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Marketing Manager of the World Poker Tour Matt Clark joins us to discuss the past and future of marketing poker to the masses.
The book Matt recommended is Strokes of Genius. You can follow him on Twitter.
You can
Now through the end of 2018, I’m offering 25% off custom strategy videos when you purchase two hours or more. That’s two hours for just $150!
Get the most out of your poker study time with a poker strategy videos custom-tailored to your needs. If you play online, I can
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Nate and Andrew put out an hour of pure strategy, brought to you by our friends at Tournament Poker Edge. Topics include limp-raising, thin value three-betting, donk betting, overbetting, and mixing up your play (or not).
Links
Contribute to Andrew’s BAUDL … Read full post
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This week’s guest asked us not to use his name, but he’s got quite a resume. The octogenarian has served as an executive and a Board member for several major US corporations, and now that he’s finally retired, he’s a regular in … Read full post
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Danny Sprung, whom you may recall from Episode 194, joins us from the World Bridge Federation Championships. We compare this event to the World Series of Poker and discuss some key hands from Danny’s very deep run in the Monster Stack … Read full post
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Derek “Killingbird” Tenbusch is a co-founder and -owner of Tournament Poker Edge. He’s also a poker streamer and a beagle rescuer. We discuss all three, plus house hunting in Las Vegas and leaving Las Vegas.
Derek’s first appearance on the … Read full post
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Andrew and Nate share some book and podcast recommendations and, inspired by Dara O’Kearney, discuss the value of taking days off. In the strategy segment, Andrew takes an unconventional line vs Phil Galfond in a Progressive Knock-Out.
Timestamps
0:30 hello
24:19 … Read full post
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Andy Bloch is a long-time professional poker player and computer programmer who was one of the pioneers at the intersection of these fields. He was also a member of the MIT Blackjack team that was the subject of Bringing Down the House… Read full post
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Ashley Adams is the host of the House of Cards podcast/radio show (Andrew was a guest in 2010!) and the author of Winning No-Limit Hold ‘Em and Winning Seven Card Stud. We talk to him about his (now complete) … Read full post
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Comedian and professional poker player Clayton Fletcher earned himself a fourth podcast appearance with his 28th place finish in the 2018 WSOP Main Event! I think they gave him some cash for that as well. He and Andrew meet in his hotel … Read full post
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Sameer Singh grew up playing chess and teen patti, and he quickly became one of the sharpest rounders at the National Law School of India. This wide-ranging conversation covers everything from cuisine and literature to the Irish Open to overlimping the button … Read full post
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Helen Ellis is a proud housewise and poker player and the author of the novels Eating the Cheshire Cat and The Turning Book, the short fiction collection American Housewife, and the What I Do All Day Twitter account. Her poker … Read full post
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This is the conclusion of our epic three-hour interview with living legend Dick Carson (Part 1, Part 2), featuring stories from his pool hustling days and memories of Frank Rosenthal.
Timestamps
0:30 Hello
4:07 Strategy
29:45 Dick pt iii… Read full post
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Dick Carson is an old-school gambler, pool hustler, bookie, and poker player. He’s also a hulluva storyteller and a helluva nice guy. Nate, Andrew, and John the Lawyer sit down with him to talk about the best poker players you never heard … Read full post
My latest series of poker strategy videos is a review of key hands from the $3500 World Poker Tour Main Event at Maryland Live. This is the event that I discussed with Christian Soto on one of my all-time favorite podcast episodes.
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It’s one strategy segment… followed by another strategy segment, after an interview needs to be rescheduled. Nate and Andrew discuss playing from the Small Blind and playing tricky hands like top pair with a bad kicker.
