I just sent out a broadcast email with a link to my first free poker video and while I’m proud that I finally pulled the trigger on it, I think I played pretty terrible in the video.  Fortunately I chose to do the analysis post-mortem so I was able to point out what I did wrong and what I could have done better.

I learned something making the video.  Forcing action is always a losing move.  I only had one table up since this was my first video and I wanted to keep it simple, but I found that I was trying to make moves that I wouldn’t normally make just to make things more interesting.  It usually didn’t work out.

Poker players have a reputation for being a prideful group that likes to brag about how much they make or what great moves they can pull off, but the best quality for a player to have is patience.

I’m not saying that you always have to wait for a big hand to enter the pot.  I’m just saying that you have to wait for the right situation when you’re ready to make a move.

From now on I plan on keeping at least two tables open for my videos and maybe as many as four.  That should be enough that I’ll always have an interesting situation come up or something different to talk about.

If you missed this broadcast, make sure you sign up now so you’ll get my next one.  I’d be happy to hear your feedback or requests.  My hope is that these videos help me improve my game as much as they help others improve theirs.

Finally the newsletter is ready!  I’ve promised Free Poker Videos for about two months now and I’m ready to pull the trigger.  Just click on the Free Poker Video tab (or the previous link) and put in your name and email address.  That’s all.

Every week I’ll send at least one poker video.  Sometimes it’ll be game play, sometimes it’ll be classroom style and I’m open to requests.  If this ends up being a successful newsletter, I’ll start doing freerolls for subscribers too.

What’re you waiting for?  The first video is coming tomorrow night.  Sign up now!

I used to be a big Sit ‘N Go player but recently I realized that I make a better hourly rate when I’m playing cash or multi-table tournaments.  A few people have questioned my decision to include SNGs in my poker routine since it doesn’t make sense to spend my time playing a game that isn’t maximizing my hourly rate.  My response is that SNGs make a great filler game.  Let me explain.

Both cash and tournaments are time intensive.  I have to block out 3 to 5 hours when I plan on playing multi-table tournaments for obvious reasons and it usually takes me about half an hour to an hour to select a good cash table (gotta make sure I get one full of fish).  But Sit ‘N Goes are easy.  All I have to do is fire them up and I’m ready to go.

Of course, there are a few SNG regulars that I’d rather avoid, but they’re usually easy to spot since they sign up for several tables at once.

The other great thing about SNGs is that it’s easy to play a winning strategy.  There’s very little post-flop play and your edge comes from making +EV shoves and calls.  Personally, I think the simplicity of SNG strategy is part of the problem since a lot more players are getting wise to the Independent Chip Model.

Finally, one of the big reasons I’m keeping SNGs in my poker plan is because I can multi-table the bejesus out of them.  I can only play about 2 cash games at a time (’cause I have to pay attention to the people I’m targeting) and I can only play about 3 or 4 multi-table tournaments at a time (’cause that’s about the most that run at once on Bodog), but I can play 10 or 12 SNGs in one sitting.  It’s super sweet.

If you haven’t played SNGs yet, give them a try.  They’re quick games and they’ll improve your multi-table tournament play especially at the final table.

For more information about winning SNGs, see these articles:

What Makes A Winning SNG Player

Low Blind Strategy

Mid Blind Strategy

High Blind Strategy

I make a decent amount of money playing poker.  I’m better than most, but I tend to play above my bankroll which means I’m less likely to make the line-balancing bluffs needed to profit from good, thinking players.  So what do I do?

I target the bad ones.

I didn’t realize what I was doing until a friend of mine asked to sweat one of my cash sessions.  After we finished he said, “So you really only play against one person at the table.”

I thought about it for a minute and realize that he was right.  When I sit down at the poker table I target one or two players and tend to avoid the rest of them.  My targets become my bitches.  I isolate them with all kinds of crap and pound them ’til all their chips are mine then I rub the virtual chips on my titties and fall asleep on a bed of money.

My point is that you don’t have to be the best poker player to make money.  You don’t even have to be that good.  All you have to do is find the bad players and know how to exploit them.  Here’s how you can make a shit-ton of money playing poker even if you’re not the next Durrrr:

Data mine

Data mining straddles the fence of morality.  Some people say that it’s cheating since you have information derived from hands that you didn’t play.  Others say that it’s a tool available to anyone so no one truly has an edge.  I tend to side with the latter camp.

PokerTableRatings.com makes a ridiculous amount of information available to everyone.  Recently AnskyPoker.com, one of my favorite blogs, posted this information that showed the best times to play poker on different sites at different limits using Average Pot Size.  Gugel also analyzed how hard it is to move up in limits using the average number of hands played at each limit.  You’ll have to sign up for his forum to get the full reports, but it’s free and well worth the 30 seconds it takes to sign up.

It’s great to know when the fish are swimming, but it’s even better to tag individual fish that you can stalk over and over again.  There are a couple ways you can do this.

The first thing you can do is go through your Hold’em Manager or PokerTracker database and find all the big losers at your limit.  If you don’t have a large database, you can buy hand histories from PokerTableRatings.com or just use their “Biggest Losers” tool to find the people hemorrhaging money at your stakes.

