Poker Deposit Bonus

Theoretically, poker is a zero-sum game. Your loss is another player's gain. The total amount of money put into the game remains the same, it just gets redistributed as the game goes on. If ten players with $100 each sit in a game it is possible for one player to eventually win all $1,000.

But that's not possible when you play in a casino because of the "rake". The rake is a percentage of the pot that the casino takes out of each pot to compensate them for the cost of providing the dealers, chips, the poker table and all the other overhead. If you play long enough in a raked game, the house will eventually have all the money. Now, instead of one player winning the $1,000, the house will win the money, $2, $3 or $4 at a time. The house will have all of the money on the table in three or four hundred hands.
An excellent example of the impact of the rake on a game occurred when the President Casino opened in Biloxi, Mississippi in August, 1992. There was a $15-$30 and/or a $20-$40 Hold'em game nearly every day. The games were full most of the time and the rake was $5 maximum per hand.

In a big-limit game like that it was easy to build a $50 pot to qualify for the $5/10% max rake. Well, at forty hands per hour for an average of twenty hours per day, the house was taking $4,000 per day out of the game. That's $28,000 per week, per table. This money was lost forever and would never again be available to the players to put into the game.

Soon the game started later and later in the day, it broke up earlier and earlier at night, it began to be spread short-handed and eventually there weren't enough players with enough money to start the game at all. The same thing started all over again with a $10-$20 game and when there weren't enough players with enough money to keep that game going, the same thing started all over again with a $5-$10 game. By Spring 1994, they hardly ever had a Hold'em game at all. If they would offer a Hold'em game with a $2 maximum rake, they could fill every Hold'em table every day.

The rake is taken out of the winner's pot. Remember that every time you enter a pot you're exposing yourself to the house rake, the jackpot drop and the dealer's toke if you win the hand. You need to play pretty good poker to beat all that, and nine other players too.

• Poker – The Flop Part2 (0)
• Poker – The Blinds (0)
• Poker – Straddling (0)

Sometimes the player to the immediate left of the big blind, for example in a $l-$4-$8-$8 game, will put $4 in the pot before he even gets his cards. This is called a straddle and what he is doing in effect is raising the big blind $2 "in the dark." This raise has the effect of creating three blinds ($l-$2-$4) and does not count against the maximum number of raises allowed. When the action comes back around to the straddle he then has the option of raising himself and this time his raise does count against the maximum number of raises allowed.

This is what you should keep in mind when playing against a straddle:
• The straddle will have a random hand since he raised before he saw his hand. Statistically speaking, his median hand will be around a Q+ 6*. That means that half of his hands will be better than that and half will be worse than that.
• You should pass ordinary drawing hands such as J* T* and Qv 9* and play only premium hands.

• You should come in raising if you decide to play. The $4 straddle, plus your $4 raise will give you leverage to drive out the other players behind you and go head-up with the straddle. This will pit your excellent hand against the straddle's random hand and gives you the best chance to win the pot. If other players have called to see the flop, you should still be a favorite in the hand.

• If another player reraises behind you then you are usually facing a genuinely powerful hand and you should revert back to your usual strategy.
• Don't ever straddle the blinds yourself. You're just giving your money away for no good reason.

• Poker – The Blinds (0)
• Poker – The Flop Part2 (0)
• Forget About Poker Bluffing (0)