Poker Chip's Poker Blog

Fantasy Sports Live Daily Contests

2007-06-27T04:49:00.000-07:00

Okay, this isn't poker related, except that I found a link to this site on another poker blog and the blogger was calling this "the new poker". The site is called Fantasy Sports Live, and it's basically a place where people who don't have a full season worth of time to play fantasy baseball can play for just a day in a variety of contests. This site is very cool. Basically these fantasy sports contests are like sit-and-go poker tournaments. Even the buy-in prices are similar.

So far I've placed in 2 of 3 contests, and I'm down $2, but since I got $30 as a signup bonus, I'm still up $28 total. If you're someone who likes sports and being in action, then this is something worth checking out.

Use bonus code "COWBOYS" to get free money ($30!) in your account.

Another cool thing about their site - they take PayPal!

Poker Strategy Thoughts and More Random Stuff

2007-06-24T09:11:00.000-07:00

I haven't posted in a bit, and this post doesn't contain much but some random poker dribblings frmo my feeble mind. I've got a couple of new poker strategy articles available at my new website here:

Enjoy.

Eye on Gambling also published some interesting stuff about Bill Chen being accused of collusion at the WSOP. I think it's nonsensical. Deals like this happen all the time at lots of poker tournaments, and the officials said it was fine. EOG tries to get extra press by being the National Enquirer of the gambling business, which is probably okay if you're into that sort of thing. I'm not, so I'll mention the article here, but I'm not linking to it.

I played in the Full Tilt Poker Fifty Fifty tournament last night. I placed 850th, and I went out with AQ preflop. Got all in against JJ and didn't improve. Probably not the best way to play AQ that early in the tournament, but what the hell. I thought everyone else would fold. (One of the other players had AQ too.)

Shirley Rosario's poker journal made me laugh the other day too, where she said that Steve Badger's "patience for poker and poker players is very thin. He can usually only handle one event before he is ready to go back home."

You would almost think Steve's a bit curmudgeonly.

Poker News is the place to get real time updates from the WSOP, by the way. Check it out.

A Good No Limit Holdem Session Today

2007-06-06T10:32:00.000-07:00

Played for 50 minutes, 2 tables, at Full Tilt Poker at the $0.10/$0.25 no limit holdem tables, six person max. Won $43.45. Definitely running hot lately. Got some great cards dealt to me too.

Learning to Play Pot Limit Omaha/8 - My Win Rate

2007-06-05T21:04:00.000-07:00

I've been learning to play pot limit Omaha/8 over at Full Tilt Poker, and I like the game very much. I spent 2 hours tonight on the six person tables playing $0.10/$0.25 pot limit, and I won a total of $59.15, so my hourly win rate for the evening is approximately $29.60. (And yeah, I know that 2 hours doesn't mean a thing, and that I need a LOT more hours to draw any conclusions about my play.)

But...these do seem to be the kinds of results I'm seeing pretty consistently. Lots of players sitting down short stacked. In fact, I don't think I can recall seeing more than 1 player tonight with a bigger stack than $10. I've been buying in for the full $25. My guess is that at this level these guys are still trying to learn how to play, and so they're not risking much of their bankroll.

I told Steve Badger I was learning to play Omaha/8 tonight, and he seemed amused. (I think he's more amused that I'm wasting my time on that than on building my new poker website than anything else.) Anyway, believe it or not, that was one of the first times I've ever actually discussed poker with Steve; we almost always talk webmastering and SEO when we speak.

Mondays at the Hoy and Omaha 8

2007-06-04T21:33:00.000-07:00

Iggy invited me to play in the "Mondays at the Hoy" tonight at Full Tilt Poker. It's a $24 + $2 tonight. I placed 16th out of 45 or so, but I don't feel bad, cuz it was a blogger tournament, and those guys know how to play poker better than I do. (For some reason I still don't think of myself as a real poker blogger, even though I've had this blog up for a few years now.)

