The
Ultimate
Guide To
POKER
The $20m man
IN ASSOCIATION WITH
How Sam Trickett took the poker world by storm
to w o n k o t d ee n u o y g in h t y Ever
win major tournaments and make big money from cash games
r e k o P to e id u G te a im lt U e Th
CONTENTS
78 getting started 006 History of hold’em
How poker moved from simple origins to become a multi-million-dollar phenomenon
012 How to play no-limit hold’em Master the game the whole world’s playing: no-limit Texas hold’em
020 Poker’s big winners
Introducing the seven poker players who have won more than $15 million from live tournament poker
022 Table manners
The five most common breaches of etiquette in the game
024 Poker terminology
Talk the talk with a guide to common poker jargon
026 Online poker
The real story of the rise of online poker – and some common myths debunked
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sit&gos 030 How to beat sit&gos
tournaments 050 How to beat tournaments
038 Sit&go strategy
056 Sam Trickett The UK poker superstar on playing at the
Mastering the sit&go format can help you turn a tidy profit – and it’s easier than you think 15 steps to take you from sit&go beginner to single-table titan
042 Leader of the stack
Take control of the game once it reaches the heads-up stage courtesy of an unexploitable strategy
046 Sit&go quiz
Test your knowledge of sit&go strategy with this tricky quiz
Tips and strategy on how to take down multi-table tournaments
top and keeping yourself grounded
058 Size is everything
How to play short, medium and big stacks all the way to the final table
062 JC Tran
The tournament legend on how to develop a consistent MTT game
064 Your move
Creative moves to add to your multi-table tournament arsenal
066 Chris Moorman
The online MTT master’s top 10 tips for tournament success
H O L D ’ E M O F H I S T O R Y
f o y r o t s The hi
HOLD’EM Find out how poker developed from its simple origins to a multi-million dollar phenomenon, and why the game of no-limit Texas hold’em has become the world’s most popular card game
The legendary match came to a close when Dandolos uttered the immortal line: ‘Mr Moss, I have to let you go’
T
he only thing everyone can agree upon in the history of poker is nobody knows where the game started. Some point to the French game of poque, some say the Persian game of As Nas, but wherever it began there is one place that made poker its spiritual home – the USA. During the American Civil War in the 1850s the game of poker as we know it began to take shape as the game of five-card stud sprung up. The game played with one card dealt face down and the remaining four cards dealt face-up. It led to much more betting action than other forms of poker so quickly caught on as the game of choice. It may seem unthinkable nowadays, but perhaps the most famous battle in the game’s history was played out in a time before no-limit hold’em had really caught on. Two of poker’s all-time greats clashed in a five-month headsup battle that took in a variety of variants, concentrating initially on five-card stud. Legend has it that Nick ‘The Greek’ Dandolos hit Las Vegas with a desire to play some highstakes poker. Benny Binion agreed to provide the action for Dandolos in his Horseshoe casino – and promptly contacted Johnny Moss, who was embroiled in a three-day-long cash game in Texas. Nevertheless, swayed by the promise of an epic high-stakes encounter, Moss booked himself a flight to Vegas. It proved to be a good decision.
