Poker Rules Talking During A Hand

• Deuces Wild - Wild Widow

'You will show your poker greatness by the hands you fold, not the hands you play.' Dan Reed. 'Poker is a skill game pretending to be a chance game.' James Altucher. 'Serious poker is no more about gambling than rock climbing is about taking risks.' Al Alvarez. Usually said by a poker player who has gone on a losing streak, and the streak is about to get worse. 'Trust everyone, but cut the cards.' Means trust no one, and cut the cards as a way to try to prevent cheating. 'Any two will do.' Refers to the concept that any two cards in Hold'em can theoretically win the hand.

Introduction

Five Card Draw is one of the oldest forms of poker and was by far the best known internationally until the sudden rise in popularity of Texas Hold'em at the end of the 20th century. The basic game will be described first, followed by some variations with extra opening conditions, winning conditions or wild cards. These can be combined in various ways - for example jacks or better and trips to win are often played with a bug or wild card. This page assumes some familiarity with the general rules and terminology of poker. See the poker rules page for an introduction to these, and the poker betting and poker hand ranking pages for further details.

Five Card Draw Poker

This basic game, with no restrictions on the cards needed to open or win, is sometimes known as California Draw or Guts, though Guts is also the name of another poker-like game. Because of this freedom it offers considerable scope for bluffing, especially if played for high stakes.

Players and Cards

Five Card Draw is played with a standard 52-card pack, and there can be from two to six players - six probably make the best game. It is possible for seven or or even eight people to play, but then there is the disadvantage that the cards may run out during the draw.

Ante, Deal and First Betting Round

Before the deal each player puts an agreed ante into the pot. Usually the ante is the same amount as the minimum bet.

After the shuffle and cut, the dealer deals the cards face down clockwise one at a time until each player has five cards. Players may look at their cards, and there is a betting round begun by the player to dealer's left. If everyone passes (checks) in this first betting round, the cards are thrown in, the turn to deal passes to the left, the pot remains and everyone adds another ante to it.

In fixed or spread limit games, the number of raises after the initial opening bet is usually limited to four.

The Draw

If more than one player remains in the game after the first betting round, active players have one opportunity to improve their hands by discarding some cards and obtaining replacements. Beginning with the nearest active player to dealer's left, each active player announces the number of cards to be replaced, discards that number of cards face down, and is dealt an equal number of cards face down by the dealer.

A player can discard from zero to three cards. The dealer should wait until the player has discarded the number of cards stated before starting to deal replacements. Discarding no cards at all and thus keeping one's original hand is known as standing pat. Naturally, it is in the players' interest to wait for their turns and not give away information in advance about how many cards they intend to draw.

In a game with more than six players it is possible that the deck will run out of cards (since each player can consume up to 8 cards - a hand of 5 plus 3 more drawn). If the dealer finds that not enough cards remain then the discards of the players who have already discarded are shuffled and cut to form a new deck from which replacement cards can be dealt to the remaining player(s). Reusing cards rejected by other players is not very satisfactory, and this is why six players is normally set as the maximum number for this game.

Until the second round of betting begins, any player is entitled to ask how many cards any other player drew, and be given an honest answer.

Second Betting Round

After all active players have had a chance to draw there is a second round of betting, begun by the player who opened the betting on the first round.

The minimum and maximum bets allowed in the second betting round are normally set higher than in the first betting round - typically double.

In a fixed limit or spread limit game, the second betting round, like the first, is normally limited to a bet and four raises.

Showdown

After the second betting round, if the pot has not already been won, players show their cards in clockwise order, beginning with the last player who took aggressive action (bet or raised) in the second betting round. If everyone checked in the second betting round, the player who opened the betting in the first betting round shows first.

Variations

Drawing more than three cards

Some allow a player to discard and draw four cards if the fifth card is an ace. Some allow a player to discard four or all five cards unconditionally. With these rules the likelihood of running out of cards during the draw process is increased. In practice, however, the difference is small since it is rarely if ever worthwhile to draw more than three cards.

