Texas Hold’em Basic Terms
* Blinds: Short for "blind bets," these are the forced bets made before the cards
are dealt. In Hold'em, blinds take the place of the classic "ante."
* Burn Card: The card dealt facedown before any community card is dealt.
* Button: Nickname for the player acting as the dealer in current hand, or
the name for the physical dealer button used to denote the current dealer.
* Check: Similar to a call, but no money is bet. If there is no bet or raise,
the next player to act may check.
* Fifth Street: See River.
* Flop: The first three community cards dealt.
* Fourth Street: See Turn.
* Preflop: Anything that occurs before the flop is dealt is preflop.
* River: The final (5th) community card dealt; also known as fifth street.
* Showdown: When players reveal their hands to discover the pot's winner.
* Turn: The fourth community card dealt; also known as fourth street.
Texas Hold’em Basic Rules & Texas Hold’em Hand Rankings
1. The dealer shuffles the deck.
2. The two players to the left of the dealer (or the player with the
dealer button if there is a permanent professional dealer at
the table) pay the blinds, one small and one big.
3. Starting at the player on his left the dealer deals every player
two cards face down.
4. Starting on the player to the left of the big blind, the players begin
the first betting round.
5. The first player has the option to call, raise or fold.
6. Once the betting round is over, the dealer deals one card face down
(the burn card), and three face up (the flop).
7. The second betting round starts at the player to the left of the dealer.
8. Once the betting round completes, the dealer deals one card face
down, and one card face up (the turn).
9. The third betting round functions the same as the second betting
round.
10. Once the betting round completes, the dealer deals one final card
face down, and the final card face up (the river)
11. The final betting round functions the same as the previous two
betting rounds.
12. All players still in the hand enter the showdown, where the player
holding the best hand
at this point wins the pot.
13. The dealer passes the deck (or the dealer button) to the player on
his left,and the next hand begins.In Texas Hold’em, each player must
make the best five card hand they can using any
combination of their own two cards, and the five face up community
cards.
Texas Hold’em Starting Hands
Texas Hold'em has enough strategic concepts,
theories and equationsto literally fill hundreds
of books.Needless to say, you can spend as much
time as you would like reading and discussing
poker strategywithout ever repeating the same
topic twice.When it comes to learning the game,
it's best to start at the beginning.And making
money in No-Limit Texas Hold'em starts with the
hands you choose to play and when you choose to
play them.Even a "top 10 hand" can be the wrong
hand to play depending on the situation you're in.
One of the first things you learn on the road to being
a winning player is to play tight - that is,to only play
strong hands,folding the rest.The stronger your
starting hand, typically the easier it will be to play
the hand without error.Playing tight is absolutely
fundamental when learning toplay winning poker.
Unlike on the flop and turn, which you might only
find yourself playing once or twice an orbit,you're
making pre-flop decisions every single hand you play
.If you play too loose pre-flop, you're costing
yourself money every time you play a hand
you shouldn't.
Five Common Beginner Mistakes:
1) Playing too many hands before the flop...This is the biggest of them all. New players play far too many hands pre-flop. Play only the strongest starting hands which give you the greatest chance at winning the pot. The more hands you begin to play pre-flop, the more difficult your decisions will be post flop. The simplest way to minimize the number of mistakes you will make is to remove yourself from the situations in which mistakes are made.
2) Taking hands too far past the flop...This is an extension of the previous trap. Not only do most beginners play too many hands; they go too far with them. You need to evaluate the true strength of your own hand, against the likely strength of your opponents. Only if you can realistically believe you have the advantage should you continue with the hand. You need to understand that you will only be playing a very small fraction of the hands you're dealt, and you'll only see a river with a very small fraction of those.
3) Playing by feeling rather than by cards, situations and numbers...Many new players play hands because they have a "feeling" about them. This is wrong. Poker is a mathematical game: everything that can possibly happen boils down to odds. You play a hand because the situation dictates that in the long term, by playing that hand, you're going to make money. To understand this concept, you need to have a basic understanding of Hold'em Odds. For more advice on this, head to our Poker Odds strategy section
4) Letting your emotions get the better of you...Poker can be a stressful game. If you lose a couple of hands and start to let your emotions get the better of you, you're going to start making poor decisions. Every time you act based on emotion, rather than rational thought, you're making a mistake. If you're overwhelmed with any form of emotion, take a short walk, returning to the table once you're back to a neutral, relaxed state. For more advice on this, head to our Poker Psychology strategy section.