Timestamps
0:30 hello
9:35 strat
51:43 … Read full post
I’m glad – blown away, really – that so many of you enjoy listening to the Thinking Poker Podcast. Ultimately, though, it’s a selfish endeavor (for me anyway, don’t want to speak for Nate here). I do it because it’s good for me. Poker is a stressful pursuit, and often … Read full post
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Cory Mikesell is a professional poker player, a chess master, a writer, and the author of 3Bet Pots Game Theory and Practice. We talk about his struggles, his successes, and how thoroughly he’s thrown himself into everything he’s done.
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Brad Willis is the head of blogging for PokerStars and the author of the excellent Rapid Eye Reality blog. We talk to him about politics at the poker table, raising sons, and living as a progressive in the American South. Plus we … Read full post
The first installment of latest poker strategy videos series just went up at Tournament Poker Edge. It’s one I’m especially excited about because it’s the first time I’ve ever done a member hand history review (well, excepting the time that Carlos and I looked over his big Bovada win … Read full post
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Christian Soto and Andrew meet in-person in Baltimore, hours after playing together in the World Poker Tour main event at Maryland Live!, to commiserate and talk about some key hands. This interview was tremendous fun to record and hopefully will be tremendous … Read full post
My latest poker strategy article, Progressive Knockout Examples Part 1, is now appearing in 2+2 Magazine. It’s a follow-up to a previous article, using some real examples from progressive knockout tournaments to explore some theory about how to make decisions about chasing bounties.… Read full post
There was a $2100 Super Tuesday WCOOP, but I ended up not playing because I began my session at 7AM with the $215 6-Max Rebuy, and because other things were going well, I’d been playing straight through from then until the start of the $2100 and didn’t think I would … Read full post
Monday was going to be a day off, but since I was going to be playing Day 2 of the $109 anyway, I decided to reg a few other tournaments, including the $530 NLHE WCOOP. That one got off to a good start, but I soon ended up in a … Read full post
I planned my schedule around the $2K (naturally), so I registered the warm-up quite late. That gave me time to go for a bike ride and a pastry in town before starting work for the day.
I got off to a good start in it but then lost AK to … Read full post
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Jose Pachon is a professional poker player based out of Providence, Rhode Island, but his story begins in the 1970s in Pablo Escobar’s Colombia. We discuss his childhood in the turbulent country, how he came to America, and how he ended up … Read full post
I was excited for the $215 6-max that started at 10AM. Most of the short-handed events so far in the series had been higher buy-ins, and I was looking forward to the opportunity to play short with some weaker players. I lasted all of 15 minutes:
PokerStars – 100/200 Ante … Read full post
I took Tuesday as a proper vacation day. Emily and I drove to Mont Tremblant, a ski resort about 45 minutes north of where we’re staying, to hike and get dinner. It was a nice drive deeper into the mountains, with the leaves already beginning to turn. Resorts aren’t really … Read full post
This was the second Sunday of WCOOP. There was actually a $1050 6-max that I ended up skipping. It started several hours earlier than everything else I wanted to play, and it didn’t seem quite good enough to build my entire schedule around. Sundays are (hopefully) long days already, and … Read full post
Yes, I’m behind. And there’s no Day 4 because I took Wednesday off. So here we are.
The day off (it wasn’t a proper day off, as I did do some studying, but no playing) was nice. Emily and I had brunch at a cafe in the nearby town of … Read full post
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Nipun Java made history when, along with Aditya Sushant, he won India’s first ever WSOP bracelet, in the $1500 NLHE Tag Team event. He capped off his summer with a second bracelet in the $1000 Online event. Nipun and Andrew talk about … Read full post
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Esther Taylor, better known as E-Tay, is a mixed game player who also knows how to kick ass in no-limit hold ’em tournaments. Andrew talks to her about learning new games, being a poker-playing mom, and more. Plus Carlos Welch and … Read full post
My latest poker strategy article, Head Hunting, is now appearing in 2+2 Magazine. It’s an attempt to, not solve, but build some intuition around how to value bounties in knock-out tournaments.
