The Poker Lab Rat

If you don’t have much experience playing Pot-Limit Omaha, a good rule of thumb is to play hands that can make the nuts because at a full table the pot will usually end up going to the player holding the best possible hand. If there are three flush cards on the board, the winning player will often show an Ace-high flush, and if the board pairs, the winner will usually have a full house. While flopping the nuts is nice, it’s even more important that you have redraws to make the nuts when the board changes on later streets.

Because you have four cards in your hand instead of just two, the starting hands in Omaha are much closer together in value than they are in Texas Hold ‘em. Any four random cards not containing a pair are never going to be that far behind any other starting hand. The values start to diverge on the flop and at that point they change dramatically. In Omaha, the best hand changes from street to street. The nuts almost never stay the same and the best hand on the flop will rarely be good on the river; if you’re going to continue on in a hand, you need to have a redraw that gives you plenty of outs.

More than anything, Pot-Limit Omaha is about straights and straight possibilities. You should always be looking to play starting hands that have a 10 or a 5 in them because many straights contain one or the other. Tens are particularly important because they’re more likely to make the nut straight for you. If there’s a lot of action on the flop and the board hasn’t paired, you really want to have a redraw to make the nut straight. If your hand’s got flush potential as well, all the better.

Unless you have some sort of redraw, one of the worst hands you can have on the flop in Pot-Limit Omaha is a small set because chances are good that you’ll end up losing to a bigger set, a straight, or a flush. For this reason, beginning players should avoid starting hands that feature small pairs like 5s or 7s. It’s more likely that these hands will get you in trouble than make you money – you’d be smart to fold them before the flop.

Having a redraw to make the nuts is so important in Pot-Limit Omaha that folding the nuts on the flop is often the best play if the board is scary and your hand has no chance of improving. This might sound crazy to Texas Hold ‘em players, but this situation occurs all the time in Omaha. The best way to combat this is to play starting hands that have all four cards working together so that if you do make a hand on the flop you can play it aggressively, knowing that your hand has a chance to improve on the turn or the river.

Here’s an example of what I’m talking about. Let’s say you’ve got J-10-3-2 and the flop comes 9-8-7. You’ve flopped the nut straight, but you can’t celebrate too much because if a Jack or a 10 falls on the turn or the river you won’t have the nut straight anymore. If there are two flush cards on the flop, you’re in even worse shape.

This is a very difficult situation to be in because any change that occurs on the board can ruin your hand. If the board pairs, you’re probably going to lose to a Full House. If another spade comes, you’re going to get beaten by a flush. Even if the straight you flopped somehow remains the nuts on the river, there’s a good chance you’re going to have to split the pot.

When you pick up a starting hand that has the potential to make a straight, it’s fine if the hand has a gap in it. Just remember that it’s far better to have a gap at the bottom of the hand than at the top. For example, J-10-9-7 is a better hand than J-9-8-7 because the first one allows for upward development. If the flop comes 8-6-5, you’ve made the nut straight with both hands, but if a 9 falls on the turn only the first hand allows you to make a higher straight. Ignorant of this concept, many players who are new to the game tend to overvalue a hand like 6-5-4-3. Even though the cards are perfectly connected, this hand is not as pretty as it looks because it doesn’t allow for much upward development.

As you can see, it’s not enough to flop the nuts in this game. You also need to have a redraw to make the nuts when the board changes; because in Pot-Limit Omaha, it always does.

About Barny:
In recent years, Barny has worked as a commentator for numerous televised poker tournaments, including Late Night Poker, The World Heads Up, The Poker Million, Poker Million the Masters, The Victor Cup, Celebrity Poker Club, The European Poker Tour, and The Poker Nations Cup. He has also recorded a television series called Barny’s Home Games, a show in which he visits and plays in home games all around Great Britain. He’d love to do the same thing in the U.S.A. some time.

Like most tournament players, Barny focuses mainly on No-Limit Hold ‘em. He has been at the final table of many major events around the world, including the Master Classics, the European Open, the Irish Championships, the British Open, the Euro Finals of Poker, the Aussie Millions, and The Poker Million.

