Top 11 bad poker habits_the first three

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Mark | Poker Articles, Poker Strategy

We all have bad habits when we play online poker. Identifying the bad poker habits and putting them into writing might help getting rid of some of them. Therefore we have collected our own worst poker habits and put them into writing below. Feel free to share your own bad poker habits with the rest of the PokerBRB community. For your information the bad poker habits listed below have not been put into a prioritized list yet, we have great plans to make a poll on the PokerBRB forum to decide the exact order.

Bad poker habit number one: Throwing your chips away when you are low stacked

When you are low stacked in tournaments or SNG’s it is important to be very selective with the han hands you play. In general you are better off picking your hand to do battle with and then go all in. Simply calling with drawing hands will drain your chip stack even further.

Here’s an example from a speed SNG I played recently. Blinds are 100/200, I have 1300 chips and pick up J10 (clubs) under the gun. I haven’t had a playable hand throughout the SNG so suddenly J10 looks good and I call. A few other players also call until the last player to act (the button i.e. the player in the best position) raises to 600 (damn!). The small blind folds and the big blind calls. I also reluctantly call since the pot odds are good, but secretly I am already kicking myself for ending up in the position; I have 700 chips left and I am second to act in a raised pot with J10 (clubs). Of course I don’t hit anything on the flop and have to check then fold to the button’s continuation bet. A few hands later I am knocked out. I would have been much better off folding the J10 and waiting until I was in position to make a move.

Bad poker habit number two: Playing drawing hands out of position

Drawing hands such as suited connectors (89 etc.) are played best in position. It’s as simple as that. You want to see a flop as cheaply as possible and when you call out of position this is never guaranteed.

Bad poker habit number 3: Slow playing big hands preflop

If you don’t raise preflop with your big hands your opponent’s hand ranges are very large. However if you raise preflop and it is called you can narrow down the hand range and have some information about which hand your opponent might have. It will furthermore narrow down the number of opponents. It is not at all ideal to sit with AA against 4-5 opponents on the flop. The chances are a lot higher that somebody picked up a good hand.

Here’sa typical example of what could happen if you don’t raise preflop. You have been playing in game where you havepicked up 3 or 4 great hands just to watch everyone fold to your 5xBB preflop raise. You then pick up black pocket rockets in early position and decide to simply call hoping somebody will raise later. To your disgust 5 of your opponents just call, and the flop comes 367 (2 hearts). You bet the pot and get a reraise and two calls thrown back at you. You choose to reluctantly fold your AA and your three remaining opponents end up all in showing QJ (hearts), (45 offsuit) and 88; the player with QJ catches a flush on the river and wins the pot. With a preflop raise the players with 45 and QJ would have most likely folded. In conclusion, unless you have a really good read on your opponents you should not slowplay your big hands.’

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