Blinds

Some prefer to begin the pot with a blind bet instead of or in addition to the ante. In the first betting round, the player to dealer's left is forced to bet an agreed amount, irrespective of his cards. The next player to the left may be permitted to straddle by placing a blind bet of twice this amount, the next player to re-straddle and so on. Then the betting round begins with the player to the left of the player who placed the largest blind bet. Players may fold, call or raise. If all others call or fold, the player who placed the largest blind bet may check or raise. See the poker betting page for further details.

Five Card Draw - Jacks or Better

This game, also known as Jack Pots, a hand at least as good as a pair of jacks is required to open the betting. It is probably the most popular version of Five Card Draw Poker. There should be at least four players and preferably more, otherwise most of the hands will be thrown in without play. Opinions on the merits of this game have varied widely over the years. For example:

'The addition of jack pots has probably done more to injure Poker than the trump signal has injured Whist .. the whole system has become a nuisance, and has destroyed one of the finest points in the game of Poker - the liberty of personal judgement as to every counter put into the pool, except the blind.' (R.F.Foster: Handbook to the Card Games, 1897).

'It is essential for the stability of the game that a player have jacks or better when opening. If this rule is not enforced and a player opens the pot any time he feels like it, one of the greatest factors of skill in the game is automatically eliminated - which depends on knowing that the opener holds at least a pair of jacks.' (J.Scarne: Scarne on Cards, 1949).

The ante and deal are as in Five Card Draw, but in the first betting round, if no one has yet bet, a player who does not have a pair of jacks or better is obliged to pass. Once a player has opened the betting, others are free to call or raise irrespective of what they hold.

Note that the opener does not actually have to hold jacks, or cards higher than jacks. Any hand that beats a pair of tens is sufficient - for example you could open with 5-5-3-3-6 (two pairs) but not with 10-10-A-K-Q.

The draw is the same as in Five Card Draw, except that if the player who opened the betting discards cards that formed part of the qualification to open, this must be announced and the discarded cards kept separate from the cards discarded by other players. This is known as splitting openers. For example a player might discard the Q from Q-Q-10-7-6 in the hope of getting a flush, especially if some of the other players seemed to have good hands.

The second round of betting and the showdown are as in Five Card Draw. When the pot is awarded, the player who split openers must show the discarded card(s) to prove that the opening requirement was satisfied.

If no one has a good enough hand to open (or if those that do choose not to open), then the cards are thrown in and it is the next player's turn to deal.

If the opener wins the pot, enough of the opener's hand must be shown to prove that the opener really has jacks or better. This applies even if all the other players fold on the opener's bet. If the opener cannot show a qualifying hand, the opener's hand is dead. The opener cannot win the pot. If there was a showdown, the best of the other hands wins the pot. If everyone else has folded the pool remains for the next deal.

Some play progressive jackpots: if no one opens the minimum requirement for the next deal is increased to a pair of queens, and if this hand too is thrown in then kings and then aces, then back to kings, queens, jacks and so on.

Five Card Draw - Jacks or Better, Trips to Win

The rules are the same as Five Card Draw - Jacks or Better except that a player needs a hand at least as good as three of a kind to win the pot. If the pot is won without a showdown, the winner must expose enough cards to prove that the hand is at least as good as three of a kind. This of course further reduces the scope for bluffing.

If no one has a hand as good as three of a kind after the draw, the pot remains, but the players who folded before the draw are out of the game. The players who did not fold ante again and there is a new deal involving just these players.

Five Card Draw with a Bug

To increase the proportion of good hands, some players add a joker, to make a deck of 53 cards. The joker is not a true wild card but a bug: the holder can use it to represent an ace, or to complete a straight or flush. So for example 9-9-7-7-joker is not a full house but two pairs with an ace kicker.

In this game the highest hand is five aces: A-A-A-A-joker. This beats a straight flush.

When used in a flush the joker represents the highest card not already present, so for example A-K-J-4-2 beats A-10-9-8-joker because the bug represents the K not a second ace.

The bug can be added to any of the above versions: California (Guts) Draw, Jacks or Better or Trips to Win.

Five Card Draw with Deuces Wild

In this variation of Jacks or Better, the four deuces (twos) are wild cards. A deuce can be used as any card the holder needs to complete a hand. The highest hand type is Five of a Kind, which is better than a Straight Flush.

