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Andrew’s working furiously to finish his book, so there’s no guest this week, just a quick strategy segment where he and Nate discuss whether to slowplay top set.
Timestamps
0:30 Hello
8:07 Strategy
Strategy
$2/$5 at Turning Stone in upstate NY.
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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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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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Berk Brown has spent decades in the world of poker and seen it from the perspective of a floorperson, a dealer, and a professional player. He’s full of great anecdotes and insights about staking, longevity (of games, rooms, and professional careers), game … Read full post
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Josh Nixon was a student in the Boston Debate League when Andrew was the director. In the years since then, he’s been a serious Magic: The Gathering player is now taking an interest in poker. In this interview, he talks about the … Read full post
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Nate and Andrew enjoy some “alone time” and answer listeners’ strategy questions (and a programming question) from the mailbag. Here’s the online MIT Computer Science Course that Nate recommended.
Strategy
Hand 1
100 BB effective stacks
Dealt to Hero: Ks Ts
UTG … Read full post
My birthday always falls during WCOOP, so it’s been a long time since I took it as a vacation day. But this year’s events felt more skippable than usual (the only thing I was really tempted to play was the $2100 PKO, and even then, the mid-week $2K events just … Read full post
I know it’s been a while, but I’m so close to finishing this review I figure I might as well go the distance. The only WCOOP event I played on this particular Wednesday was the $500 6-Max Progressive Knock-Out. I scored some early bounties, including with flush over flush and … 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
I slept poorly on Thursday night, probably a combination of adrenaline from making a significant final table with drinking caffeine later than usual (because of the final table) and replaying (ok, beating myself up over) some key hands in my head. I hadn’t planned to take Friday off, but the … 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
Emily and I did some extensive grocery shopping in the morning, returning in just enough time for me to squeeze in a quick workout before the start of the $1050 Progressive Knock-Out. I late registered the $215 PLO around the same time. I’m barely competent at PLO, but I do … Read full post
I’m once again in Quebec for the World Championship of Online Poker. This year, though, Emily is with me, and instead of Montreal, we’re in the Mont-Tremblant region, which is a sort of resort area in the mountains west of Quebec. We took a few days to drive up from … Read full post
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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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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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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
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
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
Here’s an interesting pot from the $200 Rebuy 6-Max WCOOP event. You probably know that in theory, multi-street bluffing tends to involve building two ranges for each street, a “keep bluffing” range and a “give up” range, such that your bluffing frequency gets lower on each street.
In practice, though, … Read full post
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Andrew’s busy with WCOOP, so he and Nate get straight to strategy, with a discussion of several hands from the No-Limit Omaha Eight-or-Better event.
Timestamps
0:30 Hello & Welcome
10:42 NLO8 Strategy
Hand 1
PokerStars – $300+$20|400/800 Ante 100 NL Hi/Lo (6 … Read full post
The eighth installment in my Thinking Poker Diaries series, which tells the story of my summers at the World Series of Poker, is now available. Unlike past volumes, this one covers many preliminary events as well as the 2013 Main Event. In particular, includes a report from the $1500 PLO8 … Read full post
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Benjamin Reason began playing the violin at the age of 4. It wasn’t so long after that that he discovered poker, and although the latter eventually subsumed the former, he remains a music aficionado (“a recovering music snob”, as he puts it). … Read full post
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In this pure strategy episode, Nate and Andrew talk about home game strategy and meta-strategy (e.g. how to get invited back), as well what you can learn from “silly” games like Baseball and Follow the Queen. Plus a microstakes strategy hand!
Strategy… Read full post
As you’ve probably figured out right now, there was no new podcast this week. We’ve got one coming tomorrow (Monday February 1) though! In the meantime, here’s another free strategy video from last month’s fundraising campaign. I realized all the videos so far have been from MTTs, so this … Read full post
This week’s free strategy video comes to you courtesy of the lucky donor who was randomly selected to receive a free review of one of his tournament hand histories. He graciously gave me permission to post it online so that everyone could see and learn from it.
I primarily review … Read full post
We raised so much money last month that I’m still rolling out all the free videos you all unlocked. Here’s the conclusion of my PLO8 WCOOP event review with Nate. If you haven’t seen them yet, be sure to check out Part 1 and Part 2.
