Funny thing happened at Razz tonight...

Razz poker and tips

I played again, and fortunately I was able to double up.

Image by Lucas Janin via Flickr

Razz poker tips:

1. If you get a bad seat, it's okay to move. I believe that some seats are just hot and others are not.

2. I misread my hand 'cause I wasn't focused. I was reading some sports news and playing in a hand...mistake! When it got to 5th street, I called a bet heads-up thinking I was on a good draw. I noticed when 6th street hit--I shouldn't have called on 5th. But I was forced to go all the way to 7th, because the 6th street card helped. Of course, 7th street was no help and I folded. A big loss at the $10-$20 level. Doh!

3. I lost some patience tonight. Some guy hit perfect to beat me, which got me pissed. I proceeded to play a hand I shouldn't have played, which made it worse.

4. I did beat this one opponent in three heads-up situations. In each case he thought he was ahead, and he was behind. But he just bitched and moaned about how unlucky he got. All he has to do is look at the hand history and he'd see he was way behind. Razz poker players are just not as good as they think. I'm not even that good, but I know how to take advantages of my opponents' weaknesses.

Funny thing happened...

When my Razz poker book came out, most players liked it. One of the Full Tilt Razz pros, Pepperman told me he liked it. I was interviewed by Lou Kreiger, Ashley Adams and the AnteUp guys even like my book.

Katja Thater recommended it as well. As a Razz bracelet winner her recommendation led to PokerStars Intellipoker (the educational site) buying the rights to translate it into many languages. Later I found out why Intellipoker took her recommendation so seriously--she is married to the head of the company=)

Now, there was one Razz expert who blasted my book everywhere. The guy went way overboard. I think he really thinks he is the best Razz poker player in the world.
In fact, he told everyone that he was going to write the definitive book on Razz, my book is awful, blah, blah. Anyway, he never did write that book.

The funny thing is that when he sees me playing Razz, he must play at my table. Does he say anything to me? Nope. It's like he pretends I don't know who he is. I always say hello to him. I never get a reply.

I know he wants to beat me real bad--it is a typical ego thing, I guess. The last time he did this (months ago) we never went head-to-head--but he lost hundreds of dollars in like 20 minutes. It was ugly. I think he was trying to show-off or something how he can catch a bluff in Razz. It wasn't working.

Tonight, he was back...this time he lost again...but not as much. It was funny because I knew what he was trying to do and the first two times we went heads-up I won. The third time, I misread my hand and he won. Overall, he lost $100 and left.

The lesson is: When you make poker personal, you will surely lose.