I've been learning how to play Omaha/8 lately, and I'm really enjoying that, mostly because I'm winning. In fact, I didn't do any work on my new poker site today because I've been so busy actually playing some poker. When I haven't been playing poker, I've been reading Steve Badger's site about Omaha strategy.

I've got a copy of Super/System 2 here, and I've heard that Bobby Baldwin's section about how to play Omaha/8 is pretty good, so I'm going to dig into that a little bit before I go to sleep tonight. I ordered 2 books about Omaha/8 over at Amazon today too. They should be here tomorrow. (The books are Winning Omaha/8 Poker and High-Low-Split Poker, Seven-Card Stud and Omaha Eight-or-better for Advanced Players. That latter book might not be a good one for me, since I'm not what I'd consider an "advanced player", but I'm looking forward to reading it anyway.

The Omaha/8 games are super soft at Full Tilt Poker, IMO, at least at the levels I'm playing. I'm mostly at the no limit and pot limit tables with the lower buy-in's, but I'm way profitable so far.

I Suck At Poker

2007-04-29T12:26:00.000-07:00

I haven't been able to place in a sit-and-go for over a week now.

I suck at poker.

Tony G Busting Ralph Perry - Intercontinental Poker Championship

2007-01-28T08:45:00.000-08:00

This was one of the most amazing displays of trash talk I've ever seen at a poker table. It was kinda like an automobile accident; I just couldn't look away. No way do I have the kind of trash talking skills that Tony G. demonstrates here.

Low Limit Holdem Rules

2006-11-29T08:18:00.000-08:00

I've been playing in the low limit holdem games at my online poker room of choice lately, and when I say low limit, I'm talking about $1/$2 limit Texas holdem. The games rule! I won $40 in about 40 minutes last night, playing 2 tables and reading articles on other websites while playing. The players online at this level will call you all the way down to the river on any kind of hopeless draw, and so far top pair or overpair has won almost every showdown except for one last night, where the villain hit his flush draw on the river.

Anyway, I'm playing the lower games for a couple of reasons. One is that I'm just not a good enough player to play much higher limits than this. The other is that my bankroll is short now, because I cashed almost all of my poker bankroll out after they passed UIGEA.

Lots of poker busts going on in Dallas lately too. You can read about that over at Pokerati. While you're at it, go check out Iggy's NEW poker blog too. (Even though I don't think he's written much about the Dallas poker busts.) I don't even play at the underground rooms here in Dallas any more. Oklahoma is just too close, and the cops won't mess with me there.

Blackjack Websites

2006-05-13T16:14:00.000-07:00

Here are some blackjack websites that I can recommend. I'm a big blackjack lover, in fact, I started playing blackjack before I took up poker. I definitely would consider myself a poker player first and a blackjack player second now, but the soft spot for the game of 21 is still there.

Blackjack Info by Ken Smith is the coolest blackjack site on the web, and it includes a basic strategy generator where you can input the casino conditions and the site will spit out a customized basic strategy chart that's perfect for your situation. He also operates a cool forum about blackjack tournaments.

This is a cool new site about blackjack strategy which shows a lot of promise. The young man who's working on this site is really putting a lot of effort into it, and I'm expecting big things, even though the site isn't finished yet.

I've got a site I helped work on with some cool blackjack articles too. Like the blackjack strategy article I mentioned above, it's not quite finished yet either.

Blackjack Palace is a pretty complete blackjack portal too, with information about the history of the game and how to play, along with some recommended online blackjack casinos.

Blackjack Professor has some recommendations for online black jack casinos too. Be sure to check him out also.

Casino Gambling Websites

2006-05-13T15:59:00.000-07:00

This blog is mostly about poker, but a lot of poker players are into casino gambling too and love casino games. So I've got some recommended sites here related to online casino games and online gambling for your surfing pleasure:

My favorite site for casino game strategies is this one, because it's so well-designed and easy to navigate. This is the best site I've found for learning how to play online slots and online blackjack. Worth checking out, for sure.

If you're interested in online casino gambling games, then Casino Geek is a site not to be missed. Not only is the site full of cool information about where to play, but it also includes information about how to play and how to best take advantage of the casino bonuses and comps that are available on the internet.