Except when making Five of a Kind, a wild card cannot be used to represent a card that is already present in a player's hand. The only case where this matters is when making a Flush, in which case if you have (for example) a natural ace, you cannot use a wild card as a second ace.

This variant is found mostly in home poker games and is usually played with the rule that players must declare their own hands (the cards do not 'speak for themselves' - see poker betting and showdown for details).

It is equally possible to play with any other set of cards wild as agreed by the players, or as specified by the dealer in a dealer's choice game. For example you one can play with fives wild, or with one-eyed jacks wild.

Wild Widow

This five-card draw variation is similar to deuces wild except that the wild card is determined during the deal rather than specified in advance. This is done by dealing a card dealt face up to the table, usually after the fourth card has been dealt to each player. The other three cards of the same rank as the face up card are wild.

Diablo

This is a five-card draw in which deuces are wild and players are not allowed to draw more than two cards. There is an extra rule that the player who opens (makes the first bet) must either win the pot or match it. In other words, if the pot is won by a player other than the opener, the opener must pay to create a new pot equal to the pot was just won. The deal then passes to the left (with no new antes) and the game is played for this new pot. This continues until a hand is played in which the opener wins the pot.

If this variant is played in a dealer's choice game, it continues until the opener wins the pot, after which the deal passes to the player to the left of the player who called Diablo, who can then select another game. To avoid the pot becoming too large, some groups may prefer to put a fixed limit on the size of the new pot that the opener must create after failing to win.

Jacks Back

This variation of Jacks or Better works well for smaller groups, say 3 to 5 players, in which case there will be many deals on which no one can open.

The game begins like Five Card Draw. Five cards are dealt to each player and there is a betting round, in which Jacks or Better are required to open. If someone opens the betting the game proceeds exactly like normal Five Card Draw, and in a showdown the highest hand wins the pot.

If no one opens in the first betting round the cards are not thrown in. Instead the players keep their cards and the game changes to Ace-to-five Lowball, and there is a new betting round begun by the player to dealer's left. Provided that the betting is opened in this new betting round, the players then have the chance to draw with the aim of making a low hand. After the draw there is another betting round, begun by the first active player to dealer's left. If more than one player stays in there is a showdown in which the lowest poker hand wins. Aces are low and straights and flushes do not count, so the best hand is A-2-3-4-5 (a 'bicycle'). A-A-2-3-4 is a pair, so it is worse than any hand without a pair, but better than any other pair since aces are low.

It may happen that no one opens in the first betting round, and then after the game changes to Lowball everyone checks again. In this case the cards are thrown in and the turn to deal passes to the left.

To avoid the possibility that a hand is thrown in, some clubs have a rule that when the game changes to Lowball the player to dealer's left must place a 'blind' bet, and the betting round begins with the next player to the left. The player who placed the blind may raise after everyone else has acted even if no one did more than call. The betting round after the draw is begun by the first active player to dealer's left as usual.

Gambling casinos in baltimore maryland. Some play that check-raising is not allowed in the Lowball part of this game, and also apply the betting sevens rule as for California Lowball.

Jacks Back is often played with a joker, which acts as a bug for high hands. When the game is played for low, the joker is known as a fitter, and it represents the lowest card not already present in the player's hand. Other forms of Lowball Draw Poker are described on the Lowball page.

All for One and One for All

In this game the drawing and betting can continue until the deck is all but exhausted.

Antes are placed and five cards are dealt face down to each player. There is a betting round.

Now there is a drawing round. Each active player, beginning to dealer's left, can either:

1. stand pat, or
2. discard one card face down and receive a replacement, or
3. discard all five cards face down and receive a new five-card hand.

The drawing round is followed by another betting round.

Poker Rules Talking During A Handshake

This process is repeated: there is a series of drawing rounds, each begun by the player to the left of the one who began the previous drawing round. Each drawing round is followed by a betting round.

There are restrictions to ensure that the cards do not run out:

1. A player is not allowed to exchange all five cards if this would not leave enough cards for all remaining active players in the current drawing round to exchange one.
2. If after a betting round there are fewer cards remaining in the deck than there are active players, there is no more drawing, but a showdown in which the highest hand wins the pot.

