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The big live tournaments that make the poker headlines each week come and go, but the ring game tables never sleep. Action is always plentiful in the virtual poker world. Perhaps nobody knows this better than Gus Hansen, who is famous for his significant bankroll swings in online poker. In what was likely one of his worst days ever, HighStakesDB.com has reported that Hansen lost over $1 million dollars Sunday… to just two opponents.

Cole South and eight-time World Series of Poker bracelet winner Phil Ivey took Hansen for more than $1.1 million on the final weekend day of August, accounting for almost half of the “Great Dane’s” net losses on the year. HighStakesDB – which tracks the action at high-stakes online poker tables – reported that Hansen’s losses Sunday came primarily in $2,000/$4,000 Fixed Limit Omaha Hi-Lo. He lost $358,000 to Ivey in that game along with $99,000 to South, and to make matters worse, he even lost $335,000 in Omaha Eight or Better when it was part of a Seven Game rotation.

All told during 2010, Hansen is down $2.3 million according to the records kept by HighStakesDB. He started off the year strong, peaking at $2.3 million in the black in January. His current deficit is his low point of the year so far. Despite his poor run in the Omaha Hi-Lo portion of HORSE on Sunday, it looks like Hansen should stick to HORSE, as he is up over $1.7 million in the Fixed Limit format of the mixed game in 2010.

Ivey and South, on the other hand, have had good 2010′s so far, and of course, HighStakesDB only counts online games, so they could be doing even better in live games. Ivey is up an astounding $3.5 million in internet competition this year and is on the rise, as that mark is his high point. He hit his valley back in March, when he was down $117,000. Ivey’s best game has been Fixed Limit HORSE, in which he was won $1.5 million. He is at least break-even in each game type for which HighStakesDB has records.

South has not won nearly as much as Ivey, but it is safe to say that the average person would love to have made $78,825 through the first eight months of the year. It’s a far cry from his high water point in February, when he was up $3.5 million. Just last month, though, South was down $260,000, so being above break-even means that he has had a nice few weeks recently. Fixed Limit Omaha Hi-Lo has been South’s best game, netting him almost a half million dollars.

By Dan Katz

Next Monday, September 6th, catch a marathon of “High Stakes Poker” on GSN. Once the Labor Day barbequing has finished and the relatives have left, it’ll be all poker after hours on the popular cable station.

A total of eight hours of “High Stakes Poker” will air with episodes from the show’s recently completed sixth season. Players you can expect to find on the airwaves include Patrik Antonius, Tom “durrrr” Dwan, and Doyle Brunson. The action will begin at 7:00pm ET and run all the way through 3:00am ET. If you’re on the “Left Coast” of the United States, then catch the “High Stakes Poker” Labor Day marathon on GSN from 4:00pm PT to Midnight PT. It’s a great way to catch up if you missed any of the action from Season 6.

The sixth season of “High Stakes Poker” premiered in February and featured UB.com pro Phil Hellmuth going broke in the first episode. On a four-way flop of 7-6-4 with two hearts, Phil Ivey fired out a bet of $6,000 with K-9 of hearts for a flush draw and two overcards, while Hellmuth bumped the action to $25,000 with J-5 of hearts for straight and flush draws. Ivey called behind and the turn was the king of diamonds, pairing the 2009 November Niner, who checked. Hellmuth moved all-in for $82,000 and Ivey called. No saving eight came on the river and Hellmuth had blown through his $200,000 buy-in.

In an episode that appeared in March, four players were felted, including Daniel Negreanu, Dario Minieri, Gus Hansen, and Jason Mercier. It was one of the most memorable episodes of “High Stakes Poker” ever and followed a $1 million vegetarian prop bet forged by Ivey. With Ivey ultimately sitting with more than $1 million in the Golden Nugget’s “High Stakes Poker” soundstage after the four-man bloodbath, host Gabe Kaplan jokingly commented that Ivey could easily buy out of his bet: “He could have a whole barbeque if he wants.”

