If you just started out to play poker, you can think poker is just a game of luck. But when you play more often and start reading some book from well-established poker players like “Ace on the River” from Barry Greenstein or “Power Hold’em Strategy” from Daniel Negreanu, you start to think otherwise.

Just last week I argued about it with a colleague of mine. He said that poker is pure luck.
So I started out giving him example after example to prove him that skill is more important than luck.
No matter what I told him he always came down to: “Yes, but you still where lucky you got the card you wanted, etc…”

So in the next week we played poker, I introduced an extra rule into the game I once saw being used on “High stakes poker” episodes. If you win with Seven Deuce (72) in your hand and show them, you get extra chips from every player at the table. But I didn’t tell him that this rule would prove to him that skill is more important than luck.

So we started playing hand after hand, nobody got the Seven Deuce hand. Then I saw a big raise pre-flop and immediately started thinking could he playing the Seven Deuce or does he have a big pair?
My hand was bas so I folded. The ‘luck’ guy called with a KJ suited. With a rainbow A49 flop, his king wasn’t good anymore. The other guy made a big raise and he folded his KJ. The guy who won the pot laughed and showed his Seven Deuce, cashing in some extra chips from every one of us and making my point clear. But I kept quiet, it wasn’t time yet to prove he’s wrong.

A few hands later another guy again won with Seven Deuce, not against him, but he did manage to bluff his hand.
The next day another 2 guys won with Seven Deuce. I just wanted to beat him myself with that hand and still said nothing.
The last day of the week, I finally got the Seven Deuce hand and faced myself playing him and another guy. So One of them had to go before the Turn-card. With AK2 on the flop and me on the button I raised big to get one of my opponents out of the game and letting them think I have an Ace or a king.
Success, me against the guy who believes poker is just pure luck. With another K on the turn, he made a small raise. I kept my cool, looked at him and didn’t put him on an Ace or a King. So I went All-in to try and bluff him out. He hesitated and started think the hand over, I raised pre-flop, I raised after the flop and I raised again after the turn. He looked at me and folded, showing his pocket jacks.

Before I showed him my hand, I asked him, “Hey, remember our little discussion about poker being luck or skill from last week?” He knotted his head and told me: “yes I sure do, why?”
“Well…” I said, “The hand I’m going to show you right now, proves which is why playing poker is clearly a game of skill!” putting my Seven Deuce on the table.
I also explained that by introducing that Seven Deuce rule, I could prove that no matter what you’re holding in your hand, you could bluff everybody out of the game. It’s just a mind switch you’ll have to make and don’t hope that your card will fall on the river.

You tell me, what do you believe, Skill or Luck?

PokerStars is celebrating a milestone, 40 Billion hands dealt!!!

And they’re celebrating it with you. They’re organizing great value tournaments and tons of exiting cash games. 

F40 Milestone hands

Poker players dealt in every millionth hand will win a cash prize of $40 for every VPP they earned in the previous 40 hands played on that table. Every player that’s dealt in will be awarded a VPP and the winner of the hand will get their cash prize doubled.
Example: Play at a $1/$2 table and get dealt into a milestone hand. PokerStars calculates that you have earned 31VPPs in the last 40 hands + the extra VPP = 32 VPPs. This means 32x$40 = $1280!!! If you win the hand it will be doubled to $2560!!!
And to top it off, at the time the 40th Billion hand will be dealt, all players will be awarded $400 for every VPP earned in the previous 40 hands.
Example: 32VPP x $400 = $12800. Win the hand and earn a whopping $25600!!!!

Multi-Table tournaments (MTTs)

F40:Sunday Million $4.000.000 guaranteed on February 21st, the biggest prize pool EVER, with at least $1.000.000 for the winner!! Buy-in $215
F40: $40 Micro Million $1,000,000 guaranteed tournament

A special F40 tournament takes place at 14:30 ET on Sunday, February 14. For a buy-in of just $40 you can play for your share of a guaranteed $1,000,000 prize pool.

