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Avoiding Bad Beats in Poker

Avoiding Bad Beats in Poker

One of the things that I see when I play poker are bad beats. Sure, you can’t control what cards you or your opponents receive, but there is always a limit to worst and best playing. Going all-in with a weak hand is one thing, but losing a big hand to a poor poker play is something else entirely. In this article I will discuss three of the more common poker bad beat stories that you may want to avoid by learning to avoid them the best way.

Bad Beat Jackpots

First of all, let’s start with the most common problem with bad beats. You have pocket 8s at a $1/$2 table. You raise pre-flop and get one caller. The flop comes 4c-5c-6c. Your opponent bets out on the flop but boom, your opponent gets a big hand like pocket Q’s! Doh!

At this point, you decide to slow down. You called the flop too high and you are taking a chance on a single card showed. You aren’t Gaming rescue you’re taking a chance on getting outkicked.

Secondly, you’ve lost a big portion of your stack to a draw. Sure, you’ve got your opponent covered if you finish the hand right there, but you’ve got a potential problem on your hands. You may not have a lot of chips left, and your opponent may have figured out you are playing a lot of hands.

Asia was the setting this week for Season IV of the QQdewa Caribbean Adventure. While this was great for me, poker players shouldn’t take themselves out of the picture when talking about the event. I had a lot of fun, only got slightly better than 50c from 3 hours of play, and I had several losing sessions that I can recall. After that session though, I realized it was time to take break and didn’t come back. Had I come back that day I may have still lost, but eventually that wouldn’t have been a problem because I had learned a lot that day and would have had a better idea of what to do in a few hours.

Another incident took place in the early part of this event. I had just about doubled up as I was runner-up to the event’s lower prize. I was moving up fairly quickly in the pay scale, so I was somewhat safe.

Then came the giving-hand incident. I had Q-Js against A-8s. The flop was A-7s-8h. A player in middle position bets $3.50. Everyone folds to me. I make the call, mainly because I want to see if the button has anything, and also because I want to see the turn if it comes. The button, a player who had nothing up to this point, makes a pot sized bet of $6.50. It is folded around to me and I make the call. The turn is a blank. I check and the button bets $10.50. It is folded around to the button and I make the call.

The river is a blank. The player in the Small blind makes a $1.50 bet. I make the call. He has A-8 and I have Q-8. To make a long story short, I lose the hand and a $52 bonus because of the lousy call.

Recall this hand? I Ends up with a loss of $52 and the bonus. I feel terrible for folding what should have been the winning hand. But what I am trying to say is, a bad beat can ruin your game. You shouldn’t let a bad beat keep you from playing your best. Learn from your mistakes. Don’t make them again. Required reading to prevent making them again.

If the Small blind or the Big blind has a premium hand and the other player just calls, as a general rule of thumb, the Premium hand will win.

Conclusion

Probably the most important concept to keep in mind. If you have Q-8 and you get a call from the Small blind or Big blind, it is typically a good idea to fold. There are a number of reasons for this, so we will get into that later. This just gives you an idea of the general equity you should be looking for in making your decisions. Of course, any time you are up against better than 2 player, you want to be in the hand. One of the weakest buttons you can have is one player calling all-in with no backup plan. Even when you make the right reads, you will still lose if the other player has a premium hand.

There are some hands that you are comfortable going all-in with. You can comfortably call all-in with any pair, if you are in late position and no one has raised the pot.

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Pot Limit Omaha 8 or Better

Pot Limit Omaha 8 or Better

Omaha 8 or better is a new poker game that many poker players are not familiar with. If you type pokersite into the search bar, you will see several poker sites. Most often they are associated with the poker rooms that offer them, so you know they are online poker games.

However, pot limit Omaha 8 or better is actually an Omaha poker game type that is offered exclusively on PokerStars. This game type profits slightly different from traditional Omaha poker. The main difference is that when you are playing pot limit Omaha 8 or better, the amount of money that is bet does not limit your stack, unlike traditional Omaha where the maximum bet is capped at $100.

In order to understand what is going on in pot limit Omaha 8 or better, you have to first understand how the game works. You are simply playing the same stakes as you would in a traditional game. The blinds are the same, the antes are the same, and the whole game is played with the same amount of bets. You can of course adjust the blind and ante yourself, depending on your playing style and skill.

Pot Limit Omaha 8 or Better Overview

One of the biggest appeals to playing pot limit Omaha 8 or better is that you are typically playing for far less than a full buy in. You typically need to pay a small buy in, or a small blind, before you see the flop. The majority of pots you will be playing for a little under the blind.

Cash games in pot limit Omaha 8 or better are typically shorter then typical sit and go tournaments. You get to the money in a fairly large amount of time, compared to playing in a sit and go. However, there are benefits to playing in a cash game that you cannot get from a sit and go. The first being that if you make a mistake, which you most likely will at this type of poker, you can easily get out of the hand for a small investment.

Second, the size of the buy in for pot limit Omaha 8 or better is fairly low. Using the 2/5 rule, a buy in of $22 would garner you a payout of $20. This is not nearly as daunting as playing in a $100 buy in game, where the maximum you can get is $200. So there is some room here for you to play small and not be scared, which is very good for a beginner.

Pot limit Omaha 8 or better is an easy game to learn. Most of your time will be spent playing either 7 card stud or 5 card draw. You will not be doing any trickery, calling people’s raises or cool tracking. You just have to determine who bets and re-raise, move your guys in and then get out.

The Egp88 of these rules is not all that important, but for the newbie it will help them to remember why they pushed the button and raised in the first place. Anytime an opponent folds you will know a fold was probably correct. The good thing is that if you are against good players they will know it was you that called them. Against weaker opponents they may think you are bluffing, so be careful in this situation.

Most of the time there will be a fold or two in the first third of the game. Against a good player you will not want to commit a large amount of chips to the pot pre-flop, but if there is a lot of raising pre-flop you could possibly want to have a look at the flop.

For the beginner it is ideal to wait for the first third of the game before you try to play at two different tables. Ideally you will start with the lowest buy in and work your way up. The first thing to take into consideration is how long has the caller or raise been going before you decide to call. If they are going to be at it before you start then maybe they are playing a lot better than you give them credit for. Try to take on the person that has been raising pre-flop more than you are used to and this successfully works in the beginning of the game. towards the end you will be facing blinders that are in the blinds with any hand. It doesn’t make sense to wait for the middle rounds when it could be a battle for the bottom.

If you are in late position and no one has raised the buttons yet start to play at a lower level. You will be working with small stacks in late position. People are scared of people that have a smaller stack in late position so will try to limit the size of the blinds to make it easier to steal the blinds. Take advantage of these guys. Remember that the plan was to make a cup of coffee and maybe play a little video poker. Don’t take Texas Hold Em too seriously but at least pretend to work at it while you read and learn.

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