If you want to learn more about Barny, join him at the table on FullTiltPoker.com.

>>For more on Full Tilt Poker check out the latest review online at PokerLabRat.com or compare FullTilt to the other poker rooms popular with USA residents here.

Ever wondered how you too can be a font of all poker knowledge and math wizardry? All you need is a calculator with a ‘combinations’ button (designated ‘nCr’ or similar).

Now imagine that ‘nCr’ stands for ‘choose’ and that you’ll be putting in numbers either side and hitting the combinations button in the middle. So, to calculate the number of possible starting hands enter ’52 choose 2’, and voila! The answer is 1,326.

Want to know how many ways someone can be dealt Aces? There are four Aces in the deck, so enter ‘4 choose 2’, which is 6. And the chances of being dealt a pair of them? Well 1,326 divided by 6 is 220-to-1. Not very good unfortunately!

But They Were Suited!  –  Don’t get dazzled by two of a kind. The odds just aren’t that good!

Starting hand requirements are one of the cornerstones of successful poker and one of the traps beginners often fall into is playing hands like Q(h), 5(h) or J(s), 3(s) “just because they’re suited”. Well, put the mechanics of poker math into action and you’ll soon see why this is a guaranteed recipe for disaster.

Forgetting for a second that you might win by pairing your hole cards (or lose a lot on your kicker), what are the chances of actually making the flush? Say you hold two hearts – the chances of actually flopping it is ’11 choose 3’ (you need three of the eleven hearts remaining in the deck) divided by ’50 choose 3’ (the total combinations possible from the cards you haven’t seen), which is 0.84%. Eek!

As you can see, those flushes on the flop come along less than one in 100 times, so what if you’re only looking for a flush draw on the flop?

Now you want two hearts and one card of another suit to turn up. The equation here is ’11 choose 2’ (two of the remaining hearts) multiplied by ’39 choose 1’ (any of the remaining cards that aren’t hearts) divided by 19,600, which is still only 10.94%.

Consider these numbers and you can see why playing hole cards simply because they’re suited is a very bad idea.

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>> Carbon Poker Review & Rating
>> Bet365 Poker Review

Here’s a poker tip from another member of the “WSOP November Nine”, Scott Montgomery. (You can read “Nov9″ Kelly Kim’s latest poker tip here) 

One of the most important aspects of poker is establishing an individual image and using it to your advantage. By playing an extremely aggressive game, you’re likely to get paid off when you make a big hand because your opponents assume you have nothing; by consistently playing tight, you’ll get away with bluffs because they assume you’re strong. Either approach is fine, but it’s tremendously important to be aware of your table image so you can profit by playing against it.

Most of the time, players fall between these two extremes and that’s not a formula for success. One of the keys to succeeding in poker is consistently playing a different game than everyone else at the table. Developing a unique style and then varying your game allows you take advantage of opponents who don’t adjust their game.

Personally, I feel the style that works best is all-out aggression. One important reason for this is that it gives me a shot at becoming the chip leader and running away with the tournament. On the other hand, it can also lead to busting out early. For me, this is a risk worth taking; in the long run, I’m more interested in finishing tournaments in 1st place once in a while than just making the money most of the time.

Keep in mind that this type of aggression isn’t just a matter of bluffing to steal pots; my ultimate goal is to get paid off when I have a big hand. By getting involved in a lot of pots with mediocre hands while still keeping my stack close to even, I put myself in a position to profit from opponents who are convinced that I’m completely loose and taking shots with any two cards. I don’t have to be successful every time I bluff, just enough to stay alive and reinforce that wild image so that when I catch that hand, I’ll be sure to win a big pot.

Here’s a perfect illustration from Day Seven of the World Series of Poker Main Event – the day that determined who would reach the final table. I came into the day with about 4.5 million in chips, which was a little below the average. I knew that to make it to the final table and have a real shot at taking it down, I’d need about 15 million in chips. I had no intention of sneaking in short-stacked, so I knew I’d have to triple up over the course of the day.

