Posted by Bryan Oulton on Thu, Apr 14, 2011 @ 02:27 PM
Every Monday at Champps, Tony is hosting a special promotion - Every time you knock a player out of a tournament there, you get a bounty.
The top 8 bounty totals after Monday, May 23rd, will play in a special tournament at Packy's on Saturday, May 28th. The winner of the 5/28 tournament will win an entry to the Monday, June 6th Tournament at the Isle Casino!
Come play every Monday night at Champps with All In Free Poker, South Florida's premier free poker league.
Posted by Bryan Oulton on Mon, Jan 10, 2011 @ 10:09 AM
Poker & Social Media
With the boom of social media blending over the boom of poker, it is no wonder that the two have so much in common. There is every source of information, market, and scam when it comes to poker. As with anything else in the world, beware of those who seem too good to be true. But, there are many great resources to find out events that are happening, news updates on tournaments, players who you can track or invest in, you will find out what you want.
With Facebook, you can communicate with the players you know in poker. More often than not, they will friend you and then you can communicate, if they & you desire. It can be an interesting view into their lives. Granted, the bigger the name, the more fake accounts there are of that person, and they’re often used to shill products, services or affiliate codes. Just beware, as Facebook does not offer “official” accounts. There are also pages for groups that will deliver your information directly to your Facebook page, for instance, facebook.com/allinfreepoker is our page for All In Free Poker.
Twitter often goes hand in hand with Facebook. What is different with twitter is that you can see who the “official” user is and who is not. It’s a great way to find out information and to communicate with top pros. But one of the best things is that you can also find out great information about poker and what is going on near you, or around the world, on twitter. @anteupmagazine is one you should follow immediately. You can find me @bryanoulton and @allinfreepoker, where you’ll get sound bites from me about poker, football and many more subjects.
Another interesting twist with Twitter & poker is the combinations and special online tournaments that are found there. @pokerstars and @fulltiltpoker will offer freerolls for their follows, plus contests for player points to quick respondents. @tptpoker is for the Twitter Poker Tour, which is a great group of Twitter users who also play live & online poker. There is a series of tournaments they run weekly online and there’s a live ustream show that will have top pros calling in and doing interviews while they play in the tournament.
@wsop @wptliveupdates are the sites for the World Series of Poker and the WPT. @islepoker is the twitter page for the Isle Casino’s poker room in Pompano Beach.
@leechilds is the twitter account for fellow Ante Up columnist Lee Childs, while @navarrotells is the incredibly awesome source of information from Joe Navarro, another outstanding Ante Up columnist.
This is just scratching the surface of the mix of poker and social media on the internet. I suggest you follow all of the above users and to start looking around the internet for more ways to stay in touch with the poker community.
Posted by Bryan Oulton on Fri, Jan 07, 2011 @ 09:55 AM
Live poker and the free bar poker player.
Speaking of live poker, it is getting to that frigid time of the year where our streets and restaurants get a bit more crowded with the arrival of the snowbirds. At least this is the case for Florida. With those annoyances, also comes the arrival of plenty of cash to our local poker rooms. With Florida transformed into a real poker state, there will be an abundance of players who have money to burn in the rooms, without the realization that there are plenty of us down here who were waiting for this moment, chomping at the bit to play real money against those who are used to playing here with small limits. The prize pools in non-guaranteed tournaments should take a nice jump as well.
In addition to the new players, the Florida Million is back for a second run, after a successful first year. The Isle just completed their Isle Open $400,000 guaranteed series of events with the prize pool going well north of $675,000 over the big three events.
There is a $5,000 WPT event this month. Needless to say, there are some serious big money, big time events going on is the state of Florida. If you want to take the next step in your game, you need to get to these events. Play the events and pick off the side games as well.
