If you ask anyone at a Chicago Charitable Games event, or at the local casinos who knows me they will tell you that Pot Limit Omaha is my favorite game.  There is nothing better than getting twice as many cards as Texas Holdem, and there is a heck of a lot more play after the flop, and you rarely get the blind play of Texas holdem where you wait and hope for good hands.  In Omaha any hand can be a great hand.

With that being said I wanted to talk about an article I read a few days back about re-draws in pot limit Omaha.  This is what separates Omaha players from Holdem players.  In Omaha you can flop the nuts and actually be behind in the hand.  If you flop the nut straight, and your opponent flops an opened straight and flush draw, you are behind in the hand 55%-45%.  This happens when your opponent has all the drawing cards and your hand cannot improve.  Makes your hand tighten up a bit when you are betting pot, and getting popped right back (also a pet peeve when players say re-pot, its just another pot size bet) on the flop.  Thats when the beginning Omaha players stop and think what could he have that would constitute another pot size bet, and what should I do in this situation.  I always try to put my opponent on what I would consider a dream hand for the flop on board and then work backwards from there.  This means that in the hand where I flop the nut straight, I am thinking if I could pick four cards what would they be, and at that point that is what I give my opponent.  Then I have to decide what card can come on the turn and improve my hand OR what re-draws do I have?  If I have no re-draws (meaning I have the best hand I can make after the flop) then I am going to be careful making any more bets in this hand for two reasons.  Reason #1 for not betting anymore is that my hand cannot improve, and any flush or bigger straight card that comes out is going to make my hand second best, and me a big loser.  Reason #2 for not betting anymore is that my opponent might have flopped the same hand as me, but with bigger draws, which means at best I am getting my money back, and at worst he wins the hand because one of his draws hits.

Pot Limit Omaha is all about your draws and re-draws.  In Omaha the nuts change from Flop to Turn to River, and you can see it in the players faces who had the re-draws and who flopped the best hand and had to dodge two bullets (which could technically be half the deck) to win the hand.  The best hand on the flop will rarely be good on the river.  This fact is something that kills new Omaha players.  Especially when said newbie flops top set and bets it the whole way only to find out they got third in the hand, and a lot less bank roll.

Drawing cards, and having your hand fit to the flop and the possibility of straights and flushes, or the possibility of a full house is what makes Omaha players foam at the mouth when playing.  Sometimes your on the winning end of receiving those drawing cards on the turn and river, and other times you are the one trying to fight off all on comers in order to win the hand.  Either way Omaha is not so much about what you have, but what hand you can make.  As a good friend once told me in Omaha “build a pot, make a hand” (Johnny Draws).

Remember my fellow poker players that Omaha is a game that is played after the flop, and is determined by what hands you can make, not what you have. Playing Omaha and flopping hands that have no chance to improve is like playing a game of Russian Roulette by yourself.  No one else is going to eat that bullet for you, and you are eventually going to take one to the head.  So please please please play hands that have at least a possibility to improve, and remember that two pair, sets and the sucker end of straights and flushes are rarely good in Omaha.

As a poker player we all should want to get the most amount of hands as possible.  A dealer effects the game very much, and how fast the dealers can get those hands out to players and push those pots out really helps.  But there are lots of factors that players can control that will help speed up the game.

• Using the largest denomination chips to call the blinds and bets while in the hand – when someone raises to $1000, use one orange chip, and not 5 black and 1 purple.  The dealer can’t burn the turn until the pot is correct, so the faster you can get your poker chips in the pot the faster the dealer can continue on with the hand. It never fails when you see poker players in the small and big blind call the blinds with the smallest denomination possible.  When the blinds are $25 and $50, then use those green chips for the blinds… But when the blinds are $300 – $600, don’t call the small blind in all $25 Green chips, and the big blind with a few black and a ton of green.  The reason for this is that it slows down the game, when players use the smallest denominations the dealers have to count more chips to ensure the pot is correct, and players take longer to count out bets when placing their bets.
• Keep your poker chips in an orderly fashion – it is easier to count out bets when your chips are in stacks of 2o.  This way when a bet of $20,000 comes out you can easily count out your call, and you will not slow down the game when a player has to count out their chips to call or place a bet.
• Pay attention when it is your turn to act – poker players are famous for when a big bet comes out, and everyone gets quite because there is a lot of action on a hand, everyone is waiting on pins and needles, and after a good 30 to 40 seconds the dealer says sir it is on you and the poker player responds with “oh is it on me, I fold”.  So make sure you do not space out until you have already checked your cards and you have folded, this will dramatically increase the amount of hands that you will get in each round.

