Again, the structure of pot-limit Hold’em (PLH) is the same, except that the betting is limited to the size of the pot. So if the blinds are $10-$20, and you want to raise the pot (make the maximum raise), you can call $20 and then raise $50 more ($10 small blind + $20 big blind + your $20 call = $50), making it $70 to go. When it is your turn to act, you can always bet or raise the size of the pot. Because it is almost always correct to bet the size of the pot, you see a lot of big bets in pot-limit Hold’em—especially on the last round of betting when the pot is huge—just as in no-limit Hold’em. free bets

Because the differences between PLH and NLH aren’t very significant, especially to beginning and intermediate players, I’ll treat the games the same way in the chapters on strategy. However, I will point out some of the subtle differences in strategy along the way.

• Two Important Aspects Of Hold (0)
• The Advantage Of Poker Position (0)
• No-limit Texas Hold (0)

No-limit Hold'em (NLH) is considered the Cadillac of poker games, because most professionals believe it involves more skill than any other modern-day poker game. The structure of no-limit Hold'em is exactly like that of limit Hold'em, except that when it is your turn to act you can bet any amount at any time during the hand! In plainer language, the game is still dealt the same way, but now you can bet any amount at any time. It's pretty exciting to watch someone push a mountain of chips into one pot! At the World Championships of 2001, I pushed in almost $1 million in one hand, and lost!

After a flop of Q-9-3,1 bet out $70,000 and Carlos Morten-son raised it to $270,000 to go. I studied awhile and then reraised all of my chips (about $1 million total) with Q-10 (top pair), thinking that Carlos had at best Q-J, and that he couldn't call me even if he did have Q-J. Carlos did have Q-J, but he made an incredible call on me! No-limit Hold'em is treacherous; I had survived for five days in the World Championships, only to get blown out in one single spectacular hand!

• Two Important Aspects Of Hold (0)
• The Advantage Of Poker Position (0)
• Pot-limit Hold (0)

As I've been teaching you the setup and basic play for Hold'em, I have referred to the advantage of position many times. Having position in Hold'em or being one of the last players to act in a hand is a great advantage. You can just sit back and wait for everyone else in front of you to act. If your opponent bets and you are strong, then you can raise, effectively doubling the amount of money that is put into the pot and raising other strong hands out of the pot by making it twice as expensive for them to call. If your opponent bets and you are weak, then you can fold. If your opponent checks (in this case he is showing you some weakness), now you can act on your hand accordingly. By acting last, you get a better feel for the strength of your opponents' hands. I will really get into the differences between being in or out of position in the chapters on strategy.

• Two Important Aspects Of Hold (0)
• Pot-limit Hold (0)
• No-limit Texas Hold (0)

If you've followed me to this point, you'll be able to play Hold'em in your own home game. At first it might seem hard, but after less than an hour of playing Hold'em, you'll have the basics down.

How much should you play for? In $l-$2-limit Hold'em, the big winner for the night might win $100. (Notice that this figure is 50 times the largest bet allowed in the game; expressing expectations in terms of x number of big bets per session or per hour is pretty common in poker.) But $20 to $40 wins (just 10 to 20 big bets) will be far more common. Wins equivalent to more than 50 big bets do happen, but they are very rare, and you could play a long time without seeing one and a much longer time without experiencing one yourself! If you've understood what I've been saying about predicting wins and losses in terms of number of big bets won, you can probably figure out that in a $2-$4 game you can expect the big winner to win around $200, but that more commonly you will see a lot of $40 to $80 wins and losses at this limit (again, 10 to 20 big bets).

