Jonathan Little's Weekly Poker Hand: Should Be an Epic Pot
Poker pro and coach Jonathan Little has been producing a wide variety of strategy content for poker players for some time, including authoring multiple books and sharing videos and articles on his website and elsewhere, much of which is free to players of all levels seeking to improve their games.
Little started his popular "Weekly Poker Hand" series on YouTube several years ago, and recently he decided to switch up the format to begin featuring footage from live small- and medium-stakes cash games and tournaments.
In the episode shown below, Little returns to Stones Gambling Hall in California to analyze another hand from a fun, somewhat loose $1/$3 no-limit hold'em cash game featuring a $10 straddle.
Action begins with Gina calling the straddle for $10 from the hijack with Q♣6♣ then a player called Poker Mama calling as well from the cutoff with A♥10♣. Yoteach calls also from the button with 10♥9♣ and Veronica in the straddle checks with 8♣3♣.
The 5♣4♣10♠ flop then hits all four players' hand in some fashion, giving two of them flush draws and the other two top pair.
With $44 in the middle, it checks around to Gina who bets big — $50 — and all three opponents call. Here Little talks a bit about whether or not the shorter-stacked players might have raise-shoved.
The turn brings the 3♦, and when checked to Gina this time bets $200 into the $244 pot. These big bets from Gina (who has been playing loose and aggressive) are putting her opponents to some difficult decisions since all of three of them have reason to want to continue with their hands.
We'll stop there and let you see how things play out from that point, as well as listen to Little analyze each player's situation and actions. Some of the concepts Little discusses in his analysis include:
- starting hand selection (and preflop strategy)
- bet sizing
- stack sizes (and stack-to-pot ratio)
- pot odds
- equity
As it turned out, a hand that looked destined to end with a huge showdown fizzled out when everyone folded to Gina's big turn bet. As Little says at the end of the video — and as Gina's play well demonstrates — if your opponents are going to be folding top-pair hands and flush draws, it's worthwhile to remain aggressive and keep firing.
Jonathan Little is a professional poker player and author with over $6,900,000 in live tournament earnings. He writes a weekly educational blog and hosts a podcast at JonathanLittlePoker.com. Sign up to learn poker from Jonathan for free at PokerCoaching.com. You can follow him on Twitter @JonathanLittle.
