Poker Basics

Pocket queens, also known as the Ladies, are the third-best starting poker hand in No-Limit Hold’em: only pocket aces and pocket kings have you beat before the flop. I have reviewed thousands of student hands […]

Pocket kings is the second-best hand in No-Limit Hold’em: only pocket aces has you beat before the flop. I have coached players on this hand for years, and the mistakes almost always come from one […]

How to play pocket aces optimally is one of the first things I teach new students, because most players assume they are already doing it correctly. Pocket aces win money in the long run no […]

Serious poker players spend a lot of time figuring out what their hourly rate is. It’s $X/hour or Y BB/hour or Z BB/100. I try to avoid that sort of thinking because it doesn’t make […]

Consider the following thought experiment: suppose you are playing heads-up no-limit Texas Hold’em against an opponent who has essentially identical skills as you. Setting aside any ethical concerns for the moment, let’s further suppose that […]

Setting the stage Invisible to me behind the dealer, in the #1 seat, is Carl. Carl doesn’t believe much in folding before he sees the three cards in the middle of the table. He doesn’t […]

Here’s a hand about value betting aces that comes from the PokerCoaching Discord cash discussion channel. Our hero, Ibney, is in the hijack position in a live $1/$2 NLHE game. The UTG player opens to […]

It was a pretty bad poker session in my $3/5 game. My pairs didn’t flop sets, my draws didn’t arrive, but the other people’s draws did arrive. Or maybe they didn’t arrive, but I wasn’t […]

A simplified game tree Multi-street poker is a complex game, and with four streets of betting, and a huge number of possible bet sizes available, no-limit Texas Hold’em can get absurdly complicated. But I’m going […]

Game selection in poker is the process of choosing which table, game, or stakes gives you the highest expected profit based on the opponents present rather than habit, ego, or proximity to an open seat. […]

It’s hard to make an extremely strong poker hand. I mean, in hold’em it’s hard to make a strong hand. In 5-card PLO, it’s really easy – the problem is that your opponents find it […]

The best places to play live poker in the US span seven states, from Nevada’s 60-plus poker rooms and the World Series of Poker to California’s massive cardrooms and the booming private club scene in […]

The odds of flopping different poker hands vary far more than most players realize: unpaired hands make one pair on the flop about 29% of the time, while flopping a flush with suited cards happens […]

Maintaining a poker face in live poker means controlling your expressions, body language, and verbal cues so that opponents cannot read the strength of your hand. Whether you are bluffing or betting for value with […]

A set is three of a kind made with a pocket pair: you hold two matching hole cards and one of that rank hits the board. Trips is three of a kind made with one […]

Poker without chips is entirely possible as long as everyone agrees on what each item is worth. Any countable object works as a betting token: coins, Monopoly money, candy, printed paper chips, office supplies, or […]

Poker suits rank spades highest, followed by hearts, diamonds, and clubs at the bottom. In almost all poker games, suits are equal and do not affect hand strength, but there are three specific situations where […]

Big O poker is a variation of Omaha poker that’s played with five hole cards and the hi/lo principal in play. The full name of the game is Five Card Pot Limit Omaha Hi-Lo 8 […]

Online poker rewards players who understand its key differences from live poker: faster game pace, tighter average competition, no physical tells, and significantly more accessible player-data through tracking software. I have played millions of hands […]

If you mention the word “poker” to most people, they immediately think of Texas Hold’em, but there are many different poker variations that fall under the umbrella of poker games.  In fact, there are dozens […]

The worst poker hands in Texas Hold’em share three characteristics: they are unconnected (cannot make a straight), unsuited (low flush potential), and contain low cards that make weak pairs when they hit. The bottom of […]