5) Thinking short term...A lot of players will make a correct play, lose the pot and second-guess themselves. They'll say, "Oh - I should have folded pocket aces because he ended up making a straight." This is wrong. If you get your money in good, it's the correct play, whether you win or lose. Your ability in poker is based on the decisions you make, not the end result of. Poker is a long-term game. You can make all the correct decisions and still lose; this is the influence of luck.
Live Poker Events
Although poker on the Internet has grown enormously over the last years, it doesn’t mean that people have stopped playing in live poker events; on the contrary. Live poker is bigger than ever and thousands of players participate in the large events every year: World Series of Poker (WSOP), World Poker Tour (WPT), and European Poker Tour (EPT). Here, we’ll take a deeper look into the biggest live poker tournaments.
WSOP - World Series of Poker is the grandfather of poker tournaments and started in the early 1970s – long before most people knew what a computer was, let alone Internet poker. Winning the WSOP Main Event is the biggest thing you can do in poker and it grants you a page in poker-history books. Poker Junkie provides WSOP news, articles about previous events, and guides you to the best WSOP satellite poker sites.
WPT - World Poker Tour is a major reason why poker boomed in the early 2000s; or more specifically, the televised WPT events. WPT is made up of a number of individual tournaments around the world. Players collect points in these events and at the end of the year, a WPT champion is crowned. This title has gone to poker celebrities such as Howard Ledered, Erick Lindgren and Daniel Negreanu.
EPT - European Poker Tour is, as the name implies, the European version of World Poker Tour. The first EPT tournament was played in 2004, and the buy-ins were a bit cheaper than in EPT’s sister tournament on the other side of the pond. In the last seasons, however, the stakes have been raised and EPT has finally received the recognition the tournament deserves.
* Blinds: Short for "blind bets," these are the forced bets made before the cards
are dealt. In Hold'em, blinds take the place of the classic "ante."
* Burn Card: The card dealt facedown before any community card is dealt.
* Button: Nickname for the player acting as the dealer in current hand, or
the name for the physical dealer button used to denote the current dealer.
* Check: Similar to a call, but no money is bet. If there is no bet or raise,
the next player to act may check.
* Fifth Street: See River.
* Flop: The first three community cards dealt.
* Fourth Street: See Turn.
* Preflop: Anything that occurs before the flop is dealt is preflop.
* River: The final (5th) community card dealt; also known as fifth street.
* Showdown: When players reveal their hands to discover the pot's winner.
* Turn: The fourth community card dealt; also known as fourth street.
Texas Hold’em Basic Rules & Texas Hold’em Hand Rankings
1. The dealer shuffles the deck.
2. The two players to the left of the dealer (or the player with the
dealer button if there is a permanent professional dealer at
the table) pay the blinds, one small and one big.
3. Starting at the player on his left the dealer deals every player
two cards face down.
4. Starting on the player to the left of the big blind, the players begin
the first betting round.
5. The first player has the option to call, raise or fold.
6. Once the betting round is over, the dealer deals one card face down
(the burn card), and three face up (the flop).
7. The second betting round starts at the player to the left of the dealer.
8. Once the betting round completes, the dealer deals one card face
down, and one card face up (the turn).
9. The third betting round functions the same as the second betting
round.
10. Once the betting round completes, the dealer deals one final card
face down, and the final card face up (the river)
11. The final betting round functions the same as the previous two
betting rounds.
12. All players still in the hand enter the showdown, where the player
holding the best hand
at this point wins the pot.
13. The dealer passes the deck (or the dealer button) to the player on
his left,and the next hand begins.In Texas Hold’em, each player must
make the best five card hand they can using any
combination of their own two cards, and the five face up community
cards.
