Online Poker: Interview With Chris 'Tribefan9' Rhodes

Chris "tribefan9" Rhodes has been playing poker for about four years and has been a poker pro - specializing in limit hold'em cash-game play - for about 2.5 years. He graduated from college with an accounting degree and spent a year working in corporate banking before realizing that he was making more money playing poker than he was at his job. At 25 years old, it was already sounding like it was time to quit his day job, so he did.

His successful play in limit games online resulted in him being snatched up as a resident trainer at the video training site PokerSavvy Plus, a site which recently teamed up with Card Player to offer Card Player Pro. (Click here to test out Card Player Pro with a seven-day free trial.) In addition to online play, he plays live in $100-$200 cash games in Las Vegas and Los Angeles, which, considering he calls Cleveland, Ohio, home, means he does his fair share of traveling.

Card Player caught up with Rhodes to pick his brain on limit hold'em, which has long been considered one of the best games to make a stable living at in poker:


Shawn Patrick Green: How did you make your way up the limits in cash games and what tools did you use to do so?

Chris "tribefan9" Rhodes: I started really low, at 5¢-10¢ online, and then slowly worked up from my initial $50 deposit just by having good bankroll management and never playing in games where I was either outclassed skill-wise or under-bankrolled. I used a lot of knowledge from some of the books that are out there and the poker forums.

SPG: How different is limit hold'em from no-limit hold'em?

CR: I think they're just totally different games which almost shouldn't even be compared to each other. They take completely different skill sets, and I think it's really rare to see players who are experts at both. I originally started playing limit because it was the most popular cash game at the time. I know when I started, no-limit was a fairly big tournament game, but more players were still playing the limit cash game. That's just kind of where I started, and I got to be pretty good at that, so I stayed there.

SPG: Limit hold'em is kind of known as a game for "grinders," for players who don't mind sacrificing smaller wins in a single session for a more stable positive flow of income. Do you agree with that assessment?

CR: I disagree, I think the limit is actually a higher variance game. Limit pros tend to have more losing weeks and months than no-limit pros. In limit, you can't force your opponents to make large mistakes, such as calling for their whole stack with only a couple of outs or drawing dead. In limit, you have fewer tools at your disposal, so you can only get your opponents chips one bet at a time. Much more of limit play comes down to battles for the blinds, wherein you end up attacking and defending the blinds with mediocre hands which you might not play in a no-limit setting.

SPG: What advice could you give to someone who plays limit hold'em but wants to transition to no-limit hold'em?

CR: I'm probably not the best guy to answer that question, because I did spend three months at the start of this year trying to learn no-limit hold'em myself, and I really struggled with trying to unlearn all of the habits that I had after playing millions of hands of limit. I just really struggled with trying to make the proper adjustments. I think it's better to try to learn both games while you're still kind of new and haven't spent as much time at either one, because once you start having your brain work one way, it's pretty hard to switch games.

SPG: What kinds of things, in particular, were giving you the most trouble?

CR: I think what was giving me more trouble in no-limit was that I'm not used to laying down overpairs and big hands like that, even when my opponent is telling me that I'm beat, because usually the pots get to the point that you're getting good odds to call. I think in no-limit, when I was playing that, I think I was getting stacked more often than I was stacking my opponents. I was willing to stack off with a little weaker of a hand than other people would just from not being able to make those laydowns. Also, I was probably not adjusting my preflop standards enough to think more about trying to win my opponent's entire stack with a hand like suited connectors or something. I was still focused on playing cards that made good top-pair hands.

SPG: As you said, limit hold'em had been the cash game of choice for years, which meant that any transition would likely be from limit to no-limit hold'em. Nowadays, no-limit hold'em is becoming ever more popular and easily rivals limit in the cardrooms. What advice can you give to someone who might be transitioning from no-limit hold'em to limit?

CR: I've actually played with a lot of players in that situation. It's more noticeable when I play live, because I can see that a no-limit player is coming to the table. It's hard to tell what a person's background is when you're playing online. Playing live, I think that a lot of the problems players have moving from no-limit to limit is that they bluff too often, which simply isn't as effective in limit, because you usually can't bet enough to get a person off of a made hand. And also, I think they're still trying to trap players a little bit too much, and they may be taking the worst of it preflop and on the flop hoping to hit their card. They're used to, in no-limit games, getting better implied odds, because they can win an opponent's entire stack. Whereas, in limit, they can't really make those fancier plays because the reward just isn't there if they do hit their hand.