From January to May in 1951, the pair locked horns every single day, breaking only briefly for the trifling matter of a few hours’ sleep. Reports of the exact amount of money that changed hands differ, but it’s thought that by the end of the confrontation Moss was anywhere from $2m to $4m up – a large amount of money by today’s standards, but an absolutely astronomical amount back in the 1950s. The legendary match came to a close when Dandolos – 15 years Moss’s senior and physically drained from the months of intense play – uttered the immortal line: ‘Mr Moss, I have to let you go.’ The contest between Moss and Dandolos raised the profile of poker hugely with Binion savvy enough to move the game from the depths of the casino to front and centre where it attracted huge crowds desperate to live the life of a high-roller vicariously, if only for an hour or two. And as poker became more popular, a new variant of the game was starting to come to the fore…
an Epic battle
Texas hold’em originated in the Lone Star State and grew in popularity during the 50s and 60s thanks to its complex nature. A group of local poker pros, known as road gamblers, including such legends as Amarillo Slim and Doyle Brunson took the game to their hearts. Their life was hugely different to the poker pros of the modern
HOLD’EM history
The timeline of hold’em The story of how hold’em went from the streets of Texas to being the most popular card game in the world. We look at the players and events that changed the face of poker and turned it into a global business worth millions of dollars…
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1950s
Hold’em grows in popularity in its home state of Texas
1967
A group of Texas-based gamblers take no-limit hold’em to Las Vegas
st r a t e g y S I T & G O
t a e b o t How SIT&GOs Sit&gos are a great format in which to build your skills and confidence, and can also yield a very handsome profit. Here we look at how to master the games by moving through the gears and how to swiftly move up the levels
O
NE OF The most popular new formats to emerge from internet poker is the sit&go, or single-table tournament. Full-ring sit&gos run with nine or ten players, with first place taking 50% of the prizepool, second place 30% and third place 20%. These are the most common games you will find in home games and pubs, and they’re a game that everyone should be able to play and beat. Sit&gos are a great way to start playing poker as they’re easy to play, relatively short, and you know exactly how much you’re playing for and how much you can potentially lose in each game. The best sit&go players at any given level can expect to average a 20% return on investment – so for every $10 game they would make $12, for a profit of $2. If you start off playing $5 games, then good players should average around $1 per game. You can then move up a level providing you have at least 20 times the buy-in. So when you get to $200 you can try the $10 games. Remember that the goal is to play at the level that is most profitable to you at any given time, so if you step up and do well stick with it, and if you take a beating then drop down and recover. If all goes to plan and you consistently acclimatise to and dominate each new level there is no reason why you shouldn’t move up a level every 100 games or so, meaning the move from the $5 to $100 level could be done in less that 500 games. Of course, in reality, the path is likely to be more circuitous and contain a few pitfalls and dead ends along the way, but the more you learn and apply yourself the quicker you will progress. Beyond this level there is still plenty of distance to cover, with buy-ins from $200 up to $2,000 currently available. Remember though that if you get this far you will start to encounter many excellent and sophisticated opponents, so beware! Should you be able to outsmart them you will certainly find a pot of gold yours for the taking – by playing four games at a time at the $200 level, a good player can rake in around
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how to win SIT&GOs
Become a sit&go master by learning how to effectively move through the gears The early phase dictates a tight hand selection and favours good post-flop players. Your goal is to gain some chips when you get a good hand.
1
The middle phase dictates a transition from post-flop play to a preflop push/fold strategy. Most players are unaware that this approach is correct and will allow you to collect the blinds. Your goal is to put yourself in a position to win the sit&go.
2
In the late phase of play, both preflop and post-flop play can dominate, depending on the blinds and the sizes of the three remaining stacks. Go for the win, and don’t be cautious.
3
$200-$300 an hour. A decent return for any online poker player. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. First we need to learn to beat the low-stakes games, which are full of bad players who don’t employ correct strategy. Unlike most forms of poker, sit&gos are almost a solved game and you need to stick to a fixed plan to do well. The key to winning is using a formula based on dividing the game into three stages – early, middle and late. It helps to view these three elements as traffic lights – red, amber and green. In the red stage you should play with extreme caution as you are in the danger zone. With amber you should start to move slowly through the gears and play a bit more freely and at green you should put your foot down and hit top gear. Confused? You won’t be.
Playing at the $200 level with four games on one high-resolution screen, a good player can make $200-$300 an hour. Happy days!