Texas Hold’em Starting Hands
Texas Hold'em has enough strategic concepts,
theories and equationsto literally fill hundreds
of books.Needless to say, you can spend as much
time as you would like reading and discussing
poker strategywithout ever repeating the same
topic twice.When it comes to learning the game,
it's best to start at the beginning.And making
money in No-Limit Texas Hold'em starts with the
hands you choose to play and when you choose to
play them.Even a "top 10 hand" can be the wrong
hand to play depending on the situation you're in.
One of the first things you learn on the road to being
a winning player is to play tight - that is,to only play
strong hands,folding the rest.The stronger your
starting hand, typically the easier it will be to play
the hand without error.Playing tight is absolutely
fundamental when learning toplay winning poker.
Unlike on the flop and turn, which you might only
find yourself playing once or twice an orbit,you're
making pre-flop decisions every single hand you play
.If you play too loose pre-flop, you're costing
yourself money every time you play a hand
you shouldn't.
Five Common Beginner Mistakes:
1) Playing too many hands before the flop...This is the biggest of them all. New players play far too many hands pre-flop. Play only the strongest starting hands which give you the greatest chance at winning the pot. The more hands you begin to play pre-flop, the more difficult your decisions will be post flop. The simplest way to minimize the number of mistakes you will make is to remove yourself from the situations in which mistakes are made.
2) Taking hands too far past the flop...This is an extension of the previous trap. Not only do most beginners play too many hands; they go too far with them. You need to evaluate the true strength of your own hand, against the likely strength of your opponents. Only if you can realistically believe you have the advantage should you continue with the hand. You need to understand that you will only be playing a very small fraction of the hands you're dealt, and you'll only see a river with a very small fraction of those.
3) Playing by feeling rather than by cards, situations and numbers...Many new players play hands because they have a "feeling" about them. This is wrong. Poker is a mathematical game: everything that can possibly happen boils down to odds. You play a hand because the situation dictates that in the long term, by playing that hand, you're going to make money. To understand this concept, you need to have a basic understanding of Hold'em Odds. For more advice on this, head to our Poker Odds strategy section
4) Letting your emotions get the better of you...Poker can be a stressful game. If you lose a couple of hands and start to let your emotions get the better of you, you're going to start making poor decisions. Every time you act based on emotion, rather than rational thought, you're making a mistake. If you're overwhelmed with any form of emotion, take a short walk, returning to the table once you're back to a neutral, relaxed state. For more advice on this, head to our Poker Psychology strategy section.
5) Thinking short term...A lot of players will make a correct play, lose the pot and second-guess themselves. They'll say, "Oh - I should have folded pocket aces because he ended up making a straight." This is wrong. If you get your money in good, it's the correct play, whether you win or lose. Your ability in poker is based on the decisions you make, not the end result of. Poker is a long-term game. You can make all the correct decisions and still lose; this is the influence of luck.
Live Poker Events
Although poker on the Internet has grown enormously over the last years, it doesn’t mean that people have stopped playing in live poker events; on the contrary. Live poker is bigger than ever and thousands of players participate in the large events every year: World Series of Poker (WSOP), World Poker Tour (WPT), and European Poker Tour (EPT). Here, we’ll take a deeper look into the biggest live poker tournaments.
WSOP - World Series of Poker is the grandfather of poker tournaments and started in the early 1970s – long before most people knew what a computer was, let alone Internet poker. Winning the WSOP Main Event is the biggest thing you can do in poker and it grants you a page in poker-history books. Poker Junkie provides WSOP news, articles about previous events, and guides you to the best WSOP satellite poker sites.
WPT - World Poker Tour is a major reason why poker boomed in the early 2000s; or more specifically, the televised WPT events. WPT is made up of a number of individual tournaments around the world. Players collect points in these events and at the end of the year, a WPT champion is crowned. This title has gone to poker celebrities such as Howard Ledered, Erick Lindgren and Daniel Negreanu.
EPT - European Poker Tour is, as the name implies, the European version of World Poker Tour. The first EPT tournament was played in 2004, and the buy-ins were a bit cheaper than in EPT’s sister tournament on the other side of the pond. In the last seasons, however, the stakes have been raised and EPT has finally received the recognition the tournament deserves.
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