32-Card Poker

Sometimes known as Stripped Deck Poker, this version of Five Card Draw is popular in Southern Europe. The 32-card deck consists of cards from Ace (high) to Seven (low) in each suit. The main differences from normal Five Card Draw are as follows:

• Because a flush is harder to make than with a 52-card pack, it ranks above a full house and below four of a kind.
• When used as a low card, Ace is adjacent to Seven, so A-7-8-9-10 is a low straight (or straight flush).
• There is a ranking of suits, usually hearts (highest), diamonds, clubs, spades (lowest). When hands are otherwise equal, the suit of the highest card in the combination is compared. For example when two players have equal pairs with equal kickers, the pair containing the heart will win (the suits of the kickers don't count).
• The maximum number of players is five: usually there are four players or fewer.

Variants

The four-player versions of Italian Poker and Turkish Poker are forms of 32-card poker with some special rules.

The following variant is found in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and perhaps other places. A player who asks to exchange four cards discards four and is first dealt three cards face down to look at. Then the dealer deals one card face up and one face down, and the player must choose which of these to take as the fourth card. If the face up card is chosen the face down card is discarded unseen.

Seven Card Draw Poker

This variant is not widespread but it is played to a minor extent in the Netherlands. It is seen as a novelty game with a greater element of risk than 5 card draw, in that players have a better chance to make a high ranking combination. Because of the larger number of cards dealt, this game does not work well with more than four players.

Before the deal, the player to dealer's left places a small blind, and the next player to the left a big blind. The size of the blinds is agreed in advance - the small blind should be half the value of the big blind. The dealer then deals seven cards to each player and there is a first round of betting beginning to the left of the big blind.

After the betting round each surviving player in turn, beginning to the left of the player who placed the big blind, has one opportunity to discard from zero to four cards and obtain replacements from the dealer. If the deck runs out during this process, the cards already discarded are shuffled to a make new deck from which replacement cards can be dealt to the remaining player(s).

After everyone has had a chance to exchange there is a second betting round beginning with the player to dealer's left. As usual, it is possible just to check, but if anyone wishes to bet, the minimum is twice the amount of the final bet in the first betting round (twice the big blind if no one raised in the first round).

In the showdown, each surviving player discards two cards and keeps five. The best five-card poker hand wins the pot.

Variant: this game is often played with an ante placed by all players, in addition to the small and large blinds.

Rules of Seven Card Draw Poker in Dutch are available on the Pokeren Online site.

In order to progress in the game of poker you have to think beyond the cards that you play. There are many situational factors that you have to take into affect when determining the expected value of your decisions. These factors may be different depending on whether you are playing a tournament or a cash game. To focus this lesson, we will concentrate on tournament play.

Situational Factors

There are many different factors to take into effect when making decisions about a poker hand. In fact, it's the layers of complexity involved in poker that make this game so fun. You may have seen lists similar to this, but the following (inspired by Harrington on Hold'em: Volume 1) are the primary situational factors to consider during tournament play.

• The stage of the tournament (early, bubble, final table, etc.)
• Number of players at the table.
• Playing styles and personalities of the players on the table.
• Your image at the table.
• Your stack size in relation to the blinds & antes.
• Your stack size in relation to the others at the table.
• Your position relative to the other players.
• Action that has occurred before you.
• Number and type of players left to act after you.
• The pot odds.
• Your position after the flop.
• Tells you may have picked up.
• Your cards.

Levels of Thinking

In order to get beyond the cards, there are different levels in which you should be thinking about the players and the situation. Please see our lesson on levels of thinking for more on this fundamental concept, but here's a quick re-cap:

• 1st Level – What cards do I have?
• 2nd Level – What do my opponents have?
• 3rd Level – What do they think I have?
• 4th Level – What do they think I think they have?
• 5th Level – Yes, you can keep going and going…

Ideally you should only be thinking one level deeper than your opponent. If they aren't capable of thinking about what cards you have (2nd level thinking) then there's no point in thinking about what you think they think you have (3rd level thinking).

The Decision Making Process

As mentioned, the actual cards you hold should only be one small factor to consider. And while I think most people fundamentally agree with this concept, many do not implement it correctly in the process they take when deciding their actions at the table. Additionally, online poker can create bad habits that are counterintuitive to successful poker play. Online, more so than in live poker, the cards you hold can have a higher weight in your decision making process than they should, simply because you see your cards first. It's important that even though your cards are exposed, you need to train yourself to detach the value of your hand until you've seen the action in front of you and thought through the situation.

