Posts Tagged ‘Poker Coaching’

One of my primary goals when coaching poker is to help my students think more creatively and situationally, to consider all of their options rather than just doing what they think is “standard”. They learn to find value in places they hadn’t thought to look for it by thinking through all aspects of a situation rather than focusing narrowly on their own holding. One common example of this is learning when and how to play unpaired hands for showdown value, usually but not always as bluff-catchers. Initially, many people are very uncomfortable calling with a hand like Ace-high. They might consider bluffing with it, but they usually have trouble recognizing opportunities to show it down as the best hand in all but the smallest pots.

I got an IM yesterday from a student who’s worked with me for a few months. He is originally from Paris, and though he now lives in Manhattan, he played this hand at a French casino while visiting his mother for the holidays. It couldn’t be a better example of what I’m trying to help my students achieve, and I am really proud both of this student and of the progress he has made:  Read the complete post...

I’ve now got three Thinking Poker Tournament Seminars under the belt, and they keep getting better every time. The next seminar will be held at 11AM Eastern time on Monday, December 19. The topic will be Advanced Flop Fundamentals, and it will take one of my most popular PokerSavvy Plus video series as a starting point on which to build more advanced skills. This seminar will include a free one-month subscription to PokerSavvy Plus.

Thinking Poker Tournament Seminars are pre-scheduled, small-group discussions focused on the most common mistakes and skills gaps that I see in my NLHE tournament students. Each two-hour seminar costs $150 per person and is capped at five participants, to enable individualized attention and opportunities for everyone to ask questions and participate in discussions. The content is prepared and the discussion facilitated by me- it’s like an interactive poker video!

Participants will learn how about alternatives to the continuation bet, how to deal with donk bets, when to slowplay, and how correct flop play varies with stack and pot size. My Flop Fundamentals video series will be required viewing in advance of the seminar, because everything we discuss will build on those concepts while getting more in-depth and sophisticated. Playing common flop spots well is essential to tournament success, so you don’t want to miss this seminar!  Read the complete post...

One nice side benefit of teaching is that forces the teacher to crystallize his own knowledge and learn concepts more thoroughly in the process. In my recent Big Bluffs seminar I talked about how people will usually bet a flush draw on the flop if they have one, which means that if the flop checks around and the turn is a flush card it’s a good time to make a healthy stab at the pot. I’d made similar plays before, but the seminar forced me to articulate the reasoning more precisely and in a way that could be applied in new situations. Consequently, I found this spot to steal the pot in today’s Saturday $300 tournament on PokerStars:

PokerStars No-Limit Hold’em, 320 Tournament, 300/600 Blinds 60 Ante (9 handed) – PokerStars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

UTG (t18593)
UTG+1 (t57136)
MP1 (t20999)
MP2 (t33621)
MP3 (t39979)
CO (t23378)
Button (t20626)
Hero (SB) (t31712)
BB (t17235)

Hero’s M: 22.02

Preflop: Hero is SB with 3♣, A♣
3 folds, MP2 calls t600, MP3 calls t600, 2 folds, Hero calls t300, BB checks

Flop: (t2940) 8♠, 5♦, 9♦ (4 players)
Hero checks, BB checks, MP2 checks, MP3 checks

Turn: (t2940) Q♦ (4 players)
Hero bets t2805, 3 folds

Total pot: t2940

Results:
Hero didn’t show 3♣, A♣.
Outcome: Hero won t2940  Read the complete post...

The next installment in the Thinking Poker Tournament Seminar series will be on Saturday, December 3rd, Noon-2 PM Eastern. The topic will be Playing Out of Position: Value Betting, Bluffing, and Getting to Showdown. Virtually all of the toughest spots in poker arise from playing out of position, and good players assume that they can get away with playing almost anything when they have position. Learn to punish them by giving them what they don’t expect: tough, creative opposition, even from out of position!

Thinking Poker Tournament Seminars are pre-scheduled, small-group discussions focused on the most common mistakes and skills gaps that I see in my NLHE tournament students. Each two-hour seminar costs $150 per person and is capped at five participants, to enable individualized attention and opportunities for everyone to ask questions and participate in discussions. The content is prepared and the discussion facilitated by me- it’s like an interactive poker video!

