Friday 29th August 2008

Welcome to Hold or Fold - The UK's only Poker E-Letter dedicated to
helping YOU become a better player!

In this week's E-Letter -

       *Bubble Play and
       *Common Mistakes

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Hiya there and how have you been this week??

Well - the words I can relate to this week are 'fly' and 'blue-arsed' !!

My workload has dramatically increased this week and my sneaky online poker games during
the day have completely stopped !

On top of that - my daughter has been away all this week so I have gone out to the casino
twice and I am happy to report that although I crashed out of the tournaments fairly quickly
both times, I played on the cash tables and have a healthy profit of £135 over the 2 nights -
so I'm smiling !!

This does mean, however, that I haven't had any time at all to watch my poker programmes
and they are safely stored in my Sky+ so I can watch them when normality resumes in this
household.

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Bubble Play

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As I was driving back at 3am the other night with my friend, she was absolutely livid because
the tournament was paying down to six places and she was knocked out, on the bubble, in 7th.

She was bewailing the fact that she had played her heart out all night, had made great decisions, great raises, great laydowns, but at the final table, with 7 people left, she was lying second in
chips.

Everyone folded around to her and she was in the cut-off position.

She picked up A Q suited and raised all-in.

Unfortunately, the lady sitting in the Small Blind, who happened to be the Chip Leader - called
with A K offsuit and it held and my mate was out.

So she asked me if I would have made the same move - and I tried to think about it objectively.

It's a very easy move to make, you've been watching lots of other players go all-in and scoop
up the very high blinds, you have about 10 big blinds left and you only have 3 other players to
get through to make it stick.

This will work as long as no-one picks up one of the top 4 hands - i.e. AA, KK, AK suited or
unsuited and QQ. If you run into one of those, you would most likely be called. You will also
most likely be called by either a short-stack or a very big stack - so you also have to bear
this in mind.

In the end - I surmised that it depends on what you want to do - do you want to 'just make
the money' - recoup your outgoings and have some bragging rights - OR - do you want to place
in the top 3 positions and therefore win ALOT of money??

If you just want to make the money - then A Q is probably a hand you should fold on the bubble -
If you want to make it to the top 3 and cash big - then yes, you should be aggressive at the
bubble time and take advantage of the tight play of the people in the first category.

Some interesting advice for you to view is at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycYJs4wl_gM


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Common Mistakes

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While I was trawling around on YouTube - I came across a quick 5 minute tutorial which
outlined Common Mistakes that poker players make - I know that the more experienced
players reading this will shrug this off as beginner-talk - but I tell you - playing live poker
twice this week has given me a chance to really study other players and the way they play and some of them make these common mistakes all the time.

I usually have an ipod on so I don't really join in the table banter - I know that's fairly anti-
social - but I find it alot easier to watch people's expressions and hand movements when
I can't actually hear what they say.

So when I saw this tutorial on Common Mistakes - I thought that it would be a good little
five minute guide for you to watch. It's about going back to basics which is sometimes
hard to do when you think that you are an experienced player and you know it all.

So - just take 5 minutes out to have a quick look at this tutorial - just check yourself and
make sure you don't make these mistakes - I know I definitely made some of them this week -

See if you agree with these...

1. Too much bluffing

2. Too much focus on your cards

3. Betting with a mediocre hand

4. Slow-playing too much

5. Checking to the better

6. Not wanting to get bluffed

7. Mood related mistakes

8. Under betting the pot

9. Wrong bluffing amount


For me personally -

1. No - I don't bluff too much - I have a fairly tight image and occasionally I'll take advantage
of that and do some stealing here and there, but on the whole, I'll only do that with good cards.

2. Occasionally I get married to my cards when I should fold them - even if it's good hand -
i.e. picking up KK and seeing an Ace on the Flop - if someone bets high - you just have to
give in and not hold onto them stubbornly !!

3. Betting with a mediocre hand - I only tend to do this in a Rebuy situation, I think to myself,
it's only £5, I'll limp in with 8 7 offsuit... sometimes it works and I can hit big - but most of the
time it's a waste of chips.

4. I like to mix it up - sometimes I'll slow-play the nuts and other times I'll bet out - I try to
judge the players that are still in the hand and work out how they would react to either action...

5. Checking to the better - GRrrrrrr - I did this to a very loose player and he decided not to try
and bluff me out - more than once much to my disgust ! So I didn't win as much as I'd hoped to.
I will only do this when I'm holding a powerful hand because I hate to give players free cards.

6. Luckily - I don't have too much of an ego so this one doesn't bother me too much.

7. OK - I don't care if you're Phil Ivey - sometimes a player will get under your skin and you'll
react to their complete twatishness - but on the whole - you just have to not let things get
to you or else you leave yourself completely vulnerable.

8. I try to think about what the other player will have and if their on a draw - then I try to work
out the pot odds to make their call bad if they decide to go for it. 9. Again - pot odds - it's
always good to be aware of the percentages in hitting or not hitting cards - A good rule of thumb
is to work out how many outs you have and then multiply it by 4 with two cards to come and
multiply it by 2 with one cards to come - if you bear this in mind - you can't make bad mistakes.

View this tutorial at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3vz3DMxXGs&feature=related

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Well I hope you have a good week - may the cards be with you hopefully things will be back
to normal by next week - I'll see you then.

All the best

Meg Arana
Hold or Fold