly will help you in the long run and a skill that can be very valuable to you in the game of poker – if you learn it early on!

In the last blog we talked about some of the emotional things that can happen when it comes to poker.  However, you might not be able to understand exactly why these emotions happen and why the mood swings come about.  No matter how happy or sad you feel when you win or lose a game, it can be a very difficult thing to control your emotions whenever you are playing poker.

Playing poker is something that will elevate all of your senses and will definitely make your emotions that much harder to control.  Whether you are trying to be happy for winning or sad for losing, you could find yourself right inside an emotional breakdown right in the middle of a game just because you had a bad hand … that is not the way it should be though.

Just remember that it is a game and even if you lose a lot of money, you could always win it back in the end!

It is very difficult when you are playing something so emotional and so high-like as a game of poker to keep all of your emotions out of it.  However, what you really need to think about how to keep your emotions in check just a little bit when you are playing poker.  Emotions and poker is something that do not mix well together and that is how mood swings usually happen.

One thing that you need to think about whenever you are dealing with playing poker is going in knowing that you are either going to win or that you are going to use.  That is a fantastic way to ensure that your emotions do not get the better of you all of the time.

We are going to touch more on why emotional mood swings might happen when you are playing poker in the next blog!

Going on tilt in a poker game is something that every single poker player wants to avoid.  It is by far the worst thing in the world that you can do and while you do not have to lose the game because of it, there are many different ways to avoid it.  The trick to avoiding going into a tilt is knowing how, why and when you are going on tilt so that way you can get out of it.  However, do you know why you might go on tilt?  That is what we are going to talk about.

Firstly, you are tired.  If you have been playing the game for a while, this is by far one of the most common things that happen to people when they go on tilt, they get tired.  Next, you have had a very bad beat; this happens a lot when people just try to hang onto a few hands that they should have folded on.  Another reason could be that you are just having a losing run.  It happens to the best of us.

These are just some of the common reasons why you might go on tilt, so make sure that you keep these in min!

In the last blog we touched a little bit on Seven-Card Stud and what the game actually is.  Now, we are going to really dive in and talk about exactly what this particular version of poker is and how to play.  Firstly, you know that Seven-Card Stud and Texas Hold ‘em are pretty close together in how they are played and while we talked about some of the differences in the last game, it is important that you look up more of the differences, so that way you do not play Seven-Card Stud just like you would Texas Hold ‘em!

Now, how do you play Seven-Card Stud?  That’s an easy one.  Firstly, the dealer is going to deal out two cards to each of the players at the table and those cards are going to be facedown.  Another car is going to be dealt and that card is going to be faceup.  This will become the start of your playing hand and just as any card game, the dealer will deal cards out clockwise around the table.  Basically, the player with the lowest value card faceup is going to be the one betting first – this is dubbed a forced bet.

So what happens if three different players all have low cards?  Well, the lowest to highest suits will come into play then to figure out who will be the forced better.  The suits are, lowest to highest: Clubs, Diamonds, Hearts and Spades.  More in the next blog folks!

If you are a novice in poker, you are probably not aware of all of the different kinds of poker games out there.  Honestly, I was not aware of them until I actually started going through them and writing about them!  One card game that I really noticed and found out was my favorite was Seven-Card Stud.  This incredible game is honestly cool and while confusing at first, once you get the hang of it, it is extremely easy.

Firstly, you need to know that Seven-Card Stud actually takes eight players.  No more, no less and if you are a person that plays Texas Hold ‘Em a lot, then you know that there are going to be four different betting rounds available to you.  However, that is in Texas Hold ‘Em and we are talking about Seven-Card Stud, where you get five betting rounds!

There are many differences between seven-card stud and Texas Hold ‘Em and in the next blog we will explore them more in detail – stay tuned!

This guy is incredible – the guy that I am referring to is Howard Lederer and he is definitely one of the most famous poker players in the world.  Now he may have started when he was just 18 years old, but he has been playing since then and he is definitely a bulldog whenever he is at the table!  This incredible guy actually found a passion for chess before he found it for poker and while he might have thought of poker as something to just play, he got hooked when he was looking for a chess set and found a poker set instead!

This guy has been around Las Vegas for years now and he is definitely into the high-stakes poker tables.  He is by far one of the most respected players in the No-Limit Hold ‘em tournaments and Limit Hold ‘em in cash games.  This guy has won all sorts of things and I know that I would not want to play a game against him!

His actual largest win was nine million dollars and that is about when he reached the WSOP tables.  So really, keep Howard Lederer in mind!

There are some things in the world that simply do not make sense to me at all and the newest rule at WSOP is actually one that does not make all that much sense to me.  The rule states that if any player that is registered at the event does not show up by the end of the second level blinds, their chips will be removed and their buy-in will be refunded in full.  Now, this absolutely makes no sense to anyone really.

I mean, really, who would miss this event besides Phil Hellmuth but we all know him right?  No matter what stage of player you are, if you are late for the WSOP, you absolutely are a loser and you should definitely not have signed up in the first place – but really, let’s talk about this…

What do you guys think of this new rule?  Like, dislike?  Let me know your thoughts on it!