Finally a Pro Deal!

I’ve been watching for years as some luck sack who gets his face on TV for two minutes gets an endorsement deal while I can’t get the time of day from the major sites. Finally a network has decided to bring in some serious online pros as well as a few old school players and build something new and I’m very happy to be a part of it. I am now a pro at the Poker Pros Network.

You should download the client – HERE – and drop by the tables and say hello.

I would love to hear your impression of the software and feel free to ask any questions you have as well, though I will only get serious about giving out free lessons at the tables after the .com site starts, I will definitely be willing to answer questions for players who download through my link when they stop by the tables. It’s hard to argue with free lessons right?

Thanks again to the Poker Pros Network for the opportunity to prove that online players can bring in more players than somebody who had 25 seconds of ESPN exposure and can’t play their way out of a wet paper bag.

New Poker Coach List

I have launched a new site with a list of quality poker coaches at foxpoker.com. The coaches are all people that I know can coach and play, and they are all sortable by game and category with the drop down menu on the right side of the page. Just find the game you want in the drop down menu and check the list of coaches that comes up for a poker coach that fits what you want to do.

Poker Coaching

If you know of a coach who you think should be on this list, have them send me an email with their qualifications, rates, games taught, contact info and type of lessons given and we’ll look in to getting them up on the site.

Blind Straddle Magazine is Live!

As many of you know I have been working on another poker project called Blind Straddle Magazine. We have the best names in the business writing for us, and the magazine has now launched. The first issue is awesome. Check out Lou Krieger, Bob Ciaffone, Jennifear, Mark Blade, and many others in the best online poker magazine around! Blind Straddle online poker magazine

Big News!

If you haven’t already heard, my site at pokerfox.net was bought by PokerXFactor. I’ve always liked PXF, and I’m very impressed with their hand replayer and all the technology they have at their disposal, so they will be a perfect fit for us. Hatfield and I get to play poker and by coaches while someone else does the web mastering. Perfect!

All of our rakeback stuff stays with us and moves over to pokerwhip.com

My Bankroll Builder Blog

This address has basically just become my lessons page, click on the links above for the info on those things. My actual blog is currently at pokerfox.net/fox Where I am currently taking a $200 bankroll up to $20,000. So far so good, things are going well, and you can drop by to see my results charted and graphed, along with guides on how I’m doing it and how you can do it yourself.

Finding that next level

Finding the next level of thought is one of the toughest things for a poker player looking to improve. A few quick words on how I perceive the levels of thought.

1. “I have good cards I raise” Very basic thought that doesn’t consider any of the finer points and will not make a nickel except at games where a nickel is all you can make.

2. “My opponent raised, he probably has good cards. I’ll fold my AQ” At least you’re thinking about your opponent and passing the AQ test, but this won’t make you any real money.

3. “This guy raises all the time from late position, I’ll reraise with my AQ” It’s good that you’ve noticed your opponent’s tendencies, but AQ is usually not hte hand to make this play with unless the guy is a constant thief and will fold to your reraise.

4. “There are four people yet to act, I only have AQo, and I certainly can’t stand a reraise. I’ll wait for a better time.” There ya go, that’s not a bad way to look at things. “This guy is short stacked and I’m ahead of his range of hands with AQ. There is only one player left to act and he’s tight, I’ll reraise to isolate.” is also a good example of solid thought processing.

5. “Hmm an early position raiser who is tight. I’ve seen him go too far many times now with big starting hands and I think he has a big hand now. I’ll see a flop with my pair of 4’s and if I flop a set I can probably win a big pot.” That’s good thinking.

The levels of thought can be incredibly complex, and these quotes are examples of fairly basic ways to see things, but they serve as good examples.

A New Beginning

Well I am just about tired of writing only what people pay me to write, so I’ll be using this space again. I hope to provide a little piece of poker wisdom every day, some of them very basic and some very advanced. Hopefully there will be a little something for everyone.

