Hump Day Pimp Day This is barely a post compared ...

Hump Day Pimp Day

This is barely a post compared to my two and three thousand word entries over the past three weeks. I don't have much time this morning since I'm going away on an assignment tomorrow, so I'll be quick.

The Travel Channel is airing the WPT Tunica, MS event tonight (check local listings) that Scotty Nguyen won back in January. Our buddy Gavin Smith also made the final table. In totally unrelated news... I was invited to cover Scotty Nguyen's Poker Challenge II in Tulsa, OK in mid-June. They even offered me a free room! I declined because I'm going to the Bonnaroo music festival instead.

I've been lurking on Party Poker over the past week. I'm making solid decisions and the variance has been tame which is why I booked 17 winning sessions out of my last 20. I played 10-20 full ring and 5-10 shorthanded 6-max all weekend. I even cashed out 1/3 of my Party bankroll after the weekend sessions. I scooped a monster in a six-way pot when I rivered a runner runner flush with AKs. I love chasing nut flushes and hitting on the river in LHE.

Spaceman is in Las Vegas covering the WSOP Circuit event at Caesar's Palace for Bluff Magazine. Check out his photos and coverage. Flipchip took some photos too and posted them over at Las Vegas and Poker Blog.

If you haven't looked at Amy Calistri's blog Aimlessly Chasing Amy, then what are you waiting for? I know Amy is married, but I would casually grope her in the hallways during the 2005 WSOP after drinking Red Stripes at the hooker bar with Otis at dinner break. That is when she wasn't getting hit on by former world champions.

My buddy BJ (who is pictured with me in the photo above) has been working on his website. Expect a guest post from him on the Tao of Poker in the future.

Lou Krieger has been keeping tabs on the Goodlate Bill on his blog. Take a look at what he had to say over the last few weeks.

Quest of a Closet Poker Player recently had an excellent post on Children and Poker.

BG wrote up a kick ass article on the Top 10 Best (and Worst) Hallmarks of the Poker Boom. If you haven't seen it, what are you waiting for?

The dudes at Wicked Chops Poker were just in Las Vegas. Read their trip reports.

Yesterday was Iggy's birthday! And it also marked the second birthday for Derek's blog... Poker in the Weeds. He had some funny things to say in his birthday post, so take a peek. In the immortal words of legendary music writer Lester Bangs, "The only true currency in this bankrupt world... is what you share with someone else when you're uncool."

By the way, I'm having issues with Haloscan, the folks who host my comments. They erased random ones and some are not even being published. The same weirdness happened on Tao of Pauly. Bare with me.

That's it for now. I'll have a special treat for you tomorrow.

What Did Les Have To Say?

High Hopes

Had a joker of a friend once named Tony who whenever the subject of pot odds came up at the home game would crack wise about the chances of him scoring a dimebag within the next day or two. Tony could be a kick in the pants sometimes.

After the shenanigans, though, Tony usually had the right answers to others' questions about the subject, despite being half-snowed half the time. To give you an example, we had a buddy, Dobby, who from time to time would try to argue that when counting outs everyone mistakenly assumes the best-case scenario. Tony knew better, and would invariably respond to such hooey with startling clarity. Here's how Dobby's argument -- one which we all likely have entertained at some (hopefully early) point in our playing lives -- would go.

You count outs to figure your chances to win the hand, then compare them to the odds the pot are giving you. For example, you're in a 10-handed game of $1/$2 limit hold 'em. Everyone folds to you sitting left of cutoff with Qh 9h. You limp, the cutoff folds, the button folds, the SB calls, and the BB checks. There is $6 in the pot when the flop comes Kh 7c 2d. The table checks, then comes the turn, the Ah. The SB bets $2, the BB folds, and now you have to decide whether to chase the nut flush or turn tail.

Now you've had this explained to you a thousand times already. There are 46 unknown cards, 9 of which are hearts. Assuming your opponent just has a pair of kings (or some other hand that can't improve to a full house), if one of those 9 hearts comes, you're a winner. In other words, you're looking at 37-to-9 or a little worse than 4-to-1 against making your flush. The pot is $8 and you have to put in $2 to call, so the pot odds are exactly 4-to-1. (For more, click on Lou Krieger's handy-dandy chart which appears above and/or check out his helpful article, "Pot Odds Made Easy.")

"You're dreaming if you think you really have 9 outs," Dobby would cry. "All 9 ain't left, so if you think you've got 9 ways to win you've got some high hopes."

Technically, the Dobster's right about it being unlikely to have 9 ways to win. Here 24 cards have been dealt (the 10 hands plus the 4 on the board), and so only 28 remain in the deck. On average, only 5 or 6 of those 28 cards will be hearts, with the other 3 or 4 having been dealt and folded. According to Dobby, since we only likely have 5 or 6 winners left, our odds are down (to 8-to-1 or thereabouts). That's where Dobby's line of reasoning goes haywire, of course. You compare the (let's say) 6 hearts left to the 23 other cards left in the deck, not to the total number of other unseen cards (41). Thus the odds remain about 4-to-1; in fact, if 6 hearts are left your odds are slightly better than average here (with about 21.5% of the possible river cards being hearts).