I stayed pretty even throughout the whole day, except for two massive pots that were directly related. The first pot came early in the day, when I tried to bluff a player off a pot on the flop with nothing but Ace-high. I made this all-in move because I thought I could get the guy to fold. He ended up calling with top pair, but I spiked the Ace on the river to double up through him. I certainly got lucky there, but one other very important thing came out of it: I made the table aware that I wasn’t afraid to make a move for most or all of my stack.

Later in the day I was involved in a hand where I had the nuts – there were four spades on the board and I had the Ace of spades. My opponent had a smaller flush – with the nine of spades, I believe – but my image was so crazy that he called because he put me on another bluff. The earlier hand, when I pushed with the Ace-high, had to have been in the back of his mind. Poker players always want to call. They think: what hands can I possibly beat? This is magnified when you’re at a TV table, because no one wants to be that guy who laid down a good hand and lost a huge pot to a stone-cold bluff, especially when the whole nation is watching. Because of my loose image, I ended up winning an 18 million chip pot.

In a sense, it isn’t easy to play poker this aggressively. You have to be equipped to handle the emotional swings; you have to understand, deep down, that sometimes you’re going to lose huge pots – maybe even your whole stack – on a bluff. When it happens, you can’t collapse. You have to walk into the next tournament willing to make that same play again, because most of the time it will work. You can never be afraid at the table or preoccupied with the past. To play this aggressively, you have to believe that it’s the right way. If you can manage this, you’re going to be successful in the long run.

With $1.3 Million in Career Tournament Winnings including 4 WSOP Cash Finishes to date Scott Montgomery plays online at Full Tilt Poker. Join him at a table some day soon!

Here’s Scott’s “plan” for the WSOP 2008 Main Table:

“I’m going to win; I planned on winning from day one. I plan on playing all the tournaments I can between now and then. I don’t know how much research you can really do, if I can get some pre-information I wouldn’t turn it down. If I take a vacation, I will go to Monte Carlo and play some poker.”

>>FullTiltPoker Room Review & Rating

Back to some poker basics:

Checking is one of the weakest moves you can make when playing poker because it is a passive move. Despite this, many beginner poker players check far too often.

There are only three reasons for a player to check.

1.    They have nothing in their hand
2.    They’re looking for information
3.    They want to trap their opponent

Reason No. 1 is by far the most common among beginners. If your first thought whenever you miss the flop is to check, then you’re not being aggressive. By checking repeatedly every time you miss the flop you’re falling into a pattern that is very easy for other players to read. It’s especially detrimental to your play because you’ll miss the flop more often than you will hit it.

Reason No. 2, to gather information, is used to try and figure out what your opponent might be holding. You’re using checking as a tool to try to gauge the strength of your opponent’s hand. You should expect a bet to follow your check here, and hopefully that bet will help you figure out whether or not you should continue in the hand or let it go.

Reason No. 3, trapping, is all about check-raising and slow-playing. You’re basically feigning weakness with a strong hand while hoping your opponent bets big so you can raise him. It can be a great strategy when used at the right time, but it can also backfire if your opponent doesn’t bet and you give away a free card. Only attempt a check-raise when you are sure that your opponent will make a bet and that your hand is good enough to hold up when they don’t bet and take a free card.

If you’re looking for a great online poker room to learn to play - or to make some money - check out these two popular sites:

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Intuitively, it would seem that checking and calling is the best way to keep a pot small when you’re uncertain as to whether or not you have the best hand. And often, that’s the case. But believe it or not, betting out can sometimes allow you to get to the showdown cheaper than checking. If your goal is to control the size of the pot, sometimes voluntarily putting chips in will actually keep the pot smaller than passively putting chips in only after your opponent does.

Here’s an example from a hand that I played during this year’s World Series of Poker Main Event that will illustrate this tactic. The blinds were 12,000/24,000 and I opened for 60,000 on the button. Usually when you open for 2 1/2 big blinds like that, especially on the button, it portrays some strength. In this case, I only had Q-J of hearts. The small blind called and the big blind folded.

The flop came A-10-rag; he checked, I bet 65,000 and he called. The turn card was a Queen – making me second pair – and he checked. This was the key moment in the hand. I decided to bet 100,000. I did this for pot control: I didn’t want to call a bet of 150,000 or 200,000 on the river, so I made a smaller bet at that point expecting it to freeze him on the river with most hands.