Thanks so much to everyone who contributed to the Bay Area Urban Debate League during our year-end fundraising campaign! I’ll announce prize winners shortly, but want to be sure I’ve got a complete list of contributors first, as some people chose to mail checks. So I’m sorting out the list … Read full post
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Nikolai Yakovenko is a highly accomplished poker player and computer scientist. We talk to him about artificial intelligence, his Open Face Chinese Poker app, playing in Bobby’s Room, preparing for the Annual Computer Poker Competition, and the Computer Poker Research … Read full post
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Neil Blumenfield, who took 3rd place in the 2015 WSOP Main Event, talked to us about making the final table on Episode 139. Now he’s back to talk about how he prepared, what he learned, the experience of playing for (and … Read full post
This hand is from the first level of the $1080 Battle of the Bay tournament that I went on to win. I don’t have any specific reads on particular players, but the field in general is quite amateurish, with lots of satellite qualifiers and shot takers. My default expectation … Read full post
Based on how risk-averse everyone seemed to be during the latter half of Day 1, I expected the start of Day 2, with 43 people competing for 40 prizes, to go quite slowly. In fact, we saw four eliminations in three hands, and just like that, the bubble was over.… Read full post
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Your hosts talk about Nate’s new book as well as strategy from a limit hold ’em game and a heads up no-limit game.
Timestamps
0:30 – hello and welcome
15:08 – strategy
Strategy
Hand 1
30/60 Limit Hold ‘Em.
Hero opens K9o … Read full post
For those of you who aren’t sick of this hand yet, here’s a video I made analyzing my river check-raise, discussed on Episodes 143 and 144 of the podcast, with GTO Range Builder. This is free because the production value is a little lacking. I was doing this analysis … Read full post
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Andrew is in Montreal for the second half of the WCOOP, and he and Nate discuss some hands.
Strategy
Hand 1
2-4 PLO8 on Bovada. 4-handed.
I open to $12 with (AT)J7–I’m using Bill Chen’s notation where suited cards go in parentheses.… Read full post
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Gareth Chantler joins us from the Dominican Republic to talk about his new life as a writer (a discussion that began during his last appearance on the show) and his WCOOP so far (as of the time of this recording, that … Read full post
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Before Julie Anna Cornelius became a professional poker player, she was a ballet dancer and a flight attendant working in the fleet of one of the poker world’s most notorious characters. In this interview, she shares her story and reflects on the … Read full post
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This isn’t a proper podcast episode, but it’s better than nothing! Andrew goes solo, with no co-host, no editor, and no bumper music (or, perhaps, worse than no bumper music). He talks about his World Series of Poker so far and discusses … Read full post
I just finished 120th in this, out of 1600 or so. It was a fun and interesting tournament, and I want to share a few hands here while they’re still on my mind:
Facing a Donk Bet
I opened 2.5x from the CO with As Tc, a good player in … Read full post
The first High event I played was the $2K 8-max. I once again found myself bet-folding a strong hand on the river to a strange raise that represented only an improbable value hand or even more improbable bluff:
PokerStars – $2000+$100|200/400 Ante 50 NL (8 max) – Holdem – 8 … Read full post
As much as I like Zoom tournaments, I needed a day off, and Friday was it. I spent a good chunk of the day at the Chun-Yet Sen Classical Garden. It proved not only interesting and beautiful but also the perfect place to unwind from the stresses of poker:
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Andrew and Nate talk about Andrew’s recent friction entering Canada to play online poker, then review two hands from early Spring Championship of Online Poker events.
Strategy
Hand 1
PokerStars – $1000+$50|30/60 Ante 5 NL – Holdem – 9 players
Hand converted … Read full post
Today was the most frustrating day I’ve had so far, though I suppose that’s in part because it comes on the backs of several other frustrating days. I don’t want to sound like a broken record, because I know I’ve said this here before, but I can swallow my share … Read full post
I intended to play the $1K Big Antes event as well, but I didn’t realize (or more precisely, had forgotten) that it was a rebuy. Initially I thought that I hadn’t presented it as such to my investors, and consequently didn’t register for it, but then one of them pointed … Read full post
I decided to unregister the Low buy-in heads up event, because heads up really isn’t a game I can autopilot in the corner of my screen the way I’ve generally been doing with the Low events, and I didn’t want to be distracted from a $700 heads up match by … Read full post
As I now live on the west coast, I decided to do Vancouver instead of Montreal for my online pokering. I’ve barely been here 24 hours, and the weather has been beautiful, but I do miss the familiarity I have with Montreal, and the ease of getting around the city … Read full post
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Nate and Andrew field some mailbag questions related to both poker strategy and ethics, including collusion, what exactly a “guaranteed” prize pool should entail, when to rebuy, and how to add more aggression to your game.
