The Card Player 2007 Player of the Year (POY) race featured the best poker players battling for points at the largest tournaments throughout the world. From the World Poker Tour to the World Series of Poker, and many other events, players got hot to ride to the top of the POY leader board, and ...
Washington Candidate Wants Online Poker Law Changed Lee Rousso Running for Governor By Bob Pajich Lee Rousso recently threw his hat in the ring for governor of the state of Washington. He will try to win the August primary against current Gov. ...continued
The European Poker Tour PokerStars Caribbean Adventure (PCA) was the first major poker tournament of 2008, and it featured a collection of the world's best poker talent. It attracted 1,136 players, making it the largest non-World Series of Poker ...continued
All the right cards were in our hands and so, gracefully, he gave his opinion that we had the answer. – James D. Watson, The Double Helix Why would an 18th-century parlor game played by a few French and Persian aristocrats take hold and flourish ...continued
In this issue, we honor the tournament players who put up the most impressive results in 2007. David Pham, with 11 final tables and $1.8 million in earnings, emerged as the 2007 Player of the Year (POY) after another wire-to-wire contest. This was ...continued
Kenny Tran reports to work at Commerce Casino in California almost every day, but he is not on its payroll. He was introduced to the game of poker about 15 years ago in a bowling alley; at that point, he was working at a fast-food restaurant. Tran ...continued
If you spend enough time in life on one activity - like golf, for example - you're bound to occasionally witness something amazing, like a hole-in-one. I've played a lot of poker in my life, and here's one of those moments, one of the more ...continued
As I mentioned in my last column, I placed 15th in the Doyle Brunson Classic, a WPT event held at Bellagio. Not only would it have been great to win my father's tournament, but the first prize was $2.5 million! This is one of the biggest ...continued
It was New Year's weekend, a jam-up time in Las Vegas. The casinos invite their best customers to town at that time, and many of them find their way into the local poker games. Playing $30-$60 limit hold'em, I had limped in from the button ...continued
Being too readable can really hurt your no-limit hold'em game. Winning no-limit hold'em depends on fear and surprise. If your opponents are uncertain about your holding and fear the hands you could have, you can steal a lot of pots. And if ...continued
Everyone knows that when you flop a flush draw, you have nine outs to make your draw, assuming that you have two of the suit in hand. But what if you have zero of the suit in hand? Then you have 11 outs, yeah? Of course, that's 11 outs to a hand ...continued
As you become more sophisticated, one of your tasks will be reading your opponents' abilities. A common error is to assume that everyone thinks the way you do. For example, if you raise and an opponent calls, you may put him on the range of hands ...continued
A-K, even A-K suited, is a treacherous holding in deep-stack no-limit hold'em. It is here that big slick earns all of its pejorative nicknames ("Walking Back to Houston," after the Houston players who went broke in Dallas playing A-K ...continued
It's the European Poker Tour main event in Prague, an event with a €5,000 buy-in. I have started out playing rather tight and unimaginatively, mainly trying to get a feel for my opponents. I have played just one hand in the previous hour, ...continued
The first three parts of this series discussed the preparation steps you should take before playing a single hand: • Study strategic principles • Plan for this specific event or session • Get into the right state of mind • Choose a ...continued
In this column, I am going to confess to some of the boneheaded poker errors I have made. One of the basic attributes of a good player is being able to read one's hand. Yet, I have misread my hand on several occasions, and as fate would have it, ...continued
I received an e-mail from reader Bob Woolley, who asked my opinion on a couple of situations he had been involved in at the poker table. Bob did such a good job of explaining both of the situations, breaking down his thoughts and then giving an ...continued
Hi. Come on in. Did you bring the pizza? Great. No anchovies, right? Toss me a slice with sausage and one with pepperoni. I'm really hungry, so I'll talk while we chew. Let's talk about soft spots and tougher games. Most players, when they ...continued
Many new players are coming into brick-and-mortar (B&M) cardrooms for the first time. They have played online and in home games, but may not know the rules and conventions of live cardroom play, and might get tripped up. As a public service, this ...continued
I recently was interviewed by Jane Goldberg, a Florida resident. I met Jane at a WPT Boot Camp in the Bahamas in December. She is a very interesting person, and an excellent writer herself. She submitted some questions to me that she thought would be ...continued
I always begin or end my seminars by encouraging the participants to embrace the same three goals that I have every time I go out to play poker: to win money, to have fun, and to make sure that my opponents have fun. I'm in a playful mood right ...continued