Let’s say my opponent had A-3. My small bet on the turn made it look like I had a strong hand and was milking him, wanting him to call. There was no way he could bet on the river with an Ace and no kicker; he was just as happy as I was to see a free showdown at that point.

It’s also important to note our stack sizes. I started the hand with about 600,000 in chips and he was deep, with about 1.5 million. By betting 100,000 on the turn, meaning I had committed more than one-third of my stack, he couldn’t try a bluff raise because it was too likely that I was pot-committed. On top of this, I had established a tight image and he had to respect the likelihood that I had a real hand. If he had come over the top, I would have found out that I was beat for a relatively cheap price.

The main goal of the turn bet was to get me to the showdown for 100,000 instead of a larger amount. If I’d checked there, with about 280,000 in the pot, he could very well have had Ace-baby, and my check would have told him that I didn’t have an Ace. He then could have easily bet about 150,000-200,000 on the river to extract value from me. He was looking for an amount that I might have paid off with a Queen or what looked like a bluff. If he had Ace-baby and opted for the 200,000-chip bet, I would have saved 100,000 by betting out on the turn.

Obviously, he could have thrown a wrinkle into the plan by moving all in on the river. Again, this is a situation where you have to incorporate image, and I’d been playing real tight to that point – he was just as scared of me as I was of him.

What if I did have him beat with the Queen? Let’s say he had J-10 or K-10; he would have been priced in to call, and I wanted him to – I needed to pick up the extra 100,000 for my stack. I was willing to take the risk of seeing the river because he only had five or six outs.

Against other players who are capable of seeing the river card and just moving in, I might have tried a different strategy, like playing real small ball and checking the turn while being prepared to pay off 175,000 on the river. But against this guy, I knew for sure he was going to check the river unless he made trips or a straight.

As it turned out, I never saw his hand. He checked the river, I checked behind. He was disgusted when I showed him the Queen, so it was obvious that he had a 10 and I turned him. But he couldn’t have just had a 10. For him to have called with a 10 on the turn he needed to have a straight card there – he either had to be holding J-10 or K-10. And that was exactly the hand I wanted to be up against on the turn.

This situation was very circumstantial because it was based on stack size and image, which are very important in live tournaments. Because of the size of my chip stack, I was playing really tight and couldn’t afford to get out of line. I couldn’t see many flops. I played with this opponent for a while to set up this play, and I knew it was the perfect situation for it. I wanted to get to a showdown because I thought queens could have been the best hand, but didn’t want to pay 200,000 in the end to find out.

Californian Kelly Kim is a member of the 2008 WSOP “November Nine” having won his way into the final table in July 2008. He is the short-stack going into the event – in 9th place with just over $2.6 million in chips. Kelly Kim plays online at Full Tilt Poker join him at a table some time soon.

For the latest views and reviews on FullTiltPoker.com online poker room check out:

>>PokerLabRat.com’s Full Tilt Poker Review
>>Full Tilt Poker Review and Rating at GoonersGuide.com

Compare Full Tilt to other US-friendly online poker sites - or just visit FullTiltPoker.com for a look around!

One of the world’s best poker players, 34-year-old Gus “The Great Dane” Hansen, has been winning big money at Full Tilt.com, earning a million dollars in a single day during October.

On one night, Hansen won more than $589,000 at Hold ‘em, $145,000 in PLO, $152,000 in Omaha Hi/Lo, and $97,000 in a HORSEgame, demonstrating a his skills over a wide range of poker styles. Playing against some of the best players around on Full Tilt, his October 2008 earnings thus far have reached $3.2 million.

Gus Hansen is famous for his loose and aggressive style of play, and started playing poker as a professional in 1997. Before that he was a world-class backgammon player who tried to make a living at the game in New York and abroad but found the pickings too slim.

In his outstanding poker career “The Great Dane” can boast a long record of wins in significant tournaments.

He has won a three World Poker Tour open titles, the 2007 Aussie Millions main event, and was the season one winner of the Poker Superstars Invitational Tournament. His official career winnings recently topped $5.8 million dollar, and he describes his approach to the game as: “I play the players, not the cards.”