s t r a t e g y
t a e b o t w Ho
t o u r n a m e n t
tournaments
No-limit hold’em tournaments offer the glamour, excitement and money that attracts most players to poker. But in order to be a success at tournament poker you need discipline, stamina and, above all, the will to win
M
m u l t i - t a b l e
any people get into playing poker because they have watched it on television and it got them curious about the game. Most televised poker is tournament poker. The action is fast-paced and the capability of being able to risk it all in one hand makes for exciting television. If you’re new to poker and are interested in learning how to play tournaments, it is important to understand the various nuances of tournament poker and the basic concepts that will come into play through the course of a tournament. A major reason that tournament poker is so popular is that there is the potential to win a large sum of money in relation to the amount of the buy-in. Take the World Series of Poker Main Event as an example. The buy in is $10,000 but if you make the final table, you’ll be guaranteed around 100 times that amount. It’s like a lottery ticket that you have some control over. Tournament poker, however, is not for everyone. If you are going to be successful you must have incredible discipline and patience. Tournaments, especially the larger ones, last countless hours and sometimes days. If you’re looking to make a quick buck, try a cash game. Discipline is important because you have to stay alert and focused on what is going on at your table. This might be easy for an hour or two, but when you’ve been playing for 10 hours straight it can become difficult.
Impdi for wsop
controlled aggression
In addition to discipline and patience, a good tournament player will need to be adept at game theory. This doesn’t mean you need to have a doctorate in game theory in order to succeed, but you need to understand the different dynamics that will exist over the course of a tournament and how to adapt your game to best take advantage of these dynamics. It’s also important to have the ability to be aggressive. While a patient and tight player can often make a good living in cash games, this isn’t necessarily true in a tournament because of the increasing blinds and antes. You can’t sit back and wait for premium hands and expect to win consistently in poker tournaments. You will need to be able to win pots using imagination, creativity, and well-timed aggression.
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Jamie Gold won the 2006 WSOP Main Event – the largest live tournament ever – for $12m
s t r a t e g y
s i e z i S
t o u r n a m e n t
everything
Poker might be a game of cards but the way you play any given hand in a tournament should largely be dictated by the size of your stack. We show you how to play short, medium and big stacks all the way to the final table…
timo hebditch
m u l t i - t a b l e
W
hen playing a no-limit hold’em tournament, your stack is your life. Lose it all and (rebuys notwithstanding) it’s game over. Use it wisely and you’ll see your stack grow to Himalayan proportions. Your ultimate aim, clearly, is to accumulate all the chips in play. However, only in a true dream scenario is your tournament going to be a smooth, steady process of accumulation. Most of the time your chipstack will fluctuate wildly as your fortunes twist and turn, and all the while the blinds will be growing, diminishing the value of your chips and threatening to engulf you completely. As such, knowing how to play different stack sizes effectively is an absolutely crucial tournament skill. Before we look at how to play different stack sizes, however, we need to know what defines a small, medium and big stack. It’s
Find your game
Everest Poker has a massive range of tournaments to choose from, whatever your stakes. There’s over €7m guaranteed each month to play for online! Plus you can play satellites to win your way into some of the best live tournaments around the world. If you love tournaments, you need to bring your game to Everest Poker.
important to appreciate that only blinds and antes dictate this, not the stacks of other players around you. Lose a big pot at the start of a tournament, see your stack go from 5,000 to 2,000 chips, and it’s easy to panic. But with low blinds of say 25/50, you’re still playing 40 big blinds. That means you have plenty of time to wait for hands and situations to rebuild your stack. In fact, you shouldn’t consider yourself short-stacked until you’ve got less than 10-12 big blinds left. A medium stack is anywhere between 12 and 25 big blinds. Anything above this and you can hold your head high – you’re officially a big-stack!
Short stacks
If you’re a short-stack your chips are more valuable than at any other time. That’s because if you win the tournament you end up with all the chips, but you don’t get all the
money in the prize pool (sadly). So as your chipstack increases above average, each individual chip is worth less, enabling you to play a little looser. But as a short-stack, the opposite is true. Because your existence in the tournament gives you some equity (as you still have a chance to make money), the smaller your stack gets, the more each individual chip is worth. If you have a genuine short stack, playing it is easy as you only really have one option and that is to move all-in or fold. The only exception to this is if you have a massive hand preflop and think you can induce action from other players by making a smaller bet, although this often looks suspicious.
Don’t fear the reaper
So when should you get your chips in? Most players wait too long, hoping to pick up a big hand before committing all their chips, but the problem with this is your stack can