If you're interested in hunting casino bonuses and taking advantage of casino comps, a great guide to online casinos and free casino bonuses can help get you started. Generous Casinos is one of the oldest and most well-respected bonus guides online, and for good reason. The author is reliable, the site is user-friendly, and the information presented is useful.

This online gambling guide includes a detailed description of Golden Palace and also recommends some other online casinos at which to play. The site also features strategy for different casino games and rules for some casino poker games.

Probably the best designed and easiest to look at site, as far as gambling guides go, is Choice Gambling, which is also full of solid information that any online gambler is going to find interesting. Whether you want to find an online casino, a sportsbook, a poker room, or a bingo hall, Choice Gambling has got the information you're going to want to review before making a decision about where to play.

This is another great guide to online casino poker, as well as other casino games and issues. OnlineCasinoReviewer includes reviews of online casinos and a forum where players can compare their experiences at some of the different casinos. The site also features recommendations related to Las Vegas casinos and a section for aspiring gambling webmasters.

If you're looking for a really straightforward way to pick out your next casino at which to play, then be sure to visit Online Casinos Ranked. It's a simple site, consisting of a list of casinos ranked and rated by a team of professionals who know all about what to watch for when choosing an online casino.

Casino Gypsy is also a neat online casino guide, with an especially good list of casino bonuses you can take advantage of. They also feature casino game tips for every casino game imaginable, from slots to blackjack.

These gambling forums are pretty cool too, especially the section with the casino recommendations. Definitely a good site to check out.

And if you like roulette, then this site will give you the lowdown about how and where to play roulette online.

Slots Websites

2006-05-13T15:48:00.000-07:00

Here are my recommendations for some cool websites about slots and slot machines:

Slots Hero Online - One of the biggest and riches sources of information about slot machines I've ever seen.

SlotTips.com is one of my favorites for slots and online slot games. Not only is the site beautifully designed and easy to read, but it's loaded with cool information about where to play slots online.

One of the oldest and most reputable guides to online slots is Slots Mania. You won't find much of anything about traditional brick and mortar casinos on this site, because the information is exclusively related to online slots and online slot machines, but man, is it comprehensive. It doesn't matter what kind of online slot game you're looking for, you'll be able to find it faster at Slots Mania than on any other slots website.

Slots Palace is another cool guide to online slots and online casinos.

Slots Patrol consists exclusively of recommendations for places to play online slots. Like Slots Mania, you won't find anything here about playing slot machines in a normal casino, but there's plenty of good stuff about online casinos here.

This website about slot machines is a little more diverse - there is plenty of information here about online casinos and online slot machines, but there are also articles about playing slots in Vegas, slot machine cheats, and news from the world of slot machines. It's a cool site with a lot of high quality content.

Slots Queen is another online slot machine guide, with details on where to find 3 reel slots, 5 reel slots, bonus slots, and more. Very cool, and very well designed.

Slots Jam is another cool slot machine website that focuses mostly on the online slot machine aspect of the subject. Worth checking out.

Video Poker Websites

2006-05-13T15:36:00.000-07:00

I've got too many recommended sites in my sidebar, so I'm going to move some of the into some posts on the blog and then just link to those posts. That should make the sidebar a little more user-friendly, and it will be easier for folks to find what they're looking for in the recommendations too. This is the first in that series of categorized recommendations, the video poker sites:

Video Poker Player is the first recommended video poker site on the list. The site has full details about the game of video poker, including a short history of the game. That information is followed by instructions how to play and an analysis of some of the different online video poker games available, like Microgaming, Realtime Gaming, and Playtech.

Video Poker St is another site similar to the first, full of information about online video poker and online casinos, especially. The site is well-designed and it's easy to find the information you're looking for there.

You can also learn how to play video poker at Video Poker School. Great info about where to play online, how to take advantage of online casino comps, and a video poker tutorial are included.

Video Poker Treasure focuses almost exclusively on recommending good online casinos at which to play video poker. The casinos recommended there are all solid, reputable places to play.