Posted by Bryan Oulton on Fri, Jan 07, 2011 @ 09:49 AM
TV Poker and it's effect on free bar poker
With all of the buzz this time of year about the Main Event of the World Series of Poker, the television viewing of the events has been the talk of many a player. With three southern players, and two from Florida, at the final table of the Main Event, the interest has been even more intensified locally. Players dream every year that one day, they will be the next big name in poker, which is why they watch relentlessly to the broadcasts.
I am a huge fan of poker, love the game and I realize that the advent of the hole card cam has made poker on TV the hit that it is, as well as the popularization of the main characters. That said, poker on TV is largely horrendously portrayed, in my opinion. I have noticed on several occasions that the sequence of the hand is out of order of the players at the table. On at least five occasions, ESPN failed to catch the fact that they were showing a player to act through the hole card camera, and yet still showed players who they had shown folding in the order of play still with cards. Granted, that can often be a factor of when a player looks at his/her cards versus the action as they show it. On one occasion, it seemed they had spliced two hands together, as there was a person at the table who they had shown previously getting knocked out. ESPN edits to create drama and for better broadcast quality hands, but they often take things too far. The way of editing can also make a player seem smarter, dumb, lucky, aggressive, meager, loud, or whatever they would like to make people into heroes or villains. Of course, the major issue I have is that the logic and process to the actual game of poker is completely removed. Granted, sometimes the hands just play out and they get what they want. Lastly, the fact that they “join a hand in progress” like they are cutting live is ridiculous. There is no information about the hand, just a straight cut to the action after the flop. All of this cheapens the product. I do like the WPT broadcasts, as they focus on things more from a players mind would, but then you do have Mike Sexton as the lead guy, and he knows a thing or two about poker. Regardless, with or without its inherent broadcast issues and nitpicking critiques by me, poker on TV has broadened the game, opened it up to millions of more players and brought tons of dead money into the game. Just remember, if you ever happen to be playing at a table with a player you have seen on TV, don’t judge a player or his actions by what you saw there, and base your judgment on live, unedited play.
Posted by Bryan Oulton on Mon, Oct 18, 2010 @ 02:21 PM
Proud to announce new All In Free Poker shirts that benefit two great charities: " Women In Distress of Broward County, Inc." and the "Susan G. Komen Foundation".
All profits from the sale of these shirts will go directly to help with their efforts to educate about Domestic Violence and Breast Cancer Awareness. You can buy these shirts at http://www.aifpgear.com/
Please do your part to help today!
Posted by Bryan Oulton on Tue, Oct 12, 2010 @ 03:08 PM
With the law changes on July 1st that opened up Florida to being a real poker state, the cash games have exploded and the players love it. An unexpected and often unnoticed side effect has occurred as well, softer and smaller tournament fields. Since we are based out of South Florida and play exclusively down here, this might not pertain to certain parts of the state.
Sure, we’re also seeing the big ticket, huge guarantee tournaments, as well as a WPT event next year, and these will continue to attract the better players. But the nightly $100-$200 buy-in tournaments have experienced a change that is, in my opinion, lost on some players that play them. Others have noticed and have kept quiet about it to use as their own weapon of cashing improvement. The better players who were forced to play these due to the bingo cash game conditions have now moved on to more profitable cash game pastures. Hopefully I don’t have a target on me for spilling the beans on this one.
With that said, now is the time for bar poker players to continue to hone their skills in tournament play in their leagues. The biggest mistake I see of bar players is that they transition right to cash games when their experience and learning has come from tournament play. As you would expect, anyone with a tournament mentality usually gets beat up pretty bad in cash games until the learning curve kicks in. Why do that when the tournaments are getting softer? Now is the time, if you’re a tournament player to take advantage of this swing and take down the dead money.
Realize also that, with softer players in the game, you’re going to have more chances of getting sucked out on, so be cognizant of that with your betting patterns. Keep the pots small and then get paid when you have the nuts.
Hope the cards are good to you and I’ll see you at the tables.
Look for this article in Ante Up Magazine!
