Ruff Poker Blog
Learn Train Dominate Poker

The addition of a maniac to a PLO table can bring about several responses from the other players: With some player’s reveling in their loose/aggressive play; while other players can become intimidated, causing their play to suffer. It sounds odd, but many players simply deplore the variance that comes with a maniac at a PLO table, and are unwilling to get into a raising war without AAxx. Instead of welcoming an ‘action’ player, they grumble and groan about the player’s tactics.

In the following examples I’ll use the following profile of a maniac: A player who raises first in every time or if there are limpers, and almost always re-raises (95% of the time). This type of maniac likes to get it all in pre-flop if he can, and let the chips fall where they may.

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Friend or Foe?

Referring to a Calling Station as a friend is like calling the sun “somewhat hot”, it’s a bit of understatement. A Calling Station is a solid player’s wet dream. Besides them chasing any hand, no matter what the odds, they are also pretty affable people, which is a great quality for someone to have while they basically hand you money.

Calling Station’s play poker as if they are allergic to money: it’s like the Richard Pryor movie Brewster’s Millions, where he has to spend $30,000,000 in order to inherit $300,000,000. If you didn’t know any better you would think a Calling Station is trying to lose.

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Everyone makes mistakes; in life we foul something up -usually trying to put something together without reading the instructions-learn a good lesson, and make sure we never commit the same mistake again. However, there are people out there who for some unknown reason refuse to learn from their errors: They go to work hung-over; get in trouble; vow to never drink on a weeknight again; and a week later they are in the same situation.

Well, these people are especially common in poker games, where mistakes can be small and almost go unnoticed. In poker uncorrected mistakes are known as ‘leaks’, holes in your game, and they can be very costly. If you continue to make big mistakes these are not leaks; they are glaring holes! This article is about leaks, so if you have any glaring holes you’ll need to pick up a book on basic strategy.

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As I mentioned in part 1 of this series; PLO starting hands tend to run very close in value. Because of this it’s unwise to commit a good chunk of your stack with anything but an AAxx hand, since things can change drastically when the flop hits.

Most of your strong hands you will want to raise, but you don’t want to put more than 10% of your stack into the pot pre-flop. The exception to this is when you have the aforementioned AAxx, or a really strong KK/QQ hand (such as double suited or with two Broadway cards). These hands you want to either commit less than 10% of your chips, or if it’s possible you want to commit over 50% of your stack in the pot.

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PLO is rapidly gaining popularity in the poker world. A long-time staple in European poker rooms, and high stakes games: Thanks to the availability of low-stakes action on the internet PLO is finding its way into the poker mainstream.

Before you learn any strategies, it’s best to know the concepts of the game, and what makes PLO different from the other poker variants.

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With the WSOP currently in full swing, I thought it would be fitting to talk about large field poker tournaments. The event I played a few days ago had close to 3,000 players in it and I noticed a common theme at the 2 tables I was at… the willingness to gamble. Why did it seem like most of the players seemed uneasy, and ready to gamble for all their money when given a chance? I think the answer is mindset. I believe a lot of the players who play in these large field tournaments alter their game because the field is so big. They feel like they need to chip up early and take risks in order to navigate the big field. In my opinion this is the wrong approach. To me a poker tournament is a poker tournament, and you should approach all of them the same. Granted some tournaments have better structure than others, and you should be aware of blind structure in all tournaments you play.

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You are thinking of hitting Vegas for some of the WSOP 2009 action but want to practice a bit on UltimateBet first. You find a nice six max game going on and sit yourself down. In this hand you see very quickly a loose player limping in from early position. Then you catch one of the regular UB players raising to $10 from the button. When the small blind folds, you decide “what the heck” and call. Then you watch with anticipation as the flop hits 4h Td 8h. What should you do?

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The WSOP main Event is the Indy 500 of the poker world. True fans know who is running hot; winning WPT and EPT events around the globe; and who won a WSOP bracelet. On the other hand, the casual poker fan -which represents the majority-only cares about one thing: Who won the Main Event.

The huge pay-day aside, winning the WSOP Main Event makes you a household name, and gives you endorsement opportunities that even the most marketable players can only dream of.

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When De Wolfe captured the $5k Pot Limit Omaha 8 bracelet at the 2009 WSOP he became the second player in history to win poker’s Triple Crown: World Poker Tour (WPT) title; European Poker Tour (EPT) title; and World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet winner. The Englishman donned a Union Jack track-suit for the final table of the $5k PLO8 event; perhaps for luck, but more likely for pride of country.

Gavin Griffin was the first player to accomplish the feat: In 2004 Griffin won the $3,000 Pot Limit Hold’ Em event at the WSOP; in 2007 he captured the EPT Grand Final title; and in 2008 Griffin completed the Triple Crown by winning the WPT Borgata Classic.

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Intolerance does not mean you discriminate against other players, or cannot stand their behavior. Intolerance in poker has to do with the way people think, and being open-minded to the possibility that no matter how bizarre a certain play may seem to you, it could make total sense to someone else.

Far too many players feel that because they win -or play properly-that their way of thinking is the only way. Anyone who may have a different opinion on how to play a hand, or a different reason for playing poker is considered a fool by the intolerant poker player.

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