Finally, if you're looking for information about video poker strategy and video poker games, you might really enjoy this new site, Video Poker 365. Lots of unique and high quality video poker content available there, including an interview with Jeff Lotspiech, who launched one of the first video poker websites on the internet a few years ago.

Video Poker 247 is another cool site about video poker that's refreshingly light on the flashing casino ads and has lots of basic information about how to play.

How to Beat the 6 Max Texas Holdem Tables

2006-05-11T17:02:00.000-07:00

I found a really cool site today, with a cool narrow focus: how to beat 6 max Texas Holdem games. The site starts off with some pretty basic information, like poker rules and poker odds, but then gets into specific strategies for play at all stages of the game, preflop, on the flop, on the river, on the turn, etc. They also offer a ton of recommended reading links in each section, which is extremely user-friendly and helpful. Very cool poker site, and it's also not loaded up with a ton of affiliate advertising links either. Strong on information, low on advertising; that's a winning combination in my book.

I Placed 114th in an Online Poker Tournament

2006-03-14T11:14:00.000-08:00

I played in an online poker tournament last night with over 1060 players and placed 114th. I felt pretty good about that. I've actually played in this particular Monday night tournament quite a few times and never made it into the money before, so I was particularly excited about last night's showing.

The hand I went out with was QQ. I re-raised all-in against a loose aggressive player from late position, and he called me with KK. If I had it to do over again, I'd probably play it more or less the same way, to tell the truth. He'd given me every reason to think he was misrepresenting his hand, since he'd raised preflop about twice out of every 10 hands he'd been dealt for the previous 30 or 40 hands or so.

Finally a showing in an online poker tournament where I can feel really good about how I did. I don't feel like I made any mistakes at all in last night's tournament, although I think I MIGHT have played a little too tight.

8 Reasons I Want to go to Camp Hellmuth

2006-01-11T18:54:00.000-08:00

I've been over at the Camp Hellmuth website, and I'm reading more and more about the upcoming poker fantasy camp, so I thought that today, for my Phil Hellmuth post, I'd post a list of reasons I want to go to camp with Phil.

1- Phil Hellmuth- I was reading some reviews and news articles about last year's Camp Hellmuth, and someone called Phil the "Tony Robbins" of poker. I enjoyed the hell out of the last Tony Robbins seminar I went to. That, and I really like Phil Hellmuth.

2- Tournaments - The event includes several actual live poker tournaments, including a tournament where you can win your way into the World Poker Tour event in Aruba.

3- The Ultimate Bet Heads Up Challenge - Phil Hellmuth and Thomas "Thunder" Keller will play a heads up poker match from different rooms at Ultimate Bet, and explain why they're doing what they're doing as they play to the audience. Very cool.

4- TJ Cloutier - He'll be giving a talk about tournament poker and how to get to the final table. A gentleman I'd love to meet, and I'd enjoy getting some direct poker advice from him.

5- Antonio Esfandiari - "The Magician" will be talking about how to become a more aggressive player. Some of my buddies think I should probably avoid this seminar because I'm already too aggressive.

6- Joe Navarro - He's from the FBI, and he's giving a talk about body language and tells. According to the official site, Phil Hellmuth was taking notes during his talk last year. Reading tells is one of my weakest skills, although I've improved since I started paying attention to it.

7- Banquets and Cocktail Parties - They're having banquest and cocktail parties along with the seminar events, so you actually get to network with Phil Hellmuth and other poker players.

8- Cyndy Violette - She's a cute one. Really cute.

I probably won't make it this year, but you never know. There's still time to change my mind.

2 Poker Hands

2006-01-11T18:40:00.000-08:00

I'm going to tell a story about 2 poker hands I played tonight. One made me very happy. One broke my heart. Both were pocket kings.

I was playing in a Pacific Poker freeroll that was being sponsored by my favorite poker strategy forum. I was playing very patiently and waiting for cards.

