The Hendon Mob Newest Articles

The Evolution of the Las Vegas Card Room

marius@thehendonmob.com (Alex Rousso) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 12:06:34 GMT

For years playing poker only meant one thing. Whether it was the smoky back rooms of British spielers, or the gambling dens and river boats of the Mid West, poker was a game you played live.
The next stage in the evolution of poker is well documented. First the internet boom, then widespread coverage on TV. One way or another the world and, perhaps significantly, his wife learned to reraise all in with A-K offsuit, and the rest is history. The evolution of live poker since then has had many...

Sick Dog

marius@thehendonmob.com (Neil Channing 'Bad Beat') — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:10:13 GMT

I was thinking about it on the plane. It could be as much as my 40th trip to Vegas, but it was definitely the only one where I wasn’t really setting out with the intention of gambling.
James had been there a few days now. I’d rung him once to ask what he was up to. He asked me to guess. I went for swimming, lazing around watching a movie in the hotel or just on his way to the gym. I was being optimistic; he was playing poker.
“You sicko.” I said, imagining he was...

Guardian Series: What was Patrick Antonius playing at? I'm not sure

marius@thehendonmob.com (Vicky Coren) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 15:03:17 GMT

What's this?

Victoria Coren
It's quite fun, this Guardian experiment. They're having a games slot every day - bridge, chess, that sort of thing - and I'm doing the poker one. It's aimed at the fairly new player, who might have watched a bit of poker on TV and just started playing with their friends and wants a few tips. So for the moment in the column I'm generally advocating caution and covering basics -...

There's No "I" In Poker

marius@thehendonmob.com (Tips From the Full Tilt Pros) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 15:32:49 GMT

I recently competed in a televised tournament where several players lost focus on their game. They were either trying to gun for a particular opponent at their table or making some ill-advised moves to show off for the cameras. In every case, these players were making the same mistake – letting their egos get in the way of their game.
While most players will never have the opportunity to try and take down a big name pro or make “fancy” poker moves in front of a TV camera,...

Leaving the Table?

marius@thehendonmob.com (You are the Tournament Director) — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 12:48:55 GMT

This one was provided by RobSamples on The Hendon Mob Forum. For anyone who doesn’t know Paul Daniels is a well known English magician who had a popular TV show in the 1980’s and David Blaine is a well known illusionist. Enjoy…
It's getting to the late stages of the celebrity poker club magicians special game. Paul Daniels is the BB and has roughly 60% of the total chips in play, The Great Suprendo is the SB and has 10% of the chips and lastly David Blaine is on the button...

13th of November

marius@thehendonmob.com (Poker News Round-up by Adam Noone) — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 15:33:55 GMT

And so, after an action packed and eagerly anticipated final table at the Rio, the November Nine have been reduced to one lucky winner who is now $8.5 million richer. It wasn’t short stacked James Akenhead, who after a fortunate treble up could do nothing when he ran KK into Kevin Schaffel’s AA. Nor was it the man who took James’ chips after he once again held aces versus...

Stack Size is Everything in Tournaments

marius@thehendonmob.com (Matthew Hilger) — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 15:32:54 GMT

Keep track of the changing stack sizes
I just completed working on the book Winning Poker Tournaments One Hand at a Time, Volume I, by Eric "Rizen" Lynch, Jon "PearlJammer" Turner, and Jon "Apestyles" Van Fleet. Other than specific concepts and strategies, this book shows the reader what it takes to think through h...

Controlling the Pot by Team Full Tilt

marius@thehendonmob.com (Tips From the Full Tilt Pros) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 15:22:59 GMT

One of the most critical aspects to surviving – and thriving – in deep stack tournaments is learning how to control the size of the pots you play. In short, your goal should be to play big pots when you have big hands and small pots when you don’t. When you and your opponents are deep stacked in a tournament, there are two vital elements to pay attention to when you enter a pot – your opponents’ playing style and the texture of the flop.
Before you commit any...

I Was Robbed

marius@thehendonmob.com (Neil Channing 'Bad Beat') — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 14:18:31 GMT

If I was the sort of person who only judges things by the total winnings accrued in poker tournaments, I might come to the conclusion that I've not had quite as good a 2009 as I had 2008.
In order to try and improve my year generally I thought I'd go to Dublin. Maybe it's the only place I can win.
Paul Spillane was again pretending to organise the IPO, while really his excellent team at BoylePoker ran the thing like clockwork, despite him. They managed to get 1,440 players this year,...

6th of November

marius@thehendonmob.com (Poker News Round-up by Adam Noone) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:40:56 GMT

The World Poker Tour is all set for a change of ownership after shareholders this week voted to approve the sale of most of WPT Enterprise’s assets to PartyGaming subsidiary Peerless Media. It’s been an action packed few weeks for investors and management of WPTE, which not so long ago could do nothing right. After repeatedly posting big financial losses, losing its broadcasting slot on the Travel Channel and closing its online poker room it seemed as though WPTE was in big...