If all 9 hearts are improbably still in the deck, you're about 2-to-1 to hit the flush. If only one is left, you're down to 27-to-1. And if none are left well then you're whistling in the dark like usual.

None of this matters, of course. Unless you're in some kind of bizarro game where all hands are played face up, you have no way of knowing what cards are spent and what cards remain. So note your outs (making sure they really are outs) and the odds of spiking one, figger your pot odds, and make your play.

Or, as Tony would explain with a glassy-eyed twinkle and dismissive shake of the head, "Pass the Doritos."

Where To Sit at the Poker Table?

While this may seem rather silly to some, there is actually merit to the question, "Where is the best place to sit at a poker table?"

No, I'm not talking about closest to the bathroom or to the fridge. I'm talking about where the best place is for you to sit at the poker table in relation to certain types of players.

If you've played poker at all, you know that people approach the game in different ways - some by the seat of their pants, others very carefully. You have experienced players and novices, aggressive types and conservative competitors. Eventually you'll meet them all at the poker table, and knowing which seat offers you the best chance for winning, against whoever you might face, can only improve your game.

There is a general rule when picking your seat that you should always abide by. You want the most difficult players on your right. With that understood, here's where you should try to be for each type of player.

1, Conservative or tight players. These rocks are no real threat to you, so, abiding by the general rule, you shouldn't really care all that much where they sit. Ideally, though, you'd want these players to your left so that you can pick on their blinds. If they happen to play with you when you've entered the pot, you can be sure they have a strong hand. Act accordingly. That wouldn't always be true with the next group of players.

2) Aggressive players. These are the players that you need to worry about. An aggressive player on your left means you're somewhat handcuffed. You have to play a little more conservatively now because having that monster behind you means you don't know what he'll do until after you've acted.

You'll always prefer the aggressive players on your right so that you can keep an eye on them and then spank them when they get out of line! Basically, you'll be able to use your position to exploit the aggressive player.

If you have a seating choice, when facing both an aggressive and a

conservative player, sit right between them with the tighter player on your left.

Things get a bit trickier when you're figuring out where to sit when playing either a novice or an experienced player, since you'll want both of them on your right to some degree.

3) Novice players. If you are playing with a rookie, chances are he's going to make a lot of mistakes, and you want to be in there when he does. So by sitting on his left you'll have the opportunity to see whether or not he enters the pot. Since you'll have position on him you can manipulate the novice much easier and force him into even more mistakes.

According to the general rule, you'll want players you worry about on your right, but in this case you aren't worried about the novice since you can control or exploit him better if you sit on his left.

4) Experienced players. Well this obviously depends on how good the experienced players are, but generally these competitors surprise you less often than a novice player. They will most likely play fundamentally sound, which, while more predictable, doesn't necessarily make it easier for you. You'll want a tough, aggressive experienced player sitting on your right. But against a more conservative experienced player, you'd prefer him on your left rather than the easily exploitable novice.

You're not always going to be able to pick your seat - especially in a tournament - so it's important to know how to play against novice and aggressive opponents when they are seated to your left.

When the novice is on your left, all that really means is you'll have less opportunities to exploit him, but you don't need to make any major strategy adjustments.

With the aggressive player on your left, however, you need to make significant strategy adjustments. You really need to respect the fact that position is power, and since this competitor has it, you must concede your relative weakness a little bit and play accordingly.

From time to time, look to set traps for the aggressive player by slow playing strong hands. This should help keep him from breathing down your neck on a regular basis. Other than that, just tighten up a little bit and wait for a better situation to arise - like maybe, switching seats!

April Numbers

What's the Rumpus?

Okay, this here’s the feeler. Firing something out to see if anyone is awake.

Name’s Shamus. A.k.a. "Short-Stacked Shamus." I play poker. Primarily hold ’em, some Omaha, some stud. Strictly recreational. Mostly micro, some low (hence the monicker). The occasional tourney. Won’t be quitting the day job. Basically your average jingle-brained sap. Once in awhile an idea’ll pulse through. None of that dizzy “poker-is-like-life-because” applesauce. Nothing is like life, by the way. Either it's living or it ain't. No, I aim lower. Another hence for the monicker, if you will.

From time to time I’ll post occasional proofs of consciousness. See if anybody’ll call or raise.

If it weren't for bad luck...

I'd have no luck at all... remember that line from Hee-Haw? But this time, it was *I* who was the donkey. After playing pretty decent ring game poker for an hour, I had 2 pair on a KQ2T board. A player who has not played a hand to a showdown in TWO HOURS goes all in. Only AJ beats me, but what else can you EXPECT? I HEE-HAW call and SUCKOUT when a K comes on the river. I feel dirty.

I played in the $20/180 at stars. This is my all-time favorite tournament/SnG. But this time I was out surprisingly early. I was defending a straight vs. the BB on a board of AT2TK with 3 spades. So, my QJ is a straight, but I could be against a back-doored flush or a BB special boat. When he goes all-in, I once again eat the peppered-beef and call. He had T2o for a boat. Could I READ that? Probably not. But can I justify once again eating the peppered-beef? No way. HEE-HAW.