After six episodes of the sixth season, the ratings for “High Stakes Poker” were up big. Overall ratings among adults age 18 to 49 were up 27% compared to Season 5, while ratings among adults age 25 to 54 were up 25%. Among men age 25 to 54, a key demographic for many advertisers, the ratings had mushroomed 29% season over season.

The show held a Sunday night time slot and the sixth season began with the departure of longtime co-host A.J. Benza. In his place, GSN officials brought in Kara Scott to conduct interviews from the “High Stakes Poker” suite, while Kaplan flew solo in the booth. The change prompted a petition to bring back Benza that appeared on TwoPlusTwo and at one point had attracted over 400 respondents.

GSN has given no indication as to whether “High Stakes Poker” will be brought back for a seventh season. The show has traditionally been filmed in November, with the most recent installment making its home at the Golden Nugget in Downtown Las Vegas. Brunson, Negreanu, Victory Poker pro Antonio Esfandiari, Eli Elezra, and PokerStars front man Barry Greenstein have appeared in all six seasons of the high-stakes cash game show.

Speaking of PokerStars, the site sponsors the “Big Game” on Fox, an alternative cash game series that airs at 1:00am ET or 2:00am ET in most markets. However, the “Big Game” won’t feature any new episodes until October. Meanwhile, NBC’s “Poker After Dark,” which airs a mix of tournament and cash game cycles, will also return with new episodes on October. Currently, encore presentations of “Poker After Dark” air daily at 2:05am ET on NBC.

The Jerry Springer hosted “Baggage” will air from 9:00am ET to 7:00pm ET preceding “High Stakes Poker” on GSN on Labor Day.

By Dan Cypra

“Who Dares Wins” has been the motto of nine different elite special forces units around the world, including the UK’s Special Air Service, Greece’s 13th Special Operations Command and the 3rd Battalion, 25th Marines in the United States.  It should also be the motto of every poker player who’s moved beyond tight aggressive play and wants to bluff effectively.  The secret to good special forces operations in intelligence, intelligence, and intelligence – getting it from the enemy and using it against them in an unexpected way, which is exactly what should happen in your poker game when you decide to push in hard on a hand that you, logically, shouldn’t be involved in.  Bluffing is not for everyone and in fact, I recommend that the majority of players simply avoid it entirely.  However, much like there are millions of military service members around the world that aren’t in the special forces, there are some things that only the best poker players can do well, and bluffing is one of them.

Much like a military operation, a single incorrect bluff can cascade and ruin the rest of the game for you.  To be fair, luck is a factor in bluffing, but intelligence is your most important asset.  You have to have read your opponents and their actions to the utmost before you enter into the fray. If you’re a novice attempting to bluff against a more experienced player, you might get lucky, but it’s best to pay attention and understand how they may well react before you push them too hard.  Bluffing early in a game only work so often, so you’ll have to deploy strategically so that they have the maximum possible impact in the game.

Some people believe in bluffing frequently; for the beginner, this is basically telling you to go hand your chips to third parties on a regular basis.  You do want to be unpredictable to some extent, true, but being thought of as a solid tight-aggressive player who is likely holding a good hand is vastly preferable to being thought of as a wild card that doesn’t know what they’re doing next. You should also be aware that just as you’re getting data from other players, they’re getting data from you and the way that a novice stages and executes a bluff can become just as notable a tell as the dramatic, over-the-top flourishes that Hollywood insists on putting into poker scenes on film.

One thing you’ll need to be able to accept in most bluffs is a very military concept: acceptable losses: you’re dedicating a certain amount of your bankroll to obtaining a certain amount of money in a pot and if you can’t read pot odds or know what your ROI or possible loss would be, you should step away.  Bluffing is as much a part of the game as anything else and you’ll want a good command of it before making a riskier investment at the table.  The motto may be “Who dares wins,” but there just like any military operation, it takes more than just guts to seal the deal.

by Bodog Poker

First of all, a refresher: when we discuss your position at the poker table, we are referring to your position in relation to the dealer button. The dealer is, obviously, in the most powerful position at the table because they act last in the betting rounds.  Second only to the cards themselves, position at the table is one of the single most important factors for any player to consider when playing a hand of poker.   Why is it such an advantage to play in the later positions?