Today’s Nugget of Poker Wisdom –

If you are going to call a preflop raise with a speculative hand in no-limit hold’em, make sure the raise is a strong one. Calling a steal raise doesn’t do you much good because your opponent isn’t likely to pay you off well if you flop abig hand. If the raiser is under the gun you have a much better read on him and he is more likely to have a big hand to pay you off with if you outflop him.

Lessons info and a change in the blog.

Greetings,

This was my blog for a short time, but I now write a blog for pocketfives.com This page hosts all my lessons and stake agreement information. The links to those things are above this page. For complete lesson information see the Lessons page.

For information on the poker coaching site I run with Adam "Hatfield" Stemple (which is still just $50 a year but won't be for long) click Here.

I am not currently in need of a stake for cash games as I am whipping the 10/20 limit games and $600 no-limit games quite regularly and paying the bills just fine. I would however be happy to take a stake in some of the higher buy-in tournaments. For information on staking me in exchange for learning from me during the tournament you stake me for, or just as a good investment, see the Stake Agreements page. Feel free to email me at pokerfox@hotmail.com with any questions you might have if you are serious about a significant stake agreement. I wrote an article on stake agreements last year which was purchased by the twoplustwo online magazine and I would be happy to forward it to you if you need any help understanding the mechanic of a stake agreement so that we can set up something that is profitable for both of us.

The blog is back on P5’s!!

Pocketfives has made a special exception for me and my blog will be back on their site! A few months ago they did away with the blogs section because I was basically the only person writing on a regular basis, but now they are making a special page and giving me some ad time on the front page. From now on I will be writing at least every other day in that blog and this one will be reserved for the controversial stuff that P5’s might not want anything to with.

Here’s the link to my blog on pocketfives, where you will find around 50 previous posts, many of them much more in depth than what I have been writing here.

A game of skill

I know I said I was going to talk about the SAGE system today, but I just got done with something and I felt like putting it up. If anyone wants to reproduce this particular piece in it’s complete and unaltered form you don’t need to ask me before doing so as long as my name remains on it. In fact I hope the whole world reads it, though with the low traffic I’m still seeing on this blog It seems unlikely.

A Game of Skill –

The battle lines are being drawn brothers, and if we don’t arm ourselves and fight for our side we are going to lose. Conservatively minded folks all across America are slowly becoming more and more organized in the fight against the game we love. “Gambling” they call it, “A sin” they say, adding something about how it ruins people’s lives for emphasis.

Poker has a bad name with the people who tend to have the loudest voice. The conservatives, older people, religious zealots, all people who vote more often than we do and all people who are more likely to catch the ear of their local politicians. We have to be the louder voice because damn it we’re right! Feel free to use the example below to show the uninitiated around you how poker works and how it is no different than any other competitive activity.

Recently the popularity of online poker has caused a few people to seize on a few negative stories and an outdated image of poker as a “shady” game. A few of the more outspoken opponents have attempted to pass laws making it a crime to play the game online because it is “gambling” Roulette is gambling folks, poker is a game of skill, and I have an example below to help you understand how and why.

In this example we’re going to use a Scrabble tournament, but you could substitute darts, bowling, 9-ball, chess or even a chili cook off, they all work the same way. There are even video game tournaments big enough to support professional players these days and they work no differently than a poker tournament. The top players in leagues like this one – http://www.thecpl.com/league/ make significant incomes simply playing video game tournaments.

Whether it’s video games or chess, in these tournaments the competitors pay an entry fee, and the prize pool is paid out to the top finishers, just like a poker tournament. The more skilled competitors finish on top and get the lion’s share of the prize pool. Like any of these other activities there is no possibility of losing more than your entry fee in a poker tournament. Once you are knocked out of the tournament you can no longer play, and you can’t lose any more. Stories about people losing their houses in a big poker game are simply outdated. While it possible to lose great quantities of money in what we refer to as “cash games” that possibility is no different from playing the stock market.

Let’s look at the details in our comparison between a poker tournament and a scrabble tournament. Our example tournaments will be the 2005 National Scrabble Championship and the 2005 Empire State Poker Championship, both of which took place during August of 2005. These tournaments were chosen because they happened at nearly the same time and they are both fairly indicative of the majority of tournaments within their respective disciplines.