Get Automatic Updates from the Mob Database

marius@thehendonmob.com (the Mob) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:19:24 GMT

You can now get automatic notifications when player profiles are changed in the Mob Database, and when results or new tournaments are added. Like every other service we offer, this is entirely free of course.
Subscribe to your own profile and any other players you wish to follow; if results or pictures are a...

Inflation Adjusted All Time Money List

marius@thehendonmob.com (Simon Galloway) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:58:10 GMT

Every sport has thrown up largely unanswerable comparisons between legends of different generations. How would Nicklaus do against Woods if they could play together in their prime, with the same technology available? How would Joe Louis or Mohammed Ali fare against Mike Tyson? There will always be split views, but the general consensus lies with the modern day sportsperson having the advantage, taking athletic performance, technical understanding and everything into consideration. This is...

It's back! Mob Forum League VI Starts 17th November

marius@thehendonmob.com (the Mob) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 16:31:38 GMT

The sixth Mob forum league will kick off Tuesday 17th November with $16,000 in World Series prizes added (4 x $4000 packages for the 2010 WSOP) plus thousands of dollars worth of added bounty prizes.
Those of you who've played before will know the score. Full Tilt Poker every Tuesday at 8pm UK Time (3pm by the Full Tilt ET clock). You'll find the tournament under the private tab in the tourament...

Omaha Hi/Lo Strategies by Perry Friedman

marius@thehendonmob.com (Tips From the Full Tilt Pros) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 10:56:19 GMT

The big difference between big-bet (Pot-Limit or No-Limit) Omaha Hi/Lo and Limit Omaha Hi/Lo is that the former plays much more like Omaha High. Low hands become much less valuable because of how often they get quartered.
If you get quartered in Limit games, you may not lose too much of your overall chip stack because the action is capped on every street. In Pot-Limit games, however, getting quartered can be much more expensive because you may have had to call big bets on both the turn and...

Dealer Miscall and Mucked Hand Wins the Pot

marius@thehendonmob.com (You are the Tournament Director) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 15:53:03 GMT

This one happened to a well known player at the ACF card room in France.
‘I am playing 200-400 mix at the ACF. The round is 2-7 triple draw. I bet the hand on every round, and draw one card.
I am heads up.
After the last change my hand is 45678, not the best 2-7 hand I have ever had. But as my opponent drew 1 card I tried a bluff. I bet and get called. There is about 3,000 in the pot.
I table my hand face up. It is displayed 86574. I say nothing. The dealer says "8-6" at...

30th of October

marius@thehendonmob.com (Poker News Round-up by Adam Noone) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 14:22:11 GMT

As was mentioned last week at the $15,000 main event of Bellagio’s Festa Al Largo Jack McClelland took the unusual step of keeping registration open up until the ninth level on day two, leading to some interesting choices from several well known players. Thirty players decided to skip day one completely including the perma-tardy Phil Hellmuth who entered proceedings during level seven, but within two hours he was unsuccessfully racing for his t...

What Is It You Actually Do for A Living?

marius@thehendonmob.com (Neil Channing 'Bad Beat') — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 15:26:40 GMT

When I was at school the careers department made you fill out a detailed questionnaire. It was actually more of a vocational aptitude test to attempt to match you to your perfect career.
It turned out I would make a good actuary.
An actuary is someone who works in the insurance business, whose job it is to assess the chances of stuff happening. He sets the odds on people’s houses burning down, people’s cars getting stolen and people snuffing it, by analysing where they live,...

Tilt Control by Ben Roberts

marius@thehendonmob.com (Tips From the Full Tilt Pros) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:07:15 GMT

About two years ago, I wrote On Cavemen and Poker Players, which talked about the importance of learning to control your emotions at the poker table. Since then, I’ve had time to further refine my views on this topic, especially when it comes to the concept of tilt.
To begin, let me state the obvious: tilt happens to everyone. In fact, it’s safe to say that tilt is one of the most feared words – and concepts – in poker. So, what causes tilt? Well, that’s dif...

He flips over Aces, and the crowd goes wild...

marius@thehendonmob.com (Alex Rousso) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 14:47:58 GMT

A game of skill or chance? The talk of the US government reversing their decision which effectively banned online poker for their citizens has brought the question back to the fore. Sod games of chance, the way poker is going, it’s turning into a full on sport.
I came to this conclusion when I was giving a talk to a group of non-poker players about how it is possible to make money from the game. I couldn’t have made it any simpler for them. Believe me, I broke it down; I mean...

23rd of October

marius@thehendonmob.com (Poker News Round-up by Adam Noone) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 12:09:29 GMT

Earlier on this year Anurag Dikshit agreed to pay the US Department Of Justice over $300 million in fines over Party Poker’s acceptance of American customers up to 2006 without really putting up too much of a fight. It’s an amount none of us can really identify with losing from the bank account but it might seem reasonable that he would be keen to start rebuilding the Dikshit millions following this massive hit to his finances. That doesn’t actually seem to be the case at all...