So what limit should your poker game be? You'll have to answer this for yourself. You can play with a limit of 25 cents and 50 cents if you're a poor college student and take $5-$ 10 swings on average. If you're an investment banker, perhaps you would enjoy playing with a limit of $300-$600, with average swings hitting $6,000 to $12,000 and the big winner sometimes winning $60,000! If your group normally takes swings of about $20, then I would suggest that you play at that level (75 cents and $1.50) for Hold'em. Remember that the stakes can be changed very easily just by changing the size of the blinds. Note that if your group really plays Hold'em poorly, then the swings will be about twice as high. Speaking of playing Hold'em poorly brings me to the next section.

• Pot-limit Hold (0)
• No-limit Texas Hold (0)
• Two Important Aspects Of Hold (0)

The game does involve some points of etiquette, and I would be remiss not to mention two issues at this point. For one, be sure you avoid "slow rolling" an opponent in a casino. When you're virtually certain you hold the winning hand (and it won't take you very long in your poker education before you know when you probably hold the winner!), and you then hesitate for a moment before you flip your hand up—clearly grandstanding and probably trying to make your opponent think he holds the winning hand—that's slow rolling.

Usually, a hesitation on the end by the bettor means that the bettor's hand is weak, and the players hate it when you then flip your strong hand up slowly. When a player perceives that he has won the pot, because you've stalled, but then, "bang," you tear his heart out and take the pot away from him, you're not making a friend; indeed, you're probably making an enemy who will have an elephant's memory and will look for revenge someday.

Another important point of etiquette is to be sure you always act in turn. Players are supposed to act one at a time, in a clockwise direction. If you look at your hand and realize you have nothing and are planning to fold, you still have a duty to the other players to sit there and look as interested or uninterested as you usually do, rather than folding out of turn. Why? I could give you many examples, but they mainly add up to this: your premature fold gives the other players information to which they aren't entitled. Your early display of weakness may encourage someone to play who might otherwise have been bluffed out by the play of an opponent.

This may seem a bit picky, but I promise you that the further you progress in your poker career, the more important you will realize this is, and the more likely it will be that at some time in your career someone will cost you a pot by giving away his weakness too soon. Suppose, for example, that you've correctly figured out that one of your opponents has nothing. You then decide to bluff at the pot with your own very weak hand in order to get rid of a third opponent whose turn to act arrives before the opponent that you think is weak can act. The man you are bluffing starts to study you and begins to fold, partly out of fear of your bet, and partly fearing that even if you're bluffing, the opponent behind him may have him beat. Now if that later opponent—the one you read as being weak—folds out of turn, and the opponent that you so skillfully bluffed at decides to call you, instead of folding, you have just lost a pot that you would have won, if only your weak opponent had played in turn!

• The Advantage Of Poker Position (0)
• Pot-limit Hold (0)
• Poker – The Two Blinds To The Left Of The Button (0)

Before the first round of betting, and before any cards are dealt, those first two players, directly to the left of the button, post (place in front of them) what we call the blinds. We call these the "blind" bets because those two players must invest them in the pot, in preset amounts, before they can look at any cards. Immediately after the button, we have the small blind, which is usually, but not always, set at half the size of the next blind, which is called the big blind.

The size of the blinds is determined by the size of the game. The small blind is usually half a small bet, and the big blind is usually a full small bet. In a hypothetical $2-$4 game, the small blind would be $1 and the big blind $2. Limit Hold'em games are thus defined by their bet sizes. For example, you might play $2-$4 Hold'em, or $10-$20 Hold'em, or whatever. In the $2-$4 game, all bets and raises during the first two betting rounds are made in $2 increments, and all bets and raises during the final two betting rounds (the third and fourth rounds) are made in $4 increments (you can't bet, say, 50 cents, or $3 on any round). As you might expect, in the $10-$20 game all bets and raises during the first two betting rounds are made in $10 increments, and all bets and raises during the final two betting rounds are made in $20 increments. In Las Vegas, the maximum number of bets is five, unless there are two players left in the pot—they can then raise and reraise until the money in front of one of them is gone.

• Two Important Aspects Of Hold (0)
• The Advantage Of Poker Position (0)
• Pot-limit Hold (0)