I get pocket kings. A raise from one person, a re-raise from another. I go all-in. One person calls me with KQ, and the other person folds, and I double up.

The VERY NEXT HAND I get dealt pocket kings again. A bet in front of me, followed by a raise. I go all-in. This time the guy next to me has pocket aces, and hits an ace on the flop knocking me out of the tournament.

Not really a bad beat story. Just a story about 2 poker hands, one of which made me very happy, and the 2nd of which broke my heart.

2 Cool New Gambling Poker Blogs

2006-01-11T07:59:00.000-08:00

I got a really nice comment yesterday from Freddy Vegas, who said some nice things about my blogging. This thrilled me more than you might think, since I've never considered myself to be the greatest poker blogger in the world. (Except in my most secret of dreams, where I am surrounded by fabulous buxom women who all want to be my lovers because of my outstanding poker blogging skills.)

Anyway, ran over to his profile to check it out, and he's got a couple of cool new blogs going on. Worth checking out:

Las Vegas & Other North American Points
The Poker Professors (This one is apparently a team blog, co-written with "jungle jim".)

Anyway, good luck to both Freddy Vegas and "jungle jim" with their blogs. (Maybe I should add those to my article about 558 cool poker nicknames?)

3 Recent Phil Hellmuth News Articles

2006-01-10T07:46:00.000-08:00

As part of my ongoing Phil Hellmuth features, I'm posting links to 3 recent news articles about Phil Hellmuth:

1- MSNBC - Phil Hellmuth has Become a Hot Commodity - All about how busy Phil Hellmuth Jr. has been since he won the National Heads-Up Poker Championship. Looks like, among other things, the Poker Brat might be promoting his own clothing line at Wal-mart. THAT's success, ladies and gentlemen.

2- Luxist - Camp Hellmuth - Luxist is all about the luxury lifestyle, and I guess there's some overlap with Cardsquad when it comes to Hellmuth's poker camp. All about how you can spend $1999 and spend a few days with the greatest no limit holdem player of all-time.

3- LA Weekly - All In With the Bad Boy of Poker - I might have posted a link to this one already, but I'm posting another one because it's such a damn fine article.

Also, not really an article about Phil Hellmuth Jr., but a personal note: I received my copy of Kill Phil the new poker tournament strategy book that elaborates on David Sklansky's all-in or fold tournament strategy chapter in Tournament Poker for Advanced Players. The book indicates that it's about how to beat any of the various "Phil's" in poker today, but naturally, Phil Hellmuth is the only "Phil" to get his photo on the cover of the book.

2 Coolest Online Poker Tournaments

2006-01-10T06:37:00.000-08:00

People love to play in online poker tournaments. And since people can play from the comfort of their own home, some of the online tourneys are getting more participants on a weekly basis than some of the big televised events like the World Poker Tour and the World Series of Poker. What follows are my picks from the 2 coolest online poker tournaments:

1- The World Championship of Online Poker - This is the biggest multi-tournament event being held online, and it's a Pokerstars event. There have been 4 World Championships of Online Poker, beginning in 2002 and the most recent one having been in 2005.

In 2004, Pokerstars had 15 events with over $12 million in prize money. This makes it the biggest poker event online, and one of the 3rd biggest poker events anywhere.

2- The Sunday Night $215 Buy-in No Limit Holdem Tournament at Pokerstars - This is the largest weekly poker event on the planet, which has over 3500 entries each week, and over $700,000 in weekly prizes.

5 Poker Mistakes

2006-01-10T05:58:00.000-08:00

I don't remember which book it's in, but I'm pretty sure it was a David Sklansky book, where the observation is made that there are only a handful of mistakes you can make playing poker. I can't find the article, but I can figure out what the mistakes are. The first thing to do in terms of figuring out what the mistakes are is to list all the possible actions you can take in a poker game:

1- You can check.
2- You can bet.
3- You can fold.
4- You can raise.

Those are really the only actions you can take in poker, so these are the only mistakes you can make:

1- Checking when you should be betting.
2- Betting when you should be checking.
3- Folding when you should be betting.
4- Folding when you should be raising.
5- Raising when you should be folding.

