Smash Vegas

Winning Low Limit Hold’em

Lee Jones

A great beginner’s book on hold’em.  The emphasis is on solid fundamental play to beat loose, low limit games.  It is an easy read and is particularly successful in pointing out the big mistakes which can cost a new player dearly.  A perfect choice for newcomers to hold’em.

Content

The first section “Hold’em : The Game” serves as an introduction and gives an overview of the fundamentals of the game.  Jones covers topics such as calculating pot odds and reading the board.  The focus is very much on bricks and mortar poker, so some adjustment to online stakes is required.  I would suggest that the games he is discussing would be roughly analogous to $0.5/$1 tables online.  The section ends with a quiz on the material it has covered.

The majority of the book is within the second section “Play of the Hand from Deal to Showdown”.  The author details the basics of winning play from preflop to showdown.  The advice will be no surprise to veterans (although they may feel it is not aggressive enough), advocating an ABC game of tight hand selection and betting for value.  I particularly like the preflop treatment - it’s a good introduction to starting hand selection, which is probably the single most important thing for beginners to learn.  There are preflop and post-flop quizzes, which I feel are both valuable.

The third section “Miscellaneous Topics” contains a number of short essays.  Some are more useful than others but I think the discussions of bluffing, bankroll, player types and discipline will be interesting to the new player.  For more advanced players the essay on implicit collusion will probably be the biggest draw.

Presentation

The book is well presented with an easy writing style.  Complicated concepts are well described, again making it ideal for newer players.

Perhaps not a presentation problem but unfortunately the book’s discussions of online play (or lack thereof) have not dated well.

Conclusion

A good buy for beginners.  However if you already play and win at small stakes then the book has less to offer you.  For instance Small Stakes Hold’em is much better suited to the intermediate player.

Small Stakes Hold’em

David Sklansky, Ed Miller, Mason Malmuth

This book on small stakes should not be mistaken for a beginners book.  Although it focusses on the smaller stakes where beginners tend to dwell the concepts and analysis are applicable to any game with loose players - this makes it one of the best books available for improving your online play.

Content

Small Stakes Hold’em (SSH) begins with a discussion of gambling concepts such as expectation, pot odds and pot equity.  It’s a well written introduction which I thoroughly approve of because I (like the authors) believe that every poker decision boils down to “which choice maximises my expected value?”.  As you’d expect with Sklansky on board the authors do a great job of explaining these concepts in simple terms and detailing why they are important.

The next chapters cover the theory behind playing each of the streets (preflop, flop, turn, river) with an emphasis on recognizing the type of hand you hold and comparing your odds to the pot odds.  Hand types and the strategy for playing them are discussed for each street - e.g. play speculative preflop hands like low suited connectors or pocket pairs if they can see the flop cheaply, try to win straight away on the flop by protecting made hands that are good but not great, etc…

The advice is good and general, emphasising the critical importance of pot odds.  There is also some discussion of awareness of the game structure.  For instance the authors argue that because of the minimum bet increase in many games on the turn and river it is sometimes useful to forego betting on the flop to reduce the pot odds being offered to an opponent on the turn.  This is thought provoking stuff and the many sections like this (along with the lack of a basic “these are the rules of poker” chapter) ensure this is definitely not a beginners book and would be useful to a wide range of players.

The last part of the book is an extensive test yourself chapter, with questions covering all the topics discussed in the book.  It is one of the largest question and answer sections I’ve seen in a poker book and is very comprehensive.

If I had to sum up the theme of the book it would be to play tight and aggressive in a loose game, being constantly aware of the pot odds.  The authors argue (correctly in my view) that in a loose game where players will call with rags the correct attitude is not to become defensive because of “bad beats” but instead to punish the opponents for their constant weak calls.

Presentation

The book is generally well laid out, although some of the tables could be a little clearer.

There is some discussion of poker mathematics which does not go into too much depth but may put off some readers with the display of equations.

The writing style is good and the book is a quick read despite its length (over 350 pages).

The test yourself sections are a useful way of absorbing the theory by practical examples.

Summary

I like SSH and regularly recommend it to friends wanting to improve their online play.  I think it does a good job of teaching players to rely on playing a solid “by the numbers” game of poker instead of fancy hollywood poker plays.  There’s a lot here even for advanced players who are perhaps not as familiar with the lower stakes and the book does a good job of explaining not only the differences in strategy at this level but the reasons for the differences.