… Read full postThe trickiest problem of all is that you can only collect bounties if you have more chips than
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Andrew tackles the mailbox alone this week, reviewing three no-limit hands played in small stakes games.
Strategy
Hand 1
I’m in MP with 9c9d, a stack of $5.56 and raise to 15c, it folds around to the SB with a stack of … Read full post
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Tommy Angelo invites Andrew and Carlos into his suite at the Rio while Nate joins by Skype to discuss Tommy’s history at the WSOP (dating back to 1987!) and some rare card-playing strategy with a man known primarily for his “mental game” … Read full post
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Andrew and Dara O’Kearney are roommates for the WSOP this summer. They talk with Nate about the start of their series, their plans for the summer, and Andrew’s hopes for Day 2 of the Colossus and the Tag Team event with Carlos … Read full post
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Gareth Chantler, who first appeared on Episode 6, once again graces us with his presence. This time around, we discuss James Joyce, Syria, SCOOP, and, begrudgingly, a bit of Limit Hold ‘Em strategy.
Timestamps
0:30 Hello and welcome
52:44 Strategy
Links… Read full post
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Daniel Wolf AKA Clarence AKA Baby Dick is a professional poker player. Originally from Pittsburgh, he now lives and plays in Maryland. We talk to him about having fun at the table, jumping back and forth between 2/5 and 25/50 no limit, … Read full post
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Don’t bet the under! Nate and Andrew manage to review three hand histories in barely an hour. There’s a four-barrel bluff from a NLHE tournament, a turn donk bet from a NLHE cash game, and even a spread-limit Omaha 8-or-better hand!
Timestamps… Read full post
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Matt Bodnar is an investor, the host of The Science of Success podcast, and an avid poker player. We talk to him about his experiences in poker inform his work in investing and vice versa, and how what he’s learned from “The … Read full post
There’s a World Poker Tour Deep Stacks series running at Maryland Live right now, and last night I managed to take second in one of the prelim events, a $570 multi-flight NLHE tournament. This was despite a shaky start where a questionable (Who am I kidding? There’s no question about … Read full post
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Tommy Angelo returns to the podcast to discuss his new book, Painless Poker, as well as his writing process, his daily meditation practice, his new goals, and his sordid past.
In our strategy segment, we discuss why it matters how the … Read full post
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The Computer Poker Research Group’s Michael Johanson and Dustin Morrill discuss Andrew and Nate’s recent battle with their heads-up no-limit hold ’em AI, DeepStack.
Johanson has previously been our guest on Episode 79 and Episode 110. Before the match, we discussed … Read full post
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Patrick McKenzie, known as “patio11” on Hacker News and elsewhere, is a blogger, consultant, and all-around public intellectual on subjects related to software and business. He’s also, as it happens, an avid if occasional poker player. We talk to him about … Read full post
My latest poker strategy article, A Thin Shove, is now appearing in Two Plus Two Magazine. It covers in great detail a large pot that I briefly mentioned on Twitter, in which I won a big pot by three-betting TT and then going bet-bet-shove with an overpair after the … Read full post
Nate and I had the great privilege of participating in the premiere broadcast of a series of matches between DeepStack, a state-of-the-art heads up no-limit hold ’em Artificial Intelligence, and human professionals. We found DeepStack to be a really tough competitor that left us questioning our play in both large … Read full post
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Michael Bowling of the University of Alberta Computer Poker Research Group, who has previously appeared on Episode 79 and on Episode 110 after “essentially” solving Heads Up Limit Hold ‘Em, returns to discuss the group’s latest work creating an AI that … Read full post
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Nikolai Yakovenko, poker player and computer scientist, returns to the podcast (he first appeared on Episode 155) to talk about recent advances in Artificial Intelligence, particularly with regard to poker.