These are just some of the ways that poker players can help keep their game going faster, so that we all can get more hands in an hour.  The more hands we all get in the more poker we get to play and the more we will learn in a shorter period of time.  If you have any questions no how to not be the slow player at the table please feel free to email Events@chicagocharitablegames.com for more informaiton.

Remember if you have a poker tip or subject that you would like to hear more about please contact Chicago Charitable Games and let us know.  If your topic becomes a CCG Poker Tip, you will win a FREE Deepstack Seat worth up to $190.  So send us those poker questions, tips, or strategies!

Had it with bad players making bad calls and ruining your poker game?  Well don’t tell them how bad of a play that was! Like the pros say:

” Don’t tap the tank and scare all the fish!”

Every poker player has had his or her aces cracked by some idiot who called a huge bet from out of position and cracked your monster with two stupid cards that he had no business playing.  The worst thing you can do after a terrible beat is to berate the other poker player for how bad they are.  The reason for this is you do not want the other player tightening up at the game, hanging on to your money, or influencing other players into not making bad calls like he just did because they are afraid you will lay into them.  Let that fish call those huge bets you make, that he/she has no business making, in hopes of winning your money back and then some from the fishy.

I personally never want to make another poker player feel bad at the table because 9 times out of 10 that player is going to do one of a few things:

1. Leave the table – you do not want a big juicy fish fresh from his basement home game money to leave your table, especially if he just cracked your monster with a total garbage hand.
   
2. Tighten up his play – most players when they are embarrassed are going to play much much tighter and stay to themselves.  There will not be a bunch of chit chat and the guy is going to go from super fish, to super nit.  Plus he might cause other players to tighten up and not make bad calls like super fish just did.
   
3. The guy follows you to the parking lot to beat the crap out of you for making fun of him in front of the entire table – worst case scenario

The moral of this blog post is not to upset the players that are holding onto your money.  Berating another poker player at the table will not give you any advantages, and it most certainly will have negative effects.  I suggest using some of these techniques to get what you want from bad poker players.

Give a compliment or two:
Any poker player who wants to be successful wants to play with bad poker players, and you want those players to play as poorly as possible.  Being genuinely nice to other players will always work to your advantage.  Complimenting another poker player on a big pot, or well played hand is a great way to earn the other players trust, and it will brand you as the nice guy at the table.  And no one wants to take the nice guys money, or at least less than the table jerk.  But be careful to not sound insincere when complimenting your fellow poker player, the worst thing you can do is say nice hand after you take a bad beat.  Everyone knows you are basically saying the poker equivalent as giving someone the middle finger in traffic.  So be nice to the bad poker players, they will always pay you off and they will love you for it.

Don’t Teach or Preach to the table-
Do not discuss previous hands or high level poker strategy when you are sitting at the poker table.  There is a time and a place for hand analysis, and playing at your local charity poker room, or casino is hardly the place to talk about strategy.  There is no reason to point out how much you know about poker to the other players at your table.  All this does it teach the bad players at your table a thing or two, and make you look like a narcissistic jerk who talks to much about how great he is at poker.

Be the crying shoulder-
When bad poker players loose a hand, they always perceive it as a bad beat.  “dude I was playing cash the other night and my aces got cracked by 89off”  What the bad player doesn’t say is that he limped into a multi way pot with his aces and got drawn out on when the flop hit 89 in the face.  Remember don’t teach at the table!  Don’t tell your new poker buddy that he should have raised pre-flop to reduce the flop seers down, console him.  Tell him that you cannot believe that happened, and you can’t believe how bad that sucked.  Let the bad poker players continue to believe that they are getting unbelievable bad beats and let them continue to be bad players.

The bottom line for this poker strategy post is to remember the golden rule in poker:  “Don’t tap the tank”.  Poker players spend more time than any other hobbyist on learning this game, don’t just give your knowledge to other poker players without at least winning money off of them.  Remember that you should always be perceived as the nice guy, not the calculating shark that you are!

This is the first of many poker playing tips, and poker strategy blog topics from your friends at Chicago Charitable Games.  If you have a tip or a particular strategy topic that you would like to learn more about, or that you want to share with your favorite charity poker experience feel free to email CCG at Events@chicagocharitablegames.com or post a reply to one of our poker blog posts.