So when I say the 'decision making process', I specifically mean the steps you go through in your mind before deciding how to act on every poker hand. Here is a typical order of events (assuming you are decent poker player and are looking at your cards last):

1. Observe the action thus far.
2. Think about situational factors and the past play and tendencies of other players.
3. Put each person on a range of hands based on #2.
4. Hope you pick up a hand that is conducive to the action and the factors.
5. Look at hand and then decide if it is the right hand to play.
6. Narrow down possible actions to take and how the players would react.
7. Act.

This is faulty thinking and isn't the right process in order to capitalize on each situation. Why? – Because you truly are not playing the players by thinking this way. You are still allowing your cards to be the primary determining factor in your decisions. The following is a more optimal thought process:

1. Observe the action thus far.
2. Think about situational factors and the past play and tendencies of other players.
3. Put each person on a range of hands based on #2.
4. Narrow down possible actions to take and how the players would react.
5. Determine what they think I would have based on those actions.
6. If my actual hand has to be a factor, consider the results based on a show down.
7. Act.

The key here is simply moving #6 from the first list up to #4 in the second list. #5 in the second list is something that most good poker players usually do, but it is harder to perform this third-level thinking after you've already decided to play a particular hand.

Keep in mind that expected value is always part of this decision making process and comes into play when narrowing down all the alternative choices of how to act. But the essence of this process is that we should be thinking about our cards after we have considered possible courses of action. For pre-flop play, this means not even looking at our cards until we've done this. But this decision making process isn't just about pre-flop hold'em. It's all poker on all streets.

Now with this line of thinking, it doesn't mean that the action itself is a bluff or a 'move'; it just means that we are considering our actual hand last in the process and not somewhere in the middle. This type of decision making process is something that separates the great poker players from the good ones. While many players may feel like they understand the concept of 'playing the player', it is easy to drift back into the habit of just playing cards. The key is to practice this decision making process over and over in order to create a habit of performing these steps at a subconscious level.

Hand Example – Making a Tough Call

• No Limit Hold'em Tournament (Online Re-buy).
• Final Table.
• Blinds: 200/400 + 25 Antes.
• You and your opponent both have 15,000 in chips.

Reads

Your opponent in the hand is an experienced loose aggressive player. The main leak in his game is that he plays with his ego and doesn't seem to change gears much. But as you have observed he tends to stick to high card combinations. He always continues his aggression post flop with a continuation bet, but you have noticed that he tends to bet stronger when he hits the flop. He also isn't the type of player to scare easily and you've seen him overvalue his marginal face cards in the face of a re-raise.

Pre-Flop

It folds to your opponent in the cut-off who raises to 1000. Based on your reads, we can narrow his range to any Ace, K9+, Q9+, J9+ as well as any pocket pair. Everyone else folds and you are in the big blind with :

Figure 1

There are several ways to play this hand based on situational factors. Folding, re-raising and calling are all viable options.

Holding when facing a raise out of position is certainly not the most desirable situation. But given our stack size in relation to the blinds, the wide range of our opponent and our confidence at playing post-flop, folding is probably too weak here.

If we are ahead in the hand, shouldn't we re-raise? Well, here's where some levels of thinking come in. He is experienced enough to understand that we know that he is aggressive. He also knows that our re-raising range doesn't have to be big because of how aggressive he is. Given our stack sizes, he is the type of player who could easily come back over the top of us here and force us to possibly fold the best hand by representing a monster. Even with a strong read, just isn't that strong of a hand for us to be calling all in at this stage of the tournament. Also, by re-raising this particular player we have much less of a chance to take it down post-flop and we're going to be out of position the rest of the hand.

Since we are relatively early in the final table but deep enough where the pot sizes have value, and given the range of your opponent and your strong reads of his betting patterns, I would lean towards a call.

The Flop

The flop is and the pot contains 2,450:

Figure 2

Poker Rules Talking During A Hand Gesture

How should we play the hand from here? Betting is okay and I would probably mix it up by betting some of the time and checking the others. However, since we are facing an aggressive player who is capable of raising a probe bet, let's control the size of the pot and evaluate how he plays. We also have a pretty accurate read as to how he plays when he hits the flop or not, so we should be able to gain the information we need without getting forced out of the pot.