Links
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Ronnie Bardah has been a poker pro since before “The Boom”, and though he’s perhaps most famous for his five consecutive cashes in the WSOP Main Event, he’s a Fixed Limit Hold ‘Em player first and foremost. He shares his story growing … Read full post
My latest poker strategy article, Evaluating Three-Bet Opportunities, is now appearing in the March 2017 issue of Two Plus Two Magazine. It builds on last month’s article, What Are the Best Hands to Three-Bet?, demonstrating how to apply the theory that I laid out there to actual decisions … Read full post
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Angela Bassa is the director of data science at iRobot and an occasional poker player with more than a passing interest in Libratus and its implications for artificial intelligence. In this interview, we talk about poker’s intersections with data science and artificial … Read full post
I never just post hands any more! I am curious in your feedback, but I don’t have a lot more to say about the hand myself, so I’m not going to construct it as a What’s Your Play? But here’s the situation:
Playing $2/$5 NL. Effective stack $600. Villain is … Read full post
In December of 2016, the Thinking Poker community raised over $8000 for the Bay Area Urban Debate League, and I’m so grateful to everyone who contributed! This hour of free poker strategy, with very special guest Matt Berkey, is part of my thanks to everyone who contributed. If you … Read full post
In December of 2016, the Thinking Poker community raised over $8000 for the Bay Area Urban Debate League, and I’m so grateful to everyone who contributed! I promised a free half-hour of strategy video for every $500 we raised, and after releasing videos with Carlos Welch, Jamie Kerstetter… Read full post
My latest poker strategy article, “What Are the Best Hands to Three-Bet?”, is now appearing in the February 2017 edition of Two Plus Two Magazine. If you know anything about me, you know that that’s not a question I’m going to answer in just a few words! In … Read full post
Nate Meyvis is my guest for the latest free strategy video, and in his honor, I found a PLO8 tournament for us to review. It’s fun and informative!
We created this video as part of a year-end fundraising campaign for the Bay Area Urban Debate League. To unlock more … Read full post
This is the second and final part of the published as part of the free strategy video that Carlos and I created as part of a year-end fundraising campaign for the Bay Area Urban Debate League. If you enjoy him here, be sure to check Carlos out on Twitch… Read full post
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Eileen Sutton discovered poker later in her life, but that only heightened her passion for the game. In this interview, Eileen beautifully describes her love affair with poker and the strange set of coincidences that resulted in her learning from the likes … Read full post
Here’s the first video published as part of my year-end fundraising campaign for the Bay Area Urban Debate League. I’m joined by the incomparable Carlos Welch, be sure to check him out on Twitch. To unlock more videos like this one and get a shot at some great prizes, … Read full post
Thanks to everyone who participated in What’s Your Play? Flush With Redraw.
I folded, and I don’t think it’s close. The short explanation is #TheyAlwaysHaveIt. Here’s a longer one:
Is This a Bluff-Catcher?
The first question to ask is whether Villain could be raising worse for value. If yes, … Read full post
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Political scientist and Congressional Research Service analyst Matt Glassman helped us put the 2016 Presidential Campaign into context a few weeks ago. Now that the election is over, we need him more than ever!
We’ve got a great strategy segment, but … Read full post
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Danny Sprung is a trader and a long-time games player. He was a serious poker player even before the boom, and he’s also a world class bridge player. In this interview, we discuss how he relates poker to bridge and to trading, … Read full post
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Is Carlos Welch settling down? Not quite. He’s still got the van, but he’s also got himself a new routine in Las Vegas that involves more live poker than ever before! Join us as we catch up with all-time favorite guest Carlos … Read full post
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William Kassouf will be familiar to you if you’ve been watching the World Series of Poker on ESPN. His constant chatter attracted plenty of attention and controversy during the final days of the Main Event. In this interview, we discuss his background … Read full post
Somehow it took me 12 years to get around to playing a World Poker Tour event, but I played my first one over the weekend at Maryland Live. Overall it was a well-run and well-attended event and I’m glad I played.
My Day 1A table draw was quite tough, I … Read full post