Cash Game Strategy
Most pkr.com poker players spend more time playing cash games over sit and go tournaments and you’ll need to make sure you’re prepared for the fight if you do decide to play No Limit Texas Holdem table games. No Limit Texas Holdem costs a lot of money and you need to first establish a bankroll before you can even sit down and play the game. Once you have a bankroll that is large enough to play poker you can sit down at the table and start playing.
When you initially sit down at a cash table game you need to determine the playing styles of the players on your table and to do this the most effective way you should play tightly. Once you find out who is loose and who is tight you can begin gaging who you want to play against in a hand and who you don’t want to play against. It’s important that you know who is tight and loose because you want to make sure you know the style of the player that you’re betting against.
Your pocker hand selection needs to be very tight in no limit cash game because with a full nine or ten player table there is bound to be one big hand out there. If you’re going to make a bluff to steal the blinds or something like that then that is fine, but it shouldn’t be something you do often. For the most part you should only play your strong hands in cash table games, especially when it’s no limit.
Risking your chips on draws and marginal hands will only take away from the winnings you could earn on your big hands so by playing tight you can capitalize on your big hands. You can’t play too tight though or else you will face the problem of nobody wanting to call you when you do have a big hand. Mixing up your play a bit will help, but don’t get involved in the big pots until you have a monster hand.
Playing loosely at a cash table is a bad idea because you’ll loose too much of your stack. You need to learn how to sit patiently when the cards aren’t there, because when you try and buy pots you’re only asking for trouble. It’s definitely wise to try and steal some blinds once in awhile, but don’t overdo it or else you’ll find players will start to raise you and you’ll lose your stack.
If you don’t possess some patience then you’ll definitely not be well suited for cash table games and you might want to stick with tournaments. You’ll run into streaks where you lose and you’ll also run into streaks where you win the pots. So you need to be able to minimize your losses on the bad streaks and maximize your profits on the good streaks which can be easier said then done. Most importantly make sure you play with cash you can afford to lose, because like anything else in a casino poker is a gamble and there is no guarantee that you’ll win money even if you play very well.