We check and our opponent bets 1,200 which is about ½ the size of the pot:

Figure 3

What does that say about his range? It really doesn't change it except that based on our reads of how strong he typically bets when he has hit the flop, it's not likely that he has an Ace. Also, if he had an Ace, wouldn't he bet more to protect against the draws? It's still possible he has one but there are many other hands he could hold here. He could have a weaker King, he could have a mid pocket-pair, he could have a flush draw. Given that his range is so wide, we can at least proceed in the hand thinking there is a strong possibility that we are ahead, but how? There are certainly cases for raising or calling here.

The theory behind raising here is that we define our hand. Many players are going to respect a check-raise and at least give us credit for an Ace. However, check-raising could also put us in a tough spot against this particular player. Since he knows that we think he's aggressive, he knows that we don't need an Ace to check-raise here. This means that he could come back over the top again representing the Ace and causing us to fold. We also know he is capable of this so we have to choose if we are ready to make this type of decision based on deep levels of thinking.

Are we possibly over thinking this? It's possible. And against a less experienced and less crafty LAG player we wouldn't need to think this deep. But we at least need to consider the implications of raising. The other implication of raising is that our opponent folds a worse hand that would put more chips in the pot on later streets.

What about calling? Well, calling in this spot is often called a float. Basically it means that the purpose of calling the flop is to either evaluate the turn or to call in order to take the pot down with a bluff on the turn. An additional benefit of calling is that we control the size of the pot.

Against this particular player, I would lean toward calling. One thing we also have to consider is that by calling, what hand does he put us on? If we had a strong Ace he would think we would re-raise pre-flop so he can probably discount AQ or AK. If we had AJ it's more likely that we would bet or check-raise the flop with the draws showing. So at best, he probably puts us on a weak Ace, but more realistically a King, mid pocket-pair or a flush draw.

Poker Rules Talking During A Hand Held

The Turn

The turn is a and the pot has 4,850:

Figure 4

The Jack is an interesting card in that if he has QT he has now made a straight. It's certainly something to be aware of, but we shouldn't be afraid of monsters just yet. The Jack also now gives us a gut-shot straight draw. Should we check or bet here? Since that Jack is somewhat of a scare card there really isn't a lot of value in betting. He will likely fold a pure bluff and probably calls us with an Ace. I would check here, keep the pot small and evaluate his play. You check and so does your opponent.

The River

The river is a . Okay, now we have to think about what his check means and what he put us on. When a LAG player checks, it should raise suspicion. But based on our reads, we know that this LAG bets into his strong hands. If he had a big Ace, a set, two pair or a straight he would have bet the turn. Since he typically plays high cards, we can narrow his range to a mid pocket pair 77 to TT, KT, KQ, QJ, JT. So what does he put us on? At this point, his read probably hasn't changed from a weak Ace, a King, mid pocket-pair or a flush draw.

Similar to the turn, betting here holds little value. Sure there are times that he pays off a small river bet with a hand in his range, but there aren't a lot of hands he can beat by calling unless he has an Ace which obviously beats us. I would check here and hope he checks it down. We check and he immediately fires out 4,500:

Figure 5

What does this mean? Could we possibly have the best hand here? On the surface this seems like a pretty tough call. Since we've been paying attention the whole hand and narrowing his range with each action, the answer is somewhat easy. If he had an Ace, two pair, a set or a straight he would have played the hand differently. Since he doesn't put us on a strong hand and the fact that he's an aggressive player that uses his ego to make decisions, the most logical conclusion is that he figures betting is the only way he can win the hand. After thinking about all the factors that made up this hand, this is a call. We call, our opponent shows QJ and we rake in a nice pot.

By Donovan Panone

Poker Rules Talking During A Hand Sanitizer

Donovan started playing poker in 2004 and is an experienced tournament and cash game player who has a passion for teaching and helping others improve their game.

