Peeking At Your Cards

Why peeking at your cards is a classic newbie poker tell...

Playing poker with friends in a social atmosphere does make you more vulnerable to tells than playing in an anonymous fashion online. I noticed a classic example in a game with business colleagues at the weekend. Two new players at the table took a peek at their hole cards two or three times each. This may not seem like much because of course you have to look at your hole cards, but unless you’ve a short term memory problem you don’t need to keep furtively peeking at them. New poker players who do this may as well take a megaphone and tell the table that they have the beginnings of a strong hand. As the game develops usually the “tell” develops with it. It was interesting to see the board making it obvious that possible flushes and even straights were out there and the new players were almost continuously checking their hole cards against these potential hands as the board grew to the turn and the river. I had long since folded a crushing pair of twos but it was an education to be in the position of knowing the outcome. Sure enough the two newbies faced off at the showdown and you could actually sense the stifled yawns from the rest of the players as the inevitable flush took down the low straight. If you’re a new player the above is worth noting. My tip to new players is always the same. Build your game online where the tells are harder to spot and make sure you’ve read about social poker skills before you go inviting your mates round.

Build Your Poker Game Online at: www.DailyStarPoker.com

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Q: What does the term capped mean?
A: Capped describes a game where there is a maximum number of permitted raises. Clearly this is a term which applies to pot-limit or fixed-limit games. The game is described as capped when the maximum number of raises has been reached.
Q: What does drawing dead mean?
A: The term applies to a situation where there are community cards still to come but none of them will assist your hand. Where this is the case, the player is said to be drawing dead.
Q: What’s an open-ended straight?
A: If you have four cards and a fifth card at either end would complete your run, that’s an open- ended straight. If you are holding
six of spades and seven of diamonds and the flop has delivered a five of hearts an eight of spades and a queen of diamonds you need the turn and river to throw up either a four or a nine to close your open-ended straight giving you either:4-5-6-7-8 or 5-6-7-8-9!

ALL THE ACES daily poker column: Thursday, August 18th 2005: Peeking At Cards