The original all in with any draw donkey, mexicans and mcnuggets

A few things:

-The other night I was re-reading a strategy book by a very famous and respected poker player, and I found some of his points very interesting. If you didn't know any better, you'd think it was written by some clown who loses at $5 online MTTs. Here are two choice excerpts...

"Every time a big pot comes up, I usually have the worst hand."
"If I've got any kind of hand, any kind of draw, I bet. If I get raised, I don't quit. I go ahead and get all my money in the pot, if it's a reasonable amount, knowing I probably have the worst hand and am an underdog to win the pot."

For those who haven't read Super System, that was written by Doyle Brunson, one of if not the greatest no limit hold 'em player of all time. It's funny because you often hear people rip other players, saying "most of these donks on PokerStars couldnt fold a draw or top pair if their life depended on it, blah blah blah". Yet here's Doyle Brunson, considered a great player by everyone, advocating playing draws very aggressively and saying how he's usually taking the worst of it in big pots.

Of course theres a lot more to Doyle's strategy, the key to it being "my opponents are afraid to play back at me because they know I'm liable to set them all in." So he picks up so many pots without showdown that by the time a big pot comes up, he's free-rolling with the all the money he won in small and medium pots. And of course when he does pick up a big hand, he gets paid off because of his aggressive image.

The point I'm making here is you can't judge a poker player solely by just looking at his odds of winning when all the money goes in before the river, because youre ignoring all the non-showdown pots. And since its hard to make a big hand in no limit, the non-showdown pots are the vast majority of the pots. So if you're wondering why you're having trouble making money despite usually getting your money in good, it could be because you're running bad, but more likely its because you're playing too nitty, not semi-bluffing enough, folding the best hand too often, and not getting enough value for your big hands. Everyone remembers the big pots when the cards are turned up, but theres much much more to the game.

- Tony Eusebio has started a blog, and so far its been very good. He does a great job of taking you through his thought process, and is always honest about his play. Check it out, just make sure to never bluff him if you see him at the tables, because he hasn't folded a pair in at least 6 months.

- I played two SCOOP events on Sunday, the $33 no limit and the $320 no limit. I was lucky enough to cash in both, but I only cashed for about double the buy in. The structures in the SCOOP events are fantastic and theres a ton of play. Between the great structures and the 3 different buy-in tiers, Stars has done an excellent job with this series, completely blowing FTOPS out of the water. Hopefully the guy who thought of having 3 different buy-in tiers has made his way out of the basement:



Thanks for reading,

George