As mentioned, the actual cards you hold should only be one small factor to consider. And while I think most people fundamentally agree with this concept, many do not implement it correctly in the process they take when deciding their actions at the table. Additionally, online poker can create bad habits that are counterintuitive to successful poker play. Online, more so than in live poker, the cards you hold can have a higher weight in your decision making process than they should, simply because you see your cards first. It's important that even though your cards are exposed, you need to train yourself to detach the value of your hand until you've seen the action in front of you and thought through the situation.

So when I say the 'decision making process', I specifically mean the steps you go through in your mind before deciding how to act on every poker hand. Here is a typical order of events (assuming you are decent poker player and are looking at your cards last):

1. Observe the action thus far.
2. Think about situational factors and the past play and tendencies of other players.
3. Put each person on a range of hands based on #2.
4. Hope you pick up a hand that is conducive to the action and the factors.
5. Look at hand and then decide if it is the right hand to play.
6. Narrow down possible actions to take and how the players would react.
7. Act.

This is faulty thinking and isn't the right process in order to capitalize on each situation. Why? – Because you truly are not playing the players by thinking this way. You are still allowing your cards to be the primary determining factor in your decisions. The following is a more optimal thought process:

1. Observe the action thus far.
2. Think about situational factors and the past play and tendencies of other players.
3. Put each person on a range of hands based on #2.
4. Narrow down possible actions to take and how the players would react.
5. Determine what they think I would have based on those actions.
6. If my actual hand has to be a factor, consider the results based on a show down.
7. Act.

The key here is simply moving #6 from the first list up to #4 in the second list. #5 in the second list is something that most good poker players usually do, but it is harder to perform this third-level thinking after you've already decided to play a particular hand.

Keep in mind that expected value is always part of this decision making process and comes into play when narrowing down all the alternative choices of how to act. But the essence of this process is that we should be thinking about our cards after we have considered possible courses of action. For pre-flop play, this means not even looking at our cards until we've done this. But this decision making process isn't just about pre-flop hold'em. It's all poker on all streets.

Now with this line of thinking, it doesn't mean that the action itself is a bluff or a 'move'; it just means that we are considering our actual hand last in the process and not somewhere in the middle. This type of decision making process is something that separates the great poker players from the good ones. While many players may feel like they understand the concept of 'playing the player', it is easy to drift back into the habit of just playing cards. The key is to practice this decision making process over and over in order to create a habit of performing these steps at a subconscious level.

Hand Example – Making a Tough Call

• No Limit Hold'em Tournament (Online Re-buy).
• Final Table.
• Blinds: 200/400 + 25 Antes.
• You and your opponent both have 15,000 in chips.

Reads

Your opponent in the hand is an experienced loose aggressive player. The main leak in his game is that he plays with his ego and doesn't seem to change gears much. But as you have observed he tends to stick to high card combinations. He always continues his aggression post flop with a continuation bet, but you have noticed that he tends to bet stronger when he hits the flop. He also isn't the type of player to scare easily and you've seen him overvalue his marginal face cards in the face of a re-raise.

Pre-Flop

It folds to your opponent in the cut-off who raises to 1000. Based on your reads, we can narrow his range to any Ace, K9+, Q9+, J9+ as well as any pocket pair. Everyone else folds and you are in the big blind with :

Figure 1

There are several ways to play this hand based on situational factors. Folding, re-raising and calling are all viable options.

Holding when facing a raise out of position is certainly not the most desirable situation. But given our stack size in relation to the blinds, the wide range of our opponent and our confidence at playing post-flop, folding is probably too weak here.

If we are ahead in the hand, shouldn't we re-raise? Well, here's where some levels of thinking come in. He is experienced enough to understand that we know that he is aggressive. He also knows that our re-raising range doesn't have to be big because of how aggressive he is. Given our stack sizes, he is the type of player who could easily come back over the top of us here and force us to possibly fold the best hand by representing a monster. Even with a strong read, just isn't that strong of a hand for us to be calling all in at this stage of the tournament. Also, by re-raising this particular player we have much less of a chance to take it down post-flop and we're going to be out of position the rest of the hand.

Since we are relatively early in the final table but deep enough where the pot sizes have value, and given the range of your opponent and your strong reads of his betting patterns, I would lean towards a call.