Participants will learn how to defend their blinds against late and early position raisers, how to deal with post-flop aggression, and how to pull-off the ever-vexing donk bet. In addition to the seminar itself, all participants receive a syllabus of recommended study materials to help prepare for the session and apply newly acquired skills in their future play.  Read the complete post...

Q: What’s your process for improving as a player?  Do you review your hand histories or take notes while you play?  Or have a master list of tips that you review regularly?  Like most “normal” people, I have a family and work full time and must do the bulk of my learning away from the table, either by reading books or blogs like yours.  Video training seems like a good idea but it takes even more precious time away from my few weekly playing opportunities.  And personal training cannot be cost-justified due to the small stakes I’m at.  What would you suggest for someone like me who only has about 10 hours a week to improve efficiently?

A: Good question, this is something I’ve been working on recently. My process is still very much a work in progress, but I’ve put a lot of thought into it that would be helpful to others so I figure I might as well share with you where I am now. It draws on two major sources: what Jared Tendler calls the Adult Learning Model and some things I’ve picked up about teaching and learning from my time in education.

Unconscious Competence  Read the complete post...

Yesterday’s inaugural Thinking Poker Tournament Seminar was a great success. I think all the participants got a lot out of it, and I learned a few things that I can do to make future seminars even better. So thinking of future seminars, the next one will be on Tuesday, November 15th, 6-8 PM Eastern. The topic will be Big Bluffs: Recognizing, Creating, and Taking Advantage of Good Spots.

These seminars are pre-scheduled, small-group discussions focused on the most common mistakes and skills gaps that I see in my NLHE tournament students. Each two-hour seminar costs $150 per person and is capped at five participants, to enable individualized attention and opportunities for everyone to ask questions and participate in discussions. The content is prepared and the discussion facilitated by me- it’s like an interactive poker video!

Participants will learn how to identify a capped range, how to set-up a multi-barrel bluff, how to choose the best hands for bluffing, and how to size bluffs for maximum profitability. In addition to the seminar itself, all participants receive a syllabus of recommended study materials to help prepare for the session and apply newly acquired skills in their future play.  Read the complete post...

Here’s an interesting hand that one of my students shared with me. We’d been working on bet-sizing, and his assignment for the week was to find spots to under- and over-bet the pot.

His reads here were that the BTN was a weak regular and the BB was on the loose-passive side (30/4 or so pre-flop):

No-Limit Hold’em, $1 BB (6 handed) Hand History converter Courtesy of PokerZion.com

BB ($60.80)
UTG ($119.40)
MP ($125.70)
Hero ($109.70)
Button ($103.65)
SB ($38.75)

Preflop: Hero is CO with Kc, Td.
2 folds, Hero raises to $3, Button calls $3, 1 fold, BB calls $2.

Flop: ($9.50) Jh, 2h, 4d (3 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $6, Button calls $6, BB calls $6.

Turn: ($27.50) 6c (3 players)
BB checks, Hero checks, Button checks.

River: ($27.50) 5h (3 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $55, Button folds, BB calls $51.80 (All-In).

Final Pot: $134.30

Results in white below:
BB has Qc Jd (one pair, jacks).
Hero has Kc Td (high card, king).
Outcome: BB wins $131.10. Hero wins $3.20.  Read the complete post...

This cloud has a silver lining for those of you who have been considering coaching: my time right now is worth a lot less than it was last week, and consequently I’m cutting the price of my coaching in half! Effective immediately, individual coaching is $150/hour with even deeper discounts available for booking a package. Please take a look at the coaching overview and then feel free to contact me if you have more questions (most people do- I understand that even the discounted price represents a big investment and I take that very seriously) or if you’re ready to sign up.

I want to take this opportunity to address a blog post that I promised frequent commenter/home game player Kevko I would comment on quite some time ago (sorry Kev):

Then I began losing. I was blaming bad luck, other bad players, or just whatever it was that seemed to be going wrong that day. This led me to begin really studying the game. I read books and articles, forums, and even subscribed to PokerVT (Negreanu’s training site) for a while.  Read the complete post...