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Table and Seat Selection

poker tableIf you play poker at home, at a real casino or online poker, this article is very useful.

Sharks use the lobby and table statistics to choose where to find the best fishing hole. They look at flop percentage, average pot, and if they have any notes on the players. Then they pick the table that best fits their style. This is called Table Selection.

Table selection should be used to help maximize profits. You can use the waiting list but be sure you add your name to specific tables that you want only as most software will ask if you want to put on all tables of the same limit and you may not get that table you want.

As a beginner, the best table would be a loose passive table. This means most players see the flop but there is little betting. This game has players playing weak hands and not protecting their strong hands with raises. Because this is a loose table, there will be big swings but if you continue to play tight and aggressive, you should see a profit.

Seat selection is the next thing to consider. You want to sit to the left of the loose poker players. This will allow you to see their action first and use this to your advantage. If they raise, and you have a premium hand you can re-raise and force others out. This is called “isolation” and some consider this an overused play.

If you have tight players at the table, it’s best to have them on your left. This allows you to steal blinds from them.

Mike Caro stated that “Money flows clockwise around the table.” That does not mean you should immediately sit to the left of the biggest stack but if you have a choice of seats to the left of two loose players, I would choose the one with the biggest stack.

Poker table and seat selection are the first thing any good poker player should consider when choosing a game. You should be able to size up some of the players from observing and make an informed choice of where to sit.  

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