Maximizing marginal top pairs
In December of 2014, I had the pleasure of traveling to Prague for both the World Poker Tour and European Poker Tour events. Compared to the players in the United States, European players are generally much more aggressive. The following hand, from a €1,000 buy-in event, beautifully illustrates how to take advantage of these aggressive players without opening yourself up to losing a bunch of chips when they happen to have a premium hand.
…
Maximizing marginal top pairs Read More »
Sometimes your opponents allow you to win a pot by making a clear mistake. I recently played this hand in a $1,500 preliminary event at the WSOP. A player who had been fairly aggressive from late position raised to 1,600 out of his 35,000 stack at 300/600-100 from the cutoff and a loose, passive, weak player with 40,000 chips called on button. …
Since top pair is the most common “value” hand you will make after the flop, it is important to fully understand how to play it. Despite the frequency with which you make top pair, most amateur players misplay this holding on a regular basis. It is important to realize that all top pairs are not created equal.
In poker, and most other games, there tend to be three types of players. In this article, I am going to tell you how to give each of them what they want so they will eventually give you what you want.