SPG: You mentioned how a lot of people transitioning from no-limit hold'em to limit hold'em are trying to bluff a lot, even though bluffing is less effective in limit. Just how much harder is bluffing in limit hold'em, and how often do you use it?

CR: I think there's not as much bluffing in limit hold'em as there is semi-bluffing, a situation where you might be playing a big draw aggressively so that you have an extra way to win, by either hitting your draw or by pushing your opponent off of his hand. It's rare that you're going to bluff an opponent off of top pair, or something like that, in a limit game, just because of the betting structure. You really can't bet enough on the end, whereas in no-limit you can bet your entire stack.

SPG: So then would you say that you almost never make a stone cold bluff, then?

CR: The situations come up sometimes.

SPG: What would it take?

CR: I think one of the keys is that in limit, you can almost never bluff a bad player. The only time that bluffing opportunities come up is when you're playing in a hand against another good player, one who might be thinking on a similar level as you and who might have a better ability to read hands. You might be able to get them to fold a pair or something of that nature.

SPG: What mistakes do you see most often in limit hold'em cash games?

CR: I think the mistake that most casual players make … I think there are two. First, they are playing too loose, especially preflop. They get themselves involved with trouble hands that might be dominated, and then they end up making a lot of second-best hands, as the hand progresses. And the other thing is a lack of aggression. Aggression is crucial in limit hold'em to help you control the size of the pot, what I call holding the reins of the pot, so you can control when the action goes in. Calling is a pretty bad option in limit hold'em; I think people should be looking for more situations where they can be raising or folding, depending on whether they think they have the best or the worst of it.

SPG: What is your opinion of limit hold'em tournaments?

CR: I kind of enjoy them. I use them just to kind of break up the monotony of a cash game. I wish there were more of them, especially at higher dollar-amounts. I think there are only maybe three or so during the LAPC [Los Angeles Poker Classic], which I will be out in L.A. for, and only a couple during the World Series. So, I really wish there were more, and I wish they were more popular, but I think limit just generally works better as a cash game where you can reload and operate that way. In limit tournaments, usually you have so few bets once the blinds move up a few levels that there's really not a whole lot of play left; it's more of a crapshoot.

SPG: What is your game plan for playing mid pocket pairs in a full-ring limit hold'em game? Obviously different factors come into play, like who you're playing with and what position you're in, but …

CR: Yeah, it's hard to give a really simple answer to that, but I think the key with the middle pairs is to play them aggressively to give yourself an extra way to win. When you're playing smaller pairs, you're basically playing them for set-value. But with middle pairs, you're often able to win unimproved as long as you're able to thin the field by playing aggressively preflop, whether by raising or three-betting, so that you can try to make one pair hold up.

SPG: How does that kind of strategy change in a sixhanded game?

CR: In a sixhanded game, mid-pocket pairs just shoot way up in value because most pots are going to be contested two or three ways, and you're in a much better position than your opponents by having a pair to start. In a full-ring game, you might be running up against three or four hands which have a lot of the overcards covered, which could hit. In a six-max game, you don't even have to be as worried when an overcard to your hand comes, because it's less likely that another player has that card.

SPG: What about mid- to low-level suited connectors? How do those play in full-ring and sixhanded games?

CR: I think that's just a big difference between limit and no-limit, that those hands are usually unplayable in a limit game unless you're getting a discounted look from the blind or something like that. You basically don't want to be opening in limit, and getting yourself in a two- or three-way pot, with a suited connector, because when you do hit your hand, you're only going to win a few bets rather than in no-limit, where you hope to stack an opponent who might have a big pair.

SPG: Well, it's interesting that you say that, because I've heard a lot in my poker career that limit is more of a game of draws because you often have pot odds to go for those draws, but you're saying that you shouldn't even be starting out with hands that could potentially give you those draws?

CR: Well, I agree that it's a game of draws, but I think those draws come in different places. Like, say you have A-J and the flop comes K-Q, in limit you're usually getting odds more often to go for that gutshot-straight draw than you do if you have that same hand with the same cards in no-limit, when they may be betting half of the pot or more. So, I think draws do come about, but I think it's something to think more about post-flop, whereas preflop you just want to be getting your money in with the best of it.

SPG: That's all I've got for you. Thanks a lot, I really appreciate you doing this interview with me, Chris.

CR: No problem.

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