It seems that we here at Juicy Stakes Poker are in a tip giving mood. Actually, giving great poker tips puts us in a very good mood. We would like to continue the mood. Ergo, here are more great poker tips. Some are normal everyday tips stated in a different way and some are new even to us.
One thing we have learned is that there is no hierarchy in advice for poker players. So, the order in which these tips are presented has no specific meaning as to their importance or significance.
Be Generous to Your Opponents
In online poker at Juicy Stakes, you can communicate in the chat room. We advise never criticizing another player’s play, never berate them for calling with a poor hand, never tell them that they had no business winning a hand, and so on.
Generosity makes your opponents feel good and should make you feel good as well. Being generous in praise or in not criticizing does not mean that you don’t go after an opponent when the striking is hot.
Just be kind and generous - win or lose.
Poker is a Simple Game if You Don’t Overthink
However, overthinking is a common practice. Even the pros overthink. YouTube is filled with clips of good players thinking too long and hard about how to proceed on a hand.
If the bet is to you and a lot of money is involved, and you aren’t sure if the bettor has the nuts or is bluffing and the more you try to figure it out the more your head spins, that is a good time to fold and recuperate from the mental strain.
A lot of the tips we will present here come from the idea that players should neither overthink nor underthink. In Goldilocks terms, poker players should think “just right”.
Overthinking makes poker too complicated.
Practice Enough So That You See Your Opponents’ Possible Draws
Here we emphasize practice and developing a poker player’s imagination. No insight is too ridiculous. If you think that a player called with two unsuited low cards and hit the flop, then just maybe that is exactly what happened.
Pots are common; pocket aces are rare. If you don’t understand a hand, wait for the next hand. It will come very soon.
Play Few Hands
A lot of poker players, especially at low stakes where they might lose $100 or more but can easily afford to do so, play too many hands. If you develop a poker player’s imagination and you know which hands to play and which hands to sit out, you will also be able to see which hands a calling machine stays in that they should have folded. When you are in a position to make them pay to see another card, jump at the chance.
Fight for Pots You Should Win
This means betting largely when you feel quite secure that you have the best hand. The corollary is: don’t fight for hands that you might win or that you should lose. Finally, it is a sign of a good poker player in development to know when they should fold a hand and when they should bluff.
Always Look for an Advantage
There are many different types of poker players. As we said above, practice will make you better. One way it will make you better is in recognizing poker types.
The way to take advantage of an overly aggressive player or a calling machine or a generally very poor player, or a very good player, and so on, is first to identify their poker type. Taking advantage of a limper is different than taking advantage of an aggressive player.
You can, and should, take advantage of even good players. This involves simply feeling that they could not have called or raised with the hand that they most likely had to justify their early action.
If you ever reach that level, you will not need smoke and mirrors to win consistently at poker.
We have all seen YouTube clips of a world-class player who nevertheless berates opponents who should have folded and then won a pot that the other player felt that he should have won. We have also seen other players take advantage of him as he tilted. They laughed at him openly as he muttered to himself.
And they took his money as he stayed tilted for a while.
This was derived not only from his failure to understand opponents but also his uncharitable nature.
Understand That Most Hands are Not Good
Here we have two competing facts of poker life. One is that most hands are not good. The second is that if you are in the cut-off or under-the-gun positions, it might be to your advantage to bet strongly with a poor hand.
A lot of hands are won in this manner in these positions against limping players in early position who don’t really want to pay to see the flop.
Poker Skill Involves Seeing the Obvious
This skill is learned the hard way by most players who learn it. Some rare poker players are born to play poker. Most players never learn to see the obvious beyond the most obvious.
A lot of poker decisions fall into the obvious category. A lot depends on the skill level of your opponent, on your skill level, on the size of the pot, and your and their position, on their poker type and so on. Aggressive players bet on terrible hands. Sometimes a bluff is obvious.
The point here is that the obvious is never obvious until it is totally obvious.
Make Opponents Feel Uncomfortable
When you are playing poker, you probably are experiencing a kind of uncomfortableness. Try to make your opponents feel the same. This comes from raising the pot a large amount against a player who will think about it before deciding what to do.
Very aggressive players seemingly never feel uncomfortable. Look for ways to take advantage of what amounts to a major flaw in their poker play.
Juicy Stakes Works Overtime to Make You Feel Comfortable
We offer poker in a great online setting. We offer poker at so many stakes levels that every player can find the stakes that best suit their poker type and monetary situation.
We also offer a casino so players can leave the poker room and move over to the casino for some unwinding and general relaxing casino play. Poker and casino are in this way opposites. Poker is rife with tension as you try to figure it all out, while playing at an online casino should always be a great way to have inexpensive fun and entertainment.
One takeaway from the tips we have started to give here is that poker doesimitate lifein general, but not in all terms. We have more to say about poker, which we will get to in the next article.