F40: 40 FPP - $40,000 Specials

You can also play in a series of special F40 FPP tournaments. Each has a buy-in of only 40 FPPs and a prize pool of $40,000. Start times will alternate between 13:40 ET & 21:40 ET each day.
To register for the Sunday Million or any of the other F40 tournaments, open the PokerStars lobby, click ‘Tourney’ & ‘Special’.

Sit & Go’s

F40: Super Sit & Go tournaments

A series of 40-man Super Sit & Go torunaments will be helt 24/7 from February 14 till February 21.

F40: First Depositor Freerolls

Every player whit a first real money deposit on PokerStars using the code F40 will be awarded a ticket to all 40 of PokerStars free-to-enter tournaments with a $1000 prize pool.

Last Monday, I played my first WBCOOP 2010 tournament. No Limit Holdem with about 1500 participants.
At starters I was very careful to get my chips in as I first wanted to see how everyone was playing.
Starting with 2000 chips, I earned some 1000 chips extra in about 15 hands, but then I made a mistake leaving me with 1/3 of my stack. I didn’t panic, knowing it will get better later on. A few hands later I won my all in with pocket Queens, doubling me up and back to 1000 something chips 2 hands later when my pocket aces got broken by a set of 5’s.

But still very calm I pushed myself right into the top 50 before the first break was there. The ‘key hand’ that changed everything for me in the tournament was at the time I had 7800 chips and called an all in against AKs with my (again) pocket Queens. He didn’t pair his Ace or king and I even made a set on the river. Suddenly I was in the top 100 and climbing higher and higher in the ranking.

After the first break, there were still plenty of other bloggers left playing before we reached the 153 paying places. My game was one of the best since a long while, so I was very pleased and nothing could touch me. Before heading into the 2nd break I had placed myself into the top 10 and more importantly, I was playing the table.
After winning 3 hands in a row, with KK, AK and 37s (on the Big Blind), they seemed to be a bit afraid of me. The 3 7 hand was of course very lucky as I only had to check to see the flop. And what a bad flop for my opponent, 4 3 9. He must have had an Ace or something high to make a call pre-flop. So I made a bet, the size of 2 times the BB, he called. The turn was a 2, so again a bad card for him I was thinking. But He’d called my ‘bluff’ on the flop, so I checked this time, not wanting to lose more chips. When checked also and the river made me a 2nd pair with a 7, I checked, hoping he would make a bet. And he did . He committed half his stack to the pot in the hope to scare me off, but hell no I would fold 2 pair how this hand was played. I raised him all in, hoping he would see it as a bluff. He called and mucked his cards while searching for the exit.

From then on, every time I called or re-raised, most of them folded and most of the time only the BB called me, trying to protect their BB. Example, sitting in late position, I re-raised pre-flop “ times the BB with only holding 2 9o in my hands. Only the BB called my bluff and with a AKJ flop, I was very scared he could have paired. But on the other hand, the way he played the hands before I was 99% sure he had nothing and completely missed the flop, just as I did. So I played my position and made a small bet. He re-raised me and now I was actually really scared, but something told me he was bluffing me. I could lose ½ my stack to him if I raised him all in, but because I felt strong, I re-raised him to an all in. He took whole his Time Bank seconds to think over what to do, but at the end he folded his cards, leaving me with a monster pot. I climbed up to the 3rd place with still more than 370 players left.

After the 2nd break I got really tired, it was already 1AM where I’m living and I guessed it would take at least another hour to get into the money places.
I made a deal with myself to stop playing at 1:30AM as I had to work also a few hours later and was desperate for some sleep.
So at 1:30AM with 250 players left, I clicked the ‘Sit Out next hand’ checkbox and went to bed.
I was very excited to see where I finished at the time I got up, so before everything else I checked my PokerStars account to see the result.
I was surprised to see I finished on the 54th place, winning me a $16,5 SCOOP ticket.
On the other hand I was wondering what if I played out the whole tournament? The poker I was playing was very good and I was pretty sure I could reach the final table. But also 1 mistake could cost me the tournament before even reaching the paid places.