I think you can come up with other mistakes combining the above 4 possible actions, but not all of them apply, IMO, but the above 5 are the ones that apply. Thinking about the possible mistakes you can make playing poker makes the game seem a little simpler, to me.

4 Easy Ways to Increase Your Poker Win Rate

2006-01-09T21:29:00.000-08:00

People want to improve their poker play. But really, there are a pretty limited number of things that you can actually DO to increase your win rate. I've listed 4 easy ways to increase your poker win rate here:

1- Track your results. If you're an online player and you're not using Poker Tracker, then you're losing (wasting) money. If you're not keeping records, you're just not serious about improving your win rate, because you don't even know what your win rate is.

In management they say that you can't manage what you don't measure. So it would be appropriate to start measuring your results.

2- Play poker. One of the surest ways to improve your game is to practice. This seems like it would go without saying, but it needs to be said, because there are plenty of studious players who spend more time reading and talking about playing poker than they actually spend playing.

3- Read about playing poker. If you're reading books, blogs, websites, magazines, and message boards about playing poker, then you're encountering new ideas. If you think about those ideas, and compare them with your experiences while you're playing, then you'll improve your game and your win rate. Reading isn't enough though; you still have to do the critical thinking part and get in your hours at the table.

4- Write and think about playing poker. Iggy pointed out to me once that the most important think about writing about poker was that it forced you to THINK about poker. If you're not thinking critically about the game and how you play, then you're not improving, you're just playing automatically, on auto-pilot.

Writing about something is one of the best things you can do to force yourself to think about it. So comment on poker blogs, blog, and participate on message boards.

558 Ideas for Cool Poker Nicknames

2006-01-09T21:05:00.000-08:00

Do you want to be a cool poker player? Then you need a cool poker nickname. I've made a list of 558 cool poker names for your review here, and I hope you'll find this helpful in your quest to become an awe-inspiring and semi-famous poker player.

Poker Nicknames Starting With Adjectives

Here's a great formula for your new nickname: adjective + your first name.

Here's a list of 8 adjectives that might work for you:

1- Big
2- Fat
3- Little
4- Skinny
5- Slim
6- Mighty
7- Slick
8- Sleepy

Feel free to use an adjective not on this list if you like, but here are some examples using the above adjectives plus some common names:

1- "Big Jake"
2- "Fat Mike"
3- "Little John"
4- "Skinny Chris"
5- "Slim Dan"
6- "Mighty Mo"
7- "Slick Willie"
8- "Sleepy Ben"

Names of States as Nicknames

Okay, here are 50 more ideas. Every state name plus your first name. Some states are already taken, but not all of them, and sometimes if you have a different first name than the person who already uses that state as part of his moniker you can still get away with it.

Examples:

1- "Texas Dolly"
2- "Florida Phil"
3- "Nevada Nick"
4- "Alabama Al"
5- "Oklahoma Bob"
6- "Minnesota Mike"

You get the idea here.

City Names + Your Name

As if 58 ideas for poker nicknames weren't enough, here are about 500 more. Take the name of a city and add your first name. That's it. Nothing could be easier. (500 assumes that there are about 10 names of cities per state.)

AND you can find a list of major city names in the USA here. You don't have to live there to use a city name as part of your nickname.

Here are some examples:

1- "Amarillo Slim"
2- "Minnesota Jim Meehan"
3- "Miami John"
4- "Tucson Tommy"
5- "Bakersfield Bill"
6- "New Orleans Mike"

Other Ideas for Poker Names

Don't feel limited to the 558 ideas I've presented you with. You can come up with cool nouns to add in between your first and last name too, like Antonio "The Magician" Esfandiari, or Men "The Master" Nguyen.

Another thing you can do is just wait til someone gives you a nickname. I used to play with a guy everyone called Lobster. No one was ever able to tell me why. I also played with a chiropractor named Dr. Tilt, but we all knew why he was nicknamed that.