The Flop

The flop is and the pot contains 2,450:

Figure 2

Poker Rules Talking During A Hand Gesture

How should we play the hand from here? Betting is okay and I would probably mix it up by betting some of the time and checking the others. However, since we are facing an aggressive player who is capable of raising a probe bet, let's control the size of the pot and evaluate how he plays. We also have a pretty accurate read as to how he plays when he hits the flop or not, so we should be able to gain the information we need without getting forced out of the pot.

We check and our opponent bets 1,200 which is about ½ the size of the pot:

Figure 3

What does that say about his range? It really doesn't change it except that based on our reads of how strong he typically bets when he has hit the flop, it's not likely that he has an Ace. Also, if he had an Ace, wouldn't he bet more to protect against the draws? It's still possible he has one but there are many other hands he could hold here. He could have a weaker King, he could have a mid pocket-pair, he could have a flush draw. Given that his range is so wide, we can at least proceed in the hand thinking there is a strong possibility that we are ahead, but how? There are certainly cases for raising or calling here.

The theory behind raising here is that we define our hand. Many players are going to respect a check-raise and at least give us credit for an Ace. However, check-raising could also put us in a tough spot against this particular player. Since he knows that we think he's aggressive, he knows that we don't need an Ace to check-raise here. This means that he could come back over the top again representing the Ace and causing us to fold. We also know he is capable of this so we have to choose if we are ready to make this type of decision based on deep levels of thinking.

Are we possibly over thinking this? It's possible. And against a less experienced and less crafty LAG player we wouldn't need to think this deep. But we at least need to consider the implications of raising. The other implication of raising is that our opponent folds a worse hand that would put more chips in the pot on later streets.

What about calling? Well, calling in this spot is often called a float. Basically it means that the purpose of calling the flop is to either evaluate the turn or to call in order to take the pot down with a bluff on the turn. An additional benefit of calling is that we control the size of the pot.

Against this particular player, I would lean toward calling. One thing we also have to consider is that by calling, what hand does he put us on? If we had a strong Ace he would think we would re-raise pre-flop so he can probably discount AQ or AK. If we had AJ it's more likely that we would bet or check-raise the flop with the draws showing. So at best, he probably puts us on a weak Ace, but more realistically a King, mid pocket-pair or a flush draw.

Poker Rules Talking During A Hand Held

The Turn

The turn is a and the pot has 4,850:

Figure 4

The Jack is an interesting card in that if he has QT he has now made a straight. It's certainly something to be aware of, but we shouldn't be afraid of monsters just yet. The Jack also now gives us a gut-shot straight draw. Should we check or bet here? Since that Jack is somewhat of a scare card there really isn't a lot of value in betting. He will likely fold a pure bluff and probably calls us with an Ace. I would check here, keep the pot small and evaluate his play. You check and so does your opponent.

The River

The river is a . Okay, now we have to think about what his check means and what he put us on. When a LAG player checks, it should raise suspicion. But based on our reads, we know that this LAG bets into his strong hands. If he had a big Ace, a set, two pair or a straight he would have bet the turn. Since he typically plays high cards, we can narrow his range to a mid pocket pair 77 to TT, KT, KQ, QJ, JT. So what does he put us on? At this point, his read probably hasn't changed from a weak Ace, a King, mid pocket-pair or a flush draw.

Similar to the turn, betting here holds little value. Sure there are times that he pays off a small river bet with a hand in his range, but there aren't a lot of hands he can beat by calling unless he has an Ace which obviously beats us. I would check here and hope he checks it down. We check and he immediately fires out 4,500:

Figure 5

What does this mean? Could we possibly have the best hand here? On the surface this seems like a pretty tough call. Since we've been paying attention the whole hand and narrowing his range with each action, the answer is somewhat easy. If he had an Ace, two pair, a set or a straight he would have played the hand differently. Since he doesn't put us on a strong hand and the fact that he's an aggressive player that uses his ego to make decisions, the most logical conclusion is that he figures betting is the only way he can win the hand. After thinking about all the factors that made up this hand, this is a call. We call, our opponent shows QJ and we rake in a nice pot.

By Donovan Panone

Poker Rules Talking During A Hand Sanitizer

Donovan started playing poker in 2004 and is an experienced tournament and cash game player who has a passion for teaching and helping others improve their game.