Bluffing is the act of making a bet with the worst hand, and hopefully forcing an opponent to fold a better one. Easy enough in principle, but when it comes to Texas Hold’em, you also need to know the various ways you can do this successfully. So here are some basic bluffs as well as a few counter tactics!

SEMI BLUFF:

When you’re bluffing with outs – that is, if you do get called, you still have ways to win, such as betting a flush draw in the knowledge that you may win with a bluff or still make the flush if you get called. This tactic is used frequently by the pros and all good players, and is often the deadliest, as it means your opponents will find it difficult to know if you have a strong hand or just a draw any time you put chips in the pot.

NAKED BLUFF:

When you’re bluffing with no outs, aware that the only way you can win is of you make the other player fold. Daring and audacious, this is a very high risk option that requires a precise read on your opponent and lots of guts. John Duthie put on a master class of naked bluffs to win $1.7 million at Britain’s inaugural Poker Million in 2001. However, one reason he got away with his bluffs is that he never had to show any of them, and the other players didn’t have a clue until afterwards – when the tournament aired on tv!

RE-BLUFF:

Sensing that someone else is making a move on a pot and fighting back to try to beat them at their own game. Often characterized as the strongest move in poker, this is an ultra-high risk, sophisticated play made by many top players mainly against other top players, all of whom understand intimately the levels-inside-levels approach that defines high stakes poker.

DELAYED BLUFF:

A less spectacular version of the re-bluff, the delayed bluff consists of calling a bet with nothing against a seemingly weak opponent - with the intention of taking the pot away on a later betting round. This tactic often works best with position; if you call a bet on the flop or turn last and then the other player fails to follow through with a bet at the next opportunity, it frequently means they were stealing. Moreover, if you either called and missed a draw or called with nothing just to bluff later, you’ve found a great low-risk opportunity to do so.

POSITIONAL BLUFF:

Using good table position to exert pressure on the opposition. You may be raising to steal the blinds in late position, or betting one of the subsequent rounds in the hope that you can make a player pass a better hand when they know you will be acting after them throughout, and could put them to some tough decisions.

CHECK-RAISE BLUFF:

Checking to let your opponent bet after you with position, and then re-raising. This is both high risk and a very powerful move, as the check raise almost always signifies strength, meaning you might force an opponent to fold. Equally though, if they call or re-raise, then you’ve created a big pot out of position and are left with the equally tough choices of giving up or making an even bigger and potentially fatal bluff on the next betting round.

TRAP:

Feigning weakness with a very strong hand in the hope that an opponent will make an ill-timed bluff. This might be through slow-play, in which you check and call other player’s bets, or make a small bet that is designed to communicate weakness and bring a raise or bluff from an opponent.

CHECK-CALL:

An antidote to very aggressive players and a way of minimizing your damage if you fear you’ve walked into a hand rather than a bluff, check-calling means simply calling down an opponent when you think they have nothing. If you’re right, then the other player has effectively given a lot of free chips to you, and if you’re wrong, at least you found out as cheaply as possible (as well as gaining a valuable insight into your opponent’s playing style).

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Poker is a game enjoyed by many, but for some people - it’s a passion. And for some of those, it is a passion taken to the extreme. After years of study and clinical research with the top minds in psychology, the team at Bodog Poker have come up with a fool-proof list designed to tell you if you suffer from Poker Dependency Syndrome (PDS).

If you find that you answer “yes,” add one point to your score. If you score six or higher, then you definitely suffer from PDS and should seek immediate medical attention (or at least deserve to be making some serious money playing).

1. Have you ever chosen to play poker instead of having sex with someone you are attracted to?

2. Have you ever gotten into a bar fight and suggested that you take it outside… and down to the casino where you can settle it over a game of poker?

3. Have you ever gone to bed snuggling your favorite poker chip set?

4. Have you ever written a poem, short story, haiku or novel that explored your love for the game of poker?

5. Have you ever dressed up as a playing card for Halloween?

6. Have you ever melted down a poker chip and tried to inject it into your veins?

7. Have you ever voted in a political election exclusively based on what the candidate’s views on poker were?

8. Have you ever finished a 16 hour online poker tournament just as your significant other was waking up to make breakfast and pretended that you had already been to bed and woke up early to play some poker?