Strategy
Villain #1 opens to $4 … Read full post
I recently finished reading Matthew Janda’s Applications of No-Limit Hold ‘Em and considered it one of the most helpful poker books I’ve read in some time. On a scale of 1 – 10, I give it a 9.5.
Applications is a Two Plus Two book par excellence. It’s dense, it’s … Read full post
I’m excited to announce the newest and most affordable poker coaching I’ve ever offered: personalized video reviews. For just $100/hour, half the price of my usual one-on-one coaching, I’ll create a custom video of your tournament or cash game database, a hand history of a tournament or cash game session, … Read full post
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Edoardo Riario Sforza has moved up through the ranks to become a contender in some of the biggest MTTs on the Italian sites. The same ambition that helped him succeed at poker is now taking him on a 10-month backpacking trip around … Read full post
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Ed Miller talks about his latest book, No Limit Hold ‘Em Made Simple, as well as the Las Vegas poker economy, his experiences with the Clark County foster care system, and how his perspective on being a parent has changed.
Ed’s previous … Read full post
Nate and I are grateful to those of you who have listened to The Thinking Poker Podcast this year, whether you’re a regular follower, a sporadic listener, or just now discovering the show. I’ve compiled a list of some of my favorite episodes of the year, in case you missed … Read full post
Now appearing on Tournament Poker Edge is a series of videos I recorded live while playing the World Championship of Online Poker. This is the first live recording I’ve done in years and my first ever for TPE. The bulk of the footage is me playing in various Knockout events, … Read full post
My latest poker strategy article, “Lessons From the WSOP Main Event: Marginal Hands in Heads-Up Play“, is now appearing in Two Plus Two Magazine. It’s an analysis of some key hands from the heads up portion of the 2014 WSOP Main Event:
… Read full post“The heads-up battle between Martin Jacobson
Andrew is still grinding the PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker in Montreal, so he and Nate break down a few hands he played in a PLO eight-or-better event and a 2-7 triple draw event.
I’m often asked about donk betting or when to take the initiative away from an opponent who’s been betting or raising. My usual answer is that you should bet when you have reason to think your opponent is unlikely to bet the next street and you don’t want to give … Read full post
This is from the $215 4-max WCOOP event. Villain is Chris Moorman. In my experience, this sort of “blatant” continuation betting tends to provoke LAGs, because they want to be the ones picking up all of the pots where no one has anything, and of course that’s going to happen … Read full post
I’m too tired to try to pick out the most interesting hand of the tournament, so here’s the one I busted on. I’d be curious to hear from those who know more about this game whether I might be better off just calling flop. FWIW Villain is Caio Pimento, who’s … Read full post
This is something I do sometimes. There are often exploitive reasons for it, but I do also think it’s good to be capable of making a flush on the turn when you check back the flop. This hand from the $300 Ante Up WCOOP illustrates why:
PokerStars – $300+$20|5/5 Ante … Read full post
This was from the first table of the $300 6-handed NLHE shoot-out. Villain is a very successful tournament player but in my opinion not fundamentally solid. Basically he’s learned how to take advantage of a lot of common weaknesses found in MTT players but is slow to adapt and back … Read full post
Andrew and Nate review a hand from a live $1/$2 cash game before talking with semi-professional poker player, entrepreneur, and DeucesCracked coach Andrew Seidman about a myriad of topics, including his book Easy Game (Andrew’s review here), his travels, his studies, and much more.
Here is the hand … Read full post
There’s no Andrew this week, but Gareth Chantler catches Nate up on his “new job” (it’s one all poker players hope for and also one that many struggle with when they’re lucky enough to get it) and his recent travels. Then the two talk strategy, including a hand where Gareth … Read full post