You can learn about the tournaments through these links –

http://www.cardplayer.com/poker-tournaments/tournament.php?tid=167

http://www.scrabble-assoc.com/tourneys/2005/nsc/prizes.html

http://www.scrabble-assoc.com/tourneys/2005/nsc/

In both of our example tournaments the participants pay a fixed entry fee and the fees go into a prize pool which is redistributed to the winners on a proportional basis. The winner of the Scrabble tournament actually took home a $25,000 first prize! The most skilled player does not always win, but the most skilled players have the best chance to win, whether it’s poker or scrabble the luck of the draw (in either tiles or cards) will have some effect on the outcome of the games.

In both our examples there is a little bit of luck involved in the short run, but if the tournament were played enough times we can expect the best player to win more often than any other. This is really no different from any sporting event or any recreational game. The team who wins the Super Bowl does not win every game all year, and often does not even hold the best record. Without an element of chance there would be very little interest in most of the forms of competition that we all enjoy at home or on television.

Would Senator John Kyl attempt to outlaw Scrabble tournaments? Does Rep. Jim Leach think the lottery is simply a better way to gamble? We may never know because they steadfastly refuse to answer any email I send them. In fact no one who is at the forefront of anti-poker campaigning or who is a sponsor of anti-gambling legislation has ever been willing to agree to a debate with me of any sort. Once they realize that I know what I’m talking about they flee for the fence like any good politician would do.

The anti-poker folks are operating on emotion, religion, and overzealous morality issues. When faced with logic they quickly back down or resort to bible verses or shouting. Occasionally throwing in a story about how someone lost their house because of a gambling addiction seems to make them feel better about their stance as well. The emotional pull of a broken family or a lost house is probably the best argument they have, so let‘s tear that one to pieces as well.

First of let me state that gambling addiction is a sad thing, and I have seen it myself first hand. I’ve also seen sex addicts ruin their families, and I have personally witnessed a family ruined because the mother spent hundreds of dollars a week on lottery tickets. She was just sure she had the right power ball numbers this time. Television, tobacco, the Internet, alcohol, sex, nearly anything can be blamed for an addiction, and the stories from those things are no less depressing than those of gambling addicts. Addictive personalities and mental illness can ruin a family or cost a man his home and his car, but the path he took is not to blame. A person on the road to ruin will always find a way to get there, no matter how many roads you try to block.

Thank God we live in America right? Where all those things are legal and the government doesn’t try to tell us that those things are too dangerous for us to make our own decisions about them. Of course poker has a bad reputation from one too many old westerns, and many people hold a belief that it is “gambling” and therefore evil in some ethereal way that no one can quite put their finger on.

I have put as much study and hard work into learning the game of poker as any Scrabble champion, basketball player, doctor or engineer, and I’m about tired of the negative attitude some people carry towards the way I make my living. I think I speak for all of us professional players and many of the amateurs when I say this. What we do for a living deserves just as much respect as any of those professions for the skill level and hard work that it takes to do it.

There are still many people in the world who believe poker is a game of luck and there is no skill involved. I can guarantee you that these people don’t win very often if they play at all. Anyone who believes poker is a game of luck is cordially invited to play me online at any time. A match can be set up easily and guaranteed fair by some of the most prestigious certification firms in the world. We’ll play a best of seven for the whole world to watch and anyone who believes poker is not a game of skill has no chance against me. Try me.

This is the land of the free and I couldn’t be more proud to be an American. In a land where lottery tickets (actual gambling, no skill involved) are sold on every street corner I would never have expected a contest of skill to be outlawed. Not here.

Regulate poker and make the tax dollars from it. Keep it safe and secure for your citizens who will do it whether it is legal or not. Prevent organized crime from getting a new foothold in this country the way they did when prohibition started. Do whatever you need to do, but for the sake of those of us who would be out of a job and out of a career –

Don’t Outlaw It!

Poker is a game of skill, keep it legal.

Chris “Fox” Wallace

P.S. Check out my poker coaching site at http://www.pokerfox.net