9 Players at My Dream Final WSOP Table

2006-01-09T17:51:00.000-08:00

These are the people I would like to see at the final table of the World Series of Poker championship event in 2006:

1- ME!

2- Iggy

3- "Minneapolis" Jim Meehan

4- Steve Badger (of Play Winning Poker)

5- Phil Hellmuth (of course)

6- Wes Young - I love playing with Wes because he's such a great audience. He laughs at me constantly, in fact.

7- Gabe Kaplan

8- David Sklansky ( I swear I could be the one to put him on tilt. The first and only one. If I couldn't do it, I bet Badger or Meehan could.)

9- Either William Shatner, Chuck Norris, or David Hasselhoff. Those guys are just plain cool.

10- Jennifer Tilly or Jennifer Leigh or Shirley Rosario (from Poker Babes)

Would make for great television.

Hey, come on. I can dream, can't I? I just can't count.

7 Ways to Confuse and Tilt Online Poker Players

2006-01-09T12:35:00.000-08:00

One quick way to gain a subtle advantage at an online poker table is to distract and tilt the other players at the table. You can do this without being a jerk and berating other players too. In fact, some of them will think it's funny, and will enjoy playing with you.

But most importantly, if they're paying attention to your table talk, they're not paying enough attention to their game, and they lose EV while you gain it. (Even if they know what you're doing, they'll still be thinking about you and what you're doing instead of their cards and your cards.)

1- Sit down at a ring game with WAY more chips than anyone else at the table. I mean lots of chips, too, like at least 10 times what the biggest stack at the table has. Then raise every single hand you get both preflop and post-flop for the first five or ten hands you play. After that you can tighten up and play well and get action from everyone at the table.

2- Bluff like a madman and show your cards, especially if you've got really crappy cards like 27 offsuit and everyone folds.

3- Type into the chatbox that you just watched the movie Rounders and every episode of the World Poker Tour Season 2 and you're ready to take on all comers with your "tight but aggressive playing style".

4- Every time you win a hand or someone else folds to a bet you make, type, "That's right. Fear me." into the chat box. This works especially well if you refer to yourself in the 3rd person, as if you were a super villain.

5- Tell other players at the table, "Be careful. I'm sooted." Be sure to spell it "sooted".

6- Rant on and on about how great a player Phil Hellmuth is in the chat box. Express amazement and disbelief at anyone who disagrees with you.

7- Find another player at the table who's mad at you, or who seems to dislike you. Then start saying things to him like, "I like you, insert-player-name-here. Can I add you to my buddy list?" and "Will you be my friend?" and "PLEASE be my friend?"

This works especially well with players who have typed "FU" into the chatbox after you nailed them with a bad beat.

5 Facts You Didn't Know About Phil Hellmuth

2006-01-09T12:05:00.000-08:00

1- If Phil Hellmuth were a captain on Star Trek, he'd be Captain Kirk, the biggest, baddest starship captain of them all. He'd be kicking Klingons' asses, raising hell, and getting it on with fine alien babes.

2- Phil Hellmuth can and has counted to infinity. More than once, in fact.

3- Phil Hellmuth has 12 sons named "The Sons of Hellmuth". (This is a pretty well-kept secret that is being revealed here for probably the first time.)

Together, they will each have 12 sons, who will begin the "12 Tribes of Hellmuth" which are often spoken of in the prophecy. (The prophecy about the greatest poker player who ever lived and who spawned descendants who took over the entire poker world.)

4- If Phil Hellmuth were on The A-Team, he'd be a combination of BA Baraccus and Hannibal. BA because he's BAD, and Hannibal because he's smart. (Come to think of it, he'd also be Faceman, because he's handsome too.)

5- Phil Hellmuth can run a mile in under 3 minutes, but when you're as good a poker player as Phil Hellmuth, you don't have to "run" anywhere. You can drive a fancy car, or have someone else drive you.

Bonus Fact # 6 - If Phil Hellmuth were a woman, he'd be a Slayer, like Buffy, only badder. He would probably be the reason for the extinction of all the vampires in the world by the end of the first season.