Understanding how to correctly use bet sizes to influence and manipulate the action is what separates skilled poker players from absolute beginners. Without a doubt, improper bet sizing is a very common...

Understanding how to bet is one of the fundamental skills in poker. If your aim is to become a skilled poker player, you have to understand why you are betting in the...

Many poker players now start out by playing no-limit hold'em and this lesson is intended for those looking to make the transition to fixed-limit hold'em. We'll focus on differences between the two...

Playing before the flop is your first opportunity to voluntarily put money in the pot. Don’t just toss in the first single bet to be a part of the action. Make good...

Before the flop the only information available to you is position, the value of your hand and any knowledge you might have acquired regarding the playing tendencies of your opponents. The flop...

In this lesson we will direct our focus to strategies for the turn. If you have reached a turn decision then you haven't folded pre-flop or on the flop and now the...

The river is possibly the easiest street to play in limit hold’em. There are no more cards to come so there will be no further improvement to anyone’s hand. There are basically...

Hold'em strategies continue to evolve and catch the fancy of some players and are dismissed by others. One such strategy is “Floating” which means calling with a weak hand in position with...

When it comes to poker, I’ve often written that knowledge is power and guessers are losers - and while I do adhere to those two dictums, let’s face it … sometimes you...

Do you get frustrated playing poker tournaments? You play all the time and it seems like you never cash. And even when you do, you cash the minimum. Every once in a...

“Trust your instincts, class.” Those were a teacher’s words back when I was a teenager and prepping for one of the myriad standardized tests administered to see how we were progressing with...

In my last article I addressed the first three of the six pieces of conventional poker wisdom that I have found exception to. In this article I’ll deal with the remaining three....

Have you ever heard the expression, most people do not plan to fail, however, many people fail to plan? I think it's a pretty neat adage which could lead us to conclude...

Poker is a complex game – easy to learn but hard to master. Accordingly, many have tried to simplify the learning of poker strategy by embracing broad generalizations about the game. Many...

Tweet, tweet… what does a canary have to do with poker? I’m certain you are all familiar with the use of pigeons, donkeys and fish as poker terms but canaries might be...

I was playing in a $1,000 maximum buy-in, $2-$5 no-limit game recently, when a new player sat down two seats to my right and bought in for $1,000. On the third hand...

There are many types of poker players. Most are relatively easy for the good player to read. They tend to play hands within a certain range in certain situations. They tend to...

When I was in college, a journalism professor told our class (we all fancied ourselves future newspaper or magazine columnists back then) this wonderful truth: When you have trouble coming up with...

Regardless of whether you’re playing in a poker tournament or a cash game, it’s seldom fun to play on a short stack, although it’s easier out in a cash game because you...

Has your game gone to the dogs? Dogging it is an expression describing weak play on the end of a hand. If you’re not familiar with the expression, I’m sure you’ll be...

Split-pot games are different by nature than games like Texas hold’em, where the high hand is usually the only winner. Whenever the pot is split in hold’em, it’s because two or more...

Right between the eyes is a description which normally refers to a top notch shot which stops a foe in his tracks. Other phrases used to depict this type of excellent marksmanship...

Way back in poker’s dark ages (the years prior to 2003, before Chris Moneymaker won the World Series of Poker’s main event after gaining entry via a $40 online satellite) no-limit hold’em...

Situation: 2004 World Series of Poker Final Table Stacks : Greg Raymer 7,920,000Josh Arieh 3,890,000Matt Dean 3,435,000David Williams 3,250,000Glenn Hughes 2,375,000Dan Harrington 2,320,000Al Kruk 2,175,000 This often discussed hand from the 2004...

We poker players tend to want to present poker as a sport more than as a game. We point out how much skill is a factor – and how little luck plays...

Everyone talks about implied odds as though it’s some sort of ubersophisticated poker concept that only poker’s in-group is aware of, but in truth it’s a simple idea to understand and just...