9. Have you ever selected the location of a marriage, honeymoon, funeral or bat mitzvah based on its proximity to a quality poker room?

10. Have you ever played online poker until one of your eyeballs has fallen out?

11. Have you ever tried patenting a device that would allow you to play online poker 24/7 by inserting electrodes directly into your brain?

12. Have you ever played all of the events at the World Series of Poker and then after busting out of the Main Event gone and joined the nearest cash game? (Worth 2 points if answered Yes.)

13. Do you find yourself yelling out poker terms during everyday conversations? For example, “I’ll see your coffee and raise you a triple shot Grande Macchiato.”

14. Even though you’re totally straight, do you have sexual dreams that involve Daniel Negreanu, David Williams or Phil Ivey? The same goes for women who dream about Evelyn Ng, Isabelle Mercier or Kathy Liebert. (Worth 3 points if answered Yes and 4 if it was about Kathy Liebert)

15. Do you find yourself watching Jennifer Tilly play poker rather than staring at her tits? (Worth 2 points if answered Yes)

16. Have you cried more at the poker table than at funerals?

Add up your score and please note that some positive responses are worth more than a single point (we’re looking at you people who fantasize about Kathy Liebert).

Here’s what the various scores mean:

0: If you scored zero you’re healthy but kind of a loser in our books.

1-3: Although your love of poker isn’t negatively impacting your life too much you might find some relief with a little counseling.

4-5: Danger, danger, you’re getting kind of weird on us there.

6-7: Okay, you have PDS and should seek treatment. Science says you’re nuts, so go deal with it already!

8-10: You scare us. Seriously, you’ve gone too far and need to take a break and come down off the poker for a while, possibly with some Roulette, Craps or Go Fish.

11+: You are beyond all help and hope. You only read this article in hope that it would end with a link to a fantastic online poker site. There’s your link, now go indulge yourself at Bodog Poker.

Sit and Go poker tournaments are a fun and exciting way to get your poker fix in a hurry. Since you don’t usually have to pre-apply or find an open date to play, the Sit and Go (“SNG”) is a favorite amongst poker enthusiasts who want to play cards in their spare time.

Say you get home from work at 5:30 PM (I wish!) and, amazingly, have a night with nothing on the horizon. With the SNG, you can find a table with an open spot, wait for the pre-selected amounts to be filled and try to win yourself a nice dinner for tomorrow. Imagine covering the cost of that Porterhouse steak before eating it!

These SNG online poker tournaments are fast-paced, usually consisting of 10 players, and they’re the best way to build a bankroll with a minimal deposit. It’s important to note that they normally pay the top three finishers out of 10 players and are the only tournaments where you will find 30 percent of the field getting paid (in multi-table tournaments, generally only about 10 percent of the field is paid). SNGs definitely are the best “risk/reward” ratio in online poker.

A good way to play in these SNGs is to employ a “tight aggressive” mentality. While you do face the possibility of seeing some bad beats doing so, those losses can be mitigated if you stay the course. The blinds usually start quite low, so the conservative player will be rewarded down the road. Generally speaking, you can start out tight and then slowly become aggressive with premium hands. Chances are you’re sitting at a table with some causal players who want to make big splashes as well, so bide your time and wrangle them in. One of the staples of a SNG is that people will often pay any price to see a flop, regardless of what cards they’re holding.

Table position will play a big role in how you pull off this strategy, however. In early position, you should only play these strong hands. Later on, however, is your chance to occasionally loosen the reins. Middle-to-late positions are great because you can see what others players might be doing – maybe take a flyer on that low pocket pair or those suited connectors. Really, the middle-to-late positions are great for one thing: getting to see the action. You will get to see what kind of action your opponents take before you have to make a decision, and more importantly, what kind of pot odds you’ll be getting to see a flop.