Conclusion, sitting out paid off this time. It wasn’t fun for me to do it, especially because I was standing 3rd at that time, but it had to be done.

Now up to the next WBCOOP event.
Did you play?

From starting my “From Zero to Hero challenge” in February 2009, I finally passed the $100 mark yesterday evening.

The $50 mark was passed in May 2009 and I hoped to double up in 2 months’ time. I guess I was wrong . It took me much longer than expected, but I had some other businesses to do that were a bit more important than playing poker unfortunately. But even then I didn’t reached the double up in 2 months.

What made it so hard this time was that I played more at cash tables and with that losing more. When playing freerolls, you don’t lose anything, you can only win. In cash games you better be sure you cash out at least the amount you spend to enter. And that’s a lesson I’ve learned to many times the last couple of months.
A couple of months back, I started playing more and more cash games and at first everything went really well. I had the $100 mark in sight with just a couple of cents left. But then in a $0,05/$0,10 cash game I got pocket jacks and lost to a set of 4’s on the river, losing $4 in one game.
It was the starter of a bad streak. The day after I lost a bit more than a dollar in 5 different cash games. The week after I only made profit in 30% of the cash games I played, but never enough to cover the losses.
I decided that it was time to stop playing for a while. I kept calling that it was bad luck etc… But never how I played. And that’s where the problem was. I was to confident and started bluffing the wrong way. Ok, sometimes it sure was bad luck and I definitely had some bad beats, but I was playing BAD, no doubt about that.
For a month I didn’t play at all, it was just what I needed, a little time of. (Hear me, sounding like a pro).
After that time-off I started playing safe and entered in the freerolls. And since then I’m also playing much better. It isn’t the fast money you would be expecting, but I was getting closer and closer to my goal.
Yesterday, with about $2 to go I played a $1000 and $5000 freeroll on PokerStars. In the $1000 freeroll, I won 0,85 cents and in the other I won $0,45 cents. So only about 50 cent left. And I was eager to pass that until now magical $100 marker the same day.

In a cash game on Full Tilt, I entered a $0,05/$0,10 cash game hoping to score the left cash. I waited for the big blind to really start playing, which gave me time to observe what I’m up to. With 4 games played I already won 20 cents. At the time I got AK suited (clubs) and in middle position, I raised 3x the BB to see only 1 player calling me. Flop was beautiful, although not pairing me, 9JQ with 2 clubs. I had a straight draw and a flush draw. My opponent checked and I made a 40 cent bet to get called again. If he paired, I needed a good card quick or I have to fold the hand. Luckily another spade (5) came on the turn, giving me the nuts. I could quietly sit back and figure out how many I would bet, not making him fold. He checked (as expected), I made a 20 cent bet, not too much to scare him, just enough to lure him into the trap. He called and when the river draws a 10 of hearts he made a 40 cent bet. I figured he made a straight now and I started thinking what amount of cash would make him fold or should I take the risk of re-raising and hope he would re-raise again? I could go all-in, but he definitely would fold then. So I took the bet and just re-raised him. He quickly went all-in to scare me. I called his all-in immediately. I won the hand and reached my goal!!!

Hopefully the next double up, to $200 will not take this long again

The WBCOOP returns for 2010!

It’s time for all poker-playing bloggers to put down the keyboard and mouse and get ready for action, because the annual PokerStars World Blogger Championship of Online Poker (WBCOOP) is back once again. This time round the seven-day event includes six preliminary tournaments, running January 25-30, 2010. The action culminates with the Main Event on January 31, and you can register for all of the events now. What’s more, the WBCOOP is completely free-to-enter for all verified bloggers.

Every year the WBCOOP gives bloggers from all over the world the chance to play tournament poker for great prizes. It’s the perfect way to challenge other poker writers, and compete to prove that you are the best in the business. This year you can win seats to the Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP)*, plus SCOOP Steps satellite tickets. We’ll also be awarding spot prizes during the event for the best live blogs and Twitter posts.

So if you have a blog that’s older than 2 months and regulary updated, you can join th eaction and try to win your seat. I’m alreasy registered, hope to see you there!