Crush The Game.com

What To Look For In Staking Poker Players

There is a great chasm between those who have money and those who know what to do with it.

While I may say that slightly tongue-in-cheek (and forgive me, I mean no offense), the truth is that it’s hard to make good staking decisions in poker. And while I am in no position to stake anyone right now, I do believe my experience with and observation of the world of staking in the past month has given me a little insight which comes from my unique (if I may declare so myself) perspective.

Here are a few things to look for in a poker staking candidate. › Continue reading

Tags: Bankroll, discipline, hold 'em, no limit, online poker, Poker, Staking

A Non-Poker Topic: Effective Value

The principle of Effective Value (FV) is this: a product’s worth is determined by the length of time using or deriving use from the product, and/or the amount of time spent gaining benefits derived from using the product.

Each unit of time is worth an amount of money. For simplicity’s sake, the lowest unit of time is 1 hour and it is worth $1.

Effective Value can be labeled as FV for short; as in e’F'fective ‘V’alue, so as not to be confused with EV (expected value – now common nomenclature in risk-taking communities).

A friend of mine bought a bag of candy. We were prowling around the town, hopping from bar to bar and he had the urge to buy a bag of “Red Dollars” from the convenience store. He bought the candy and enjoyed it. I, for the life of me, could not understand this purchase. It seemed so ineffective! I thought my money was much better spent on a cheap beer at the bar. But looking at these two purchases (his Red Dollars and my cheap beer) through the lens of Effective Value, I then saw that his purchase was ultimately more effective than mine. › Continue reading

Tags: discipline, General

Poker and God: Jesus Boosts My Winrate

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline. – Proverbs 1:7

As I gamble for my living wages, I have often been asked how I reconcile my profession with my Christian faith. I want to write this out so all know where I am coming from on the subject. I’m not going to debate if playing online poker is sinful. To some folks it will be and to others it won’t be. Honestly, many of the Christians who will talk about what is and isn’t sinful forget that everything we do is sinful. We do not live a split second without “living in sin.” › Continue reading

Tags: discipline, General, God, hold 'em, is gambling a sin, no limit, Poker

Online Poker vs. Live Poker

The teaching on this site refers to online play, but is 100% applicable live. The emphasis is on online play because for all poker players, but especially aspiring students of the game, online play is the proving ground. The players are indisputably better, and attempting to beat them will make you better. You can see 8 to 24 times the amount of hands you can see live – thereby giving you many years worth of experience in far less time. And situations are far more concrete. Meaning, your bias cannot influence statistics staring at you right on the screen. (I played for two hours with a friend – a good friend but poor poker player – at the poker table at the Four Winds Casino who claimed another player was raising “every hand.” The truth is, this player had raised 3 hands in 2 hours. My friend disputed this point, claiming this rather passive player was a “maniac” and a “donkey”. But there is no disputing a PokerTracker statistic.) › Continue reading

Tags: discipline, General, no limit, probability

The Biggest Picture

The goal of checkers is to jump all of your opponent’s pieces until he is vanquished from the board or he cannot make a move.  The goal of euchre is to take tricks.  The goal of chess is to take the king.  Poker’s goal is to get the chips.  But there is an incredible difference between the goal of a no limit hold ‘em cash game and a chess match in this fact:  The cash game goes on forever.  In a cash game, noone sits down, wins all the chips, and wins the game – game over.  The game is always going and you simply sit down for a period of time, play, then at your leisure stand up and leave.  Reading this from your computer, you are literally 5 seconds from a poker game.  In your home town there maybe several going on at this moment.  You join a game, play, leave, repeat another time.

› Continue reading

Tags: discipline, General, hold 'em, Macro-level, no limit

Introduction

Welcome to CrushTheGame.com.  I’ve created this site because I love the game of poker and I want to see its survival and evolution.  The goal of this site is to teach as many who want to learn how to survive, beat, and eventually crush the game – offering free, searchable, high-quality poker advice that stands above any existing poker-talk website.  In the early articles of this site, I will be discussing primarily no limit hold ‘em cash games (except where otherwise noted) due to the games’ immense popularity.  I am also affiliated with Full Tilt Poker, and will feature advice from their stable of professionals from time to time (although if the advice is ever misguided, I’ll add my 2 cents).

› Continue reading

Tags: discipline, General, hold 'em, Macro-level, no limit