A lot of people admire my GUTS. They just think it's sooo amazing that I can make semmingly IMPOSSIBLE plays, and GET AWAY WITH IT!! Well, it's hard to be afraid of going broke, when you've been is as many hospitals, as I have (we won't mention what KIND of hospital, I'll leave that to you) If I should go bust, I can always check in to another hospital.

But, ok, the rest of you don't have that option, so what can you, the typical player do, to gain the COURAGE necessary to win in poker (especially in tournaments)

BY THE WAY, THIS IS SOME OF MY BEST STUFF EVER!! SO PLEASE PAY ATTENTION


Knowing the odds, can give you tremendous BALLS (oops, can I say "balls") And let's face it, guys AND gals, BALLS are necessary to WIN.

Let's say you were offered 10 million, to play Russian Roulette, with one chamber loaded. Would you do it? Almost certainly NOT. But, suppose you were armed with the additional information, that only one bullet from the whole box (50 for handguns) actually had any gunpowder in it. Would you do it then? Now, you have gone from 1-6 chance of death, to 1-300. Many people would now do it.

Same thing in poker. So many beginning players don't know the odds in any given situation, and this prevents them from being more aggressive.

For example: I have a new student who was watching me play in a 100 single table event, on Party. He thought it was SOOOOOO "expert" when I went all in with a flush draw, after being checked too. The guy called a LOT of chips, with just A10 high, and NO pair. Guess what PLAYA!! I'm a 55-45 favorite. . . . . . . IF HE CALLS!!! Makes it kind of EAZY to make that play, when you know the numbers.

On other sites, I have posted a very helpful chart, showing the odds of anyone having a bigger pocket pair, based on the remaining players and the size of YOUR pair. I will try to repost it here. Yes, as someone pointed out, it's only about 98% accurate, ATE is NOT a math expert. But, this is MORE than accurate enough.

Learn the different matchups, and memorize them!! You should automatically know the odds of Pair vrs. pair. Pair vrs two overcards Pair vrs one overcard etc.

This will help you TREMENDOUSLY, in your quest to become a winning player.

Know the odds in hold em, of making a straight, flush, flush with gutstraight, and all the other possible hands.

When you know the probability (or IMprobability, as the case may be) of certain events happening (or NOT happening) it will give you an INCREDIBLE boost of courage. And this will make you a TOUGH opponent.


Adam

Hey Adam,

Great - are you going to post the pocket pair calculations in this forum, too?