All strategy aside, though, the real fun of a SNG is the spontaneity. If you’re into tournament-style poker but can’t handle a fixed schedule of events, the SNG is definitely the way to go. Blind structures encourage casual players and novices to get their feet wet in the world of online poker, which means anybody and everybody is truly welcome.

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>>Bodog Poker Review at PokerLabRat.com
>>Bodog Poker Reviewed and Rated at GoonersGuide.com

Compare Bodog Poker with other popular online poker sites that welcome USA based players

Here’s the latest tip from the team at FullTiltPoker.com. At last we’re getting some focus on ONLINE POKER tips as opposed to Live play tips (there’s a bit difference guys!)

When playing poker online, one of the most important pieces of information you can pick up on is the “timing tell.” Whenever one of your opponents gets involved in a big hand, you should always pay attention to how long it takes him to make his decision because it will often give you a clue about the strength of his hand.

Here’s an example of how important a timing tell can be. Let’s say you’re playing in a $1/$2 No-Limit Hold ’em cash game, and everyone folds to you on the button. You raise with A-8 suited, and the big blind calls. The flop comes 8-7-2, and your opponent quickly checks. You have top pair with top kicker, which is a very good hand heads up, so you check behind, hoping to get some value out of the hand on the turn and the river.

A 4 falls on the turn, and your opponent checks quickly once again. You bet $10 into the $14 pot. Previously your opponent has acted very quickly, calling and checking within a second or two, but now he takes his time making a decision. This should be like an alarm bell going off in your head, telling you that he has made a big hand.

After letting his time bank nearly run all the way down, your opponent decides to raise, but only for a small amount. This is another indication that he has a big hand and is hoping to get paid off, but it was the timing tell that should have tipped you off first. By taking so long to make a decision on the turn, he deviated from the normal timing of his actions. He was obviously thinking about much more than whether he should call, raise, or fold; he was trying to decide the best way to extract the most money from you. Now you know that your opponent has a big hand, most likely a set or a straight, and you’d be wise to fold.

Now let’s say you’re at the same table, and a player limps in under the gun. Everyone folds, and you have J-4 in the big blind. This isn’t much of a hand, but you should still take your time before checking. By acting like you are possibly considering putting in a raise, you are disguising the strength, or, in this case, the weakness of your hand.

The flop comes 9-6-3, completely missing your hand, but once again you should take your time before checking. If your opponent instantly fires a bet at the pot, that should tell you he was planning on betting no matter what the flop brought because he couldn’t possibly have had enough time to think about the flop and decide what he was going to do. Because of the speed of his bet and the nature of the flop, there’s a good chance your opponent failed to improve his hand, making this a good spot to put in a large raise. Even though you have nothing, there’s a good chance your opponent also has nothing and will fold.

Another timing tell you should be aware of has to do with the auto check/fold option. Players who use this option are giving their opponents information about the type of cards they’re likely to have and the way they play certain hands. By using the auto check/fold option, these players are telling you that they usually play their hands in a straightforward manner. Such players are more likely to play their hands based solely on the strength of the cards dealt to them, rather than taking into account all the other factors involved in a poker hand.

As important as it is to pick up on these timing tells when you’re playing online, it’s equally important to avoid giving off such tells yourself. Oftentimes you will know instantly whether you want to bet or call with a certain hand, but you should always wait a few seconds before acting. By doing this when you don’t have a hand you like, it will allow you in the future to take a little more time to consider the best way to play a hand you do like without tipping off your opponents.

It’s also important to note that some advanced online players will give off reverse timing tells in order to mislead their opponents. Therefore, before giving too much credence to an opponent’s timing tell, you should determine what kind of player he is, an inexperienced player who is genuinely perplexed by the decision he needs to make or a cagey professional trying to set a trap. (Note from Mike: Or he may just have an intermittantly cr*p Internet connection… it happens!)

ABOUT TAYLOR: Taylor Caby plays online at Full Tilt Poker as a High-stakes ring-game player. Taylor says he got serious about the playing poker in 2003 and immediately went to work building a bankroll by playing Sit & Gos. From there, he moved to low-limit ring games and, in less than two years, he was consistently winning at the 50/100 No-Limit Hold ‘em tables.

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