Once you have your fish list, sign up for a free PokerTableRatings.com account and go to the “My PTR” tab.  There you’ll find a place where you can enter your fish into your buddy list and get email alerts when they’re online.  I have a Blackberry so I know instantly when one of my fish is online.

The other way you can find bad players is to get a program like IdleMiner and let it run for about a half hour before you sit down (Careful with this. Some sites have banned IdleMiner.).  Find a table with one or two really bad players and sit down – preferably with position on your mark.

Identify Your Opponent’s Weaknesses

This is where Hold’em Manager or Poker Tracker really comes in handy.  If your opponent has a VPIP of 53 and a PFR of 4, you should isolate their limps but respect their raises.  If your opponent has a VPIP of 53 and a PFR of 32, their raise should mean shit to you and you can 3bet them wide – especially if they have a high “Call 3bet” stat and a high “Fold to Cbet” stat.

Tend to isolate with hands that are ahead of your opponent’s range or hands that can flop well.  For example, ATo isn’t usually a hand you’d 3bet, but it figures to be ahead of someone who’s raising 32% of their hands.  Likewise, mid suited connectors and suited single-gappers can flop big.

I prefer raising to calling since it tends to isolate the bad player and gives you a shot at him heads-up.  For that reason I tend to isolate limpers more often than raisers since there’s less risk involved.

Watch Out For the Sharks

Be aware that you’re not the only person preying on your mark.  There will probably be one or two good players trying to take a shot at him too and they might get annoyed with you hogging all the action.  If you want to keep feeding, you’ll have to adjust to the good players too.  Here’s how I do it:

1.      I don’t isolate with every hand.  I only use premium hands or quality speculative ones.  No trash unless I’m on the button and the blinds are passive or I have a good squeeze opportunity.

2.      Cultivate a tight/aggressive image.  If you seem loose, the TAGs will stop respecting your isolation plays.

3.      Watch out for obvious plays.  I was playing on Cake once and was hammering a really bad player who called raises in the small blind and check/folded a lot.  I raised from the cutoff, he called in the small blind and a strong TAG 3bet from the big blind.  This is a textbook squeeze spot so I put in a 4bet and took the pot down.  Decent players will make plays on you, but they’ll be obvious.  Exploit them.

4.      Throw some scraps to the sharks.  You don’t have to be involved in every pot your mark plays.  Lay down your weaker hands if there’s another shark that’s keen on a kill.  By avoiding other sharks, you’ll reduce your variance.  If you’re confident in your skills and are rolled for the stakes you play, you can fight the sharks.  Otherwise, avoid them.

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Poker is a predatory game.  A there’s a definite food chain that develops.  Seek out the weak players and avoid the strong ones.

This tip is one of the most obvious and overlooked tips in poker.  If you want to make an obscene amount of money in poker, all you have to do is play worse players.

A good player raises with good hands and folds with bad hands right?  Well yeah, but “good” is a relative term.  A hand like A9o is trash when a super-tight player enters the pot but it can be gold if a loose lagtard enters it.  The strength of your hand is relative to your opponent’s range.  Here’s how to squeak out an extra profit with some marginal holdings.

Who to Target

You can target both loose and tight players as long as they’re passive.  The idea is to steal small pots from these players cheap.  A tight-passive player is likely to check/fold when facing a player in position.  Sometimes they’ll put in a weak continuation bet, but these are easily picked off and you can be sure your opponent has something if he’s still betting on the turn.

Loose players are a little tougher.  You usually have to hit something to play against these guys.  My favorite hands for isolating loose players are middle Ax hands since they’ll usually dominate the A-small type hands they’re likely to hold.

How to Isolate

Once you have your mark, wait for the right conditions.  You want to make sure your mark is the only player in the pot (a string of callers after your mark is a better situation for a squeeze play) and you have a decent hand (pocket pairs, middle aces and high suited connectors will work).  Put in a standard raise.  I prefer to isolate weak players when they limp since there’s less of a chance I’ll be up against a big hand, but 3-betting a raise is okay occasionally if the mark is loose-aggressive.  Never 3-bet a tight-passive or loose-passive player without a strong hand because a raise from these players will indicate genuine strength.

One you’ve isolated your mark, your play will depend on your opponent’s style and the flop.

Bet the flop if a tight-passive player checks to you but be careful if they decide to stick around for the turn.  You should generally have a hand to play against a loose-passive player since they’ll call you wide.  You can play marginal hands against them by betting for value on all streets.  Loose-passive players will usually raise you at some point in the hand with top pair-decent kicker or better.

When to Give Up

Even weak players get a hand sometimes.  One of the reasons I prefer to isolate passive players rather than aggressive ones is because passive players will let you know when you’re beat.  If a passive player ever throws in a raise, you can be sure that top pair is no good.

Loose-aggressive players are more likely to spew chips to you with little or no hand, but there’s a high degree of variance when isolating these players because it’s hard to tell when they have something legitimate.

Remember that you’re either trying to win a small pot or get your opponent to over-commit with a marginal hand when you isolate.  Know your goal before you isolate.   You should be playing small ball with marginal hands if you’re isolating a tight-passive player but you can swing for the fence with loose players.