All In Free Poker won back to back years with Ante Up's Yearly Readers' Poll!
Posted by Bryan Oulton on Tue, Oct 12, 2010 @ 03:01 PM
One hundred and fifty players played in All In Free Poker's 24th Main Event Championship. After 8 hours of play, a final table was reached and play stopped.
With 2,025,000 chips in play, the final 10 players came to Packy's Sports Pub in Lighthouse Point in Wednesday, October 6th to resume play and crown a champion. With the blinds of 10,000/20,000 with a 2,000 ante and 30 minute blinds, the play began.
First out was the short stack, with back to back final tables was Lisa Woodburn. Taylor Brooks and Kildare Pierre were the next two out. With a change in the blinds to 15,000/30,000/3,000 came two more eliminations of Mike Coberly and Bruce Kahn, while Tim Roberts was eliminated in 5th place and the blinds at 20k/40k/4k. All 6 won entries into the Isle Open satellite events.
Bill Scott went out in 4th place and earned a $575 entry to the Isle Open $50,000 guaranteed event, leaving 3 players. The blinds got pushed to 30,000/60,000/5,000.
Mark Miller, the chip leader to start the final table and a previous champ, was out in 3rd place and earned a $575 entry to the Isle Open $50,000 guaranteed event.
As the blind level closed, the tournament did as well, with Joe Hedleston defeating two-time champ John Morrow, to take his first championship with his first final table appearance. John won the $1,100 Isle Open entry to the $100,000 guaranteed event. Joe won a $5,000 package on All In Free Poker's 3rd Annual Cruise August 14-21, 2011.
Posted by Bryan Oulton on Fri, Aug 20, 2010 @ 01:57 PM
allinfreepoker.com
Not just a warning, but something you need to work on in your poker game. In casinos & bar leagues, the “Florida Chop” is a prevalent monster. As soon as the money is to a certain point, people want to just chop it up along a percentage or even split and move on to the next event or live game. Sure, it’s great to get that even amount, and depending on the blind levels versus chip stacks it is the prudent thing to do for all. However, it is often laziness and fear of head’s up play that is the underlying factor in this decision. To get better, you have to be able to play well short handed and head’s up, and the only way to do that is to play it out.
We recently held our first annual $10k head’s up tournament. 216 players played over 4 weeks. This is the purest form of poker, in my opinion; as it is a true battle of wills and minds. The eventual player’s winner, Andy Weir, won a $5k Aruba tournament package for his win. Then he played my business partner & I in best 2 out of 3 matches for the chance to make his win a $10k Aruba tournament entry. He defeated Sandy in 3 hard fought games. I played him next. We played 3 matches over a 6 hour period, both starting with 10,000 in chips and 15 minute blinds. After Andy took game one, I won the next two to win the match and Andy still had his $5k package as a big win.
With all that stated, the match was an epic battle of wills. Figuring out your opponent and then playing what they do back at them is the only way (besides the luck factor) to win. Sure, you do this in full rings in single or multi-way pots, but this is focused effort. In this case, I used the knowledge I had on the player that he is willing to play big pots and can chase down hands against him. I played one of the most passive, small ball games I have ever played, and utilized that strategy continuously. When I got away from my plan of attack, I got in trouble, playing some big pots that I had to get away from or lost. Ultimately, knowing my opponent and his style, plus a few reads I picked up on him, gave me the edge I needed to overcome his well played game against me. In the end, I think a bit of frustration came out due to my continuous small ball strategy, with small blind pre-flop folds to some big hands factoring greatly into that.
So the next time you’re playing, especially in a bar league event, play it out, work on your head’s up play, it’s costing you nothing to do it and can serve you very well in your poker playing future.
Posted by Bryan Oulton on Fri, Aug 20, 2010 @ 01:55 PM
When you play bar poker, besides a nice night out and having fun with people who have a similar interest, you should also be utilizing tools of poker to improve your game. One is being a farmer; a data-farmer that is.
What is a data-famer? Well, you might have noticed that some players ask a lot of questions. Some people just do that because they want to know everything about everyone. However, there are others who are practicing this vital tool for purposes of gaining information to use against you in the game.
Phil Hellmuth stated in the forward of his & Ante Up columnist Joe Navarro’s book “Read ‘em & reap” that you are a profiler. When playing the game, you want to constantly gain information about people and then analyze that data to come to conclusions during key hands.
We’re taught in today’s politically correct society that stereotypes are bad & wrong. However, in poker, stereotypes are an important starting point when trying to gain information about a player. A 300 pound male attorney with a pinky ring is probably going to have an aggressive personality and style of play. It is a start to formulating information on this player.
Utilize stereotypes and then massage the data. As you play against a particular player more than once, maybe they have a different feel for you. Also, try to understand that others, no matter what anyone says, will have a pre-conceived notion of you based on appearance, stated profession, etc. Use this information to your benefit.
Then throughout play, continuously gain data, not just through your own questions, but the conversations of others. Some of the info may be superfluous due to the established relationship of the players conversing, but you can always pick up on things. Just as in life, the more you know the better chance you give yourself.
As you continue your growth as a player, you will always utilize this tool, so continue to develop it, it will serve you well. You might have noticed some more experienced players you know seem to take a keen interest in others, especially new players. This isn’t because they truly want to know about these players; it’s that they’re data-farming.
Part one is gaining the information; the next step is analyzing and implementing it. You’ve found out that another player had a bad day, trouble at home. More than likely, their head isn’t going to be in the game. However, they might fully dive into the game to escape reality. So pay attention as they’re playing to see which of those preconceived notions they’re following, then use it to your advantage.
As you transition into real money events in casinos, or expand your buy-in levels, this will be a major assistance to your success. It is basically free tells that most people will never cover up, as poker is still a social outing, no matter the buy-in or level of play.
allinfreepoker.com
Posted by Bryan Oulton on Fri, Aug 20, 2010 @ 01:21 PM
Home
Live freeroll poker is a tool for all poker players, no matter the level of skill they possess. You get to see thousands upon thousands of live hands against real opponents without the threat of losing your money. As opposed to the free poker you find online, people actually approach the game in the right light and really try to improve their games. This can only help you as you play more casino card room games for your hard earned cash. No matter that you play for big bucks, the more hands you can see, the better you can get.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, you must always try to play your best, no matter what the stakes of the game. Try to read the other players; try to figure out what the possible hands are. Take mental notes about how certain players play and then play around that or use it against them. It is all great practice for what you must do to succeed when you’re playing in games with buy-ins at the casino. Now, not all of the opponents in bar poker will have a high level of skill and many just do it for the entertainment factor, but you’ll face this in the casinos as well, so you might as well keep working on your game for free to go along with your increased presence in the casinos.
One of the things I hear from players that are coming up in the bar league system is that they don't like the way another person plays. This is where they are often clued in to the reality they just stated - they are learning the habits of other players. I tell them that they have learned the patterns of other players - step one of reading players - now put that knowledge into play to your advantage. It is rewarding to see players grow and to adjust their games through the free tournaments we provide.
Now, the more you play and the better you get, you’re going to find that you’re playing 80/20 cash games/tournaments in casinos vs. free bar poker, but you should never abandon the free game to help augment your casino game. But you should always be striving to get better and to play more and more in the casinos, as your bankroll permits. Never play outside your bankroll. And if you go bust, then play more in the free games until you can afford to play in the casinos again.
The freeroll leagues also provide you with the ability to play against the same people night in and night out, which allows you to create baseline reads on players. After you learn how to do this, then you should try to play in multiple venues to meet and play against new players to test reading them.
The more you play, the better your skills get, which, in turn, improves your game. You must always strive to get better or you will never get there.