First: you’ll get a grasp on the other players’ hand strengths (presuming that they’re not bluffing) and get a better idea of the relative merits of your hand.  For (an extreme) example, let’s say that you’re holding a pair of 6s and the person before you pushes all-in.  This allows you tonight reconsider your initial impulse to call or raise and even push you out of the hand entirely.  There’s absolutely nothing wrong with a strategic retreat from a hand, particularly if you can escape without even playing a blind.

Secondly: There are fewer players acting after you.  This makes it much less likely that you’ll face a raise or re-raise that could force you to spend money that you don’t want to.  For instance, if the player before you calls and you raise by a significant portion, they’re looking at a much steeper mental cost for these players to get in on a hand.  The same mentality helps you make decisions at the later positions can be used by you to push other players out of a pot.

Finally, you’ll continue to have a good position as the hand is played out, particularly if you’ve managed to get rid of those after you.  Even if you haven’t, though, your relative position gives you the ability to make critical decisions with more information and as everyone knows, information is key in poker.  In fact, one of the crucial arguments for poker acting as a game of skill is the way that players receive information from the rest of the board and decide what to do next.

That said, as great as the later positions are for the player, it’s possible to actually use the early positions in the game effectively in a manner very close to what’s described in the paragraph above. You’ll need to have cards that back up your actions. Face card pairs (KK, QQ, JJ) and high pairs like AA, TT and 99 are obvious contenders for this honor, but you can also think about effectively playing AQ and AK if you’re feeling spunky.

It’s not recommended that you attempt to bluff from early positions: you won’t have adequate information on what others are holding and while going all in and then smugly crossing your arms, waiting to see what others do can occasionally shake up a no limit Texas hold ‘em table in real life, online poker players are very different and tend to play strictly by the numbers outside of the higher-stakes tables.

by Bodog Poker

Marginal hands are those that are on the edge of being absolutely terrific: QT, QK, KJ, KQ, AJ, etc.  They have cards that are fairly strong individually but tend to cost players, particularly new ones, more than any other set of hole cards.  How do you play these cards, which obviously should be played, profitably?  If you don’t keep track of your stats — and you should — you’ll likely see that high pairs (AA, KK) create most of your profit at the tables.

That’s obvious, right?  There’s a reason we all want pocket rockets.  Meanwhile, once you clear the most blatant winners, you’ll see that the marginal hands are likely all over the place with most players seeing a near-even split: the losses they’ve endured with the hands and the winnings balance out in the end, with a few statistical outliers.  Non-pair hands that you see to the flop can either make you money or break you almost immediately without some luck.

There’s a reason that pros call these “sucker hands,” after all, and will play them the same way they’d play a lower pair, which is how you should be looking at it.  The problem with top marginal hands is that while the flop can help you, they can also blow you out of the water completely.  You may flop top pair, or even two pair but then lose out to a straight.  In general (and we’re speaking in the broadest possible terms,) players don’t go into a hand unless they’re holding something worth playing, and those very cards that you covet for the board may be in play by the guy across from you.

Let’s say you’re holding KhQh and the flop is TcJhQd.  That’s a great looking flop, isn’t it?  You’ve got an open-ended straight draw and top pair, right there.  It’s easy to see how people get excited over hands like this and end up in over their hands.  The problem is that other players will likely have hit big hands, too.  Someone might be holding a pair of Jacks, for example.  If you’re smart, you’ll assume that the other players will have also hit something worth playing, and out of all the hands that will (at a minimum) call on this flop, you’re only going to be able to beat KJ and AQ.

This is just one example, but there’s plenty more.  A flop of QcKsAd is going to be supremely tempting, but the issue is that you’ve got bottom two and can’t do much more than maybe — maybe, if you know the person is a newbie — convince them that you have a straight and push them out of the hand.

As much as it seems like I’m working to scare you out of playing these hands entirely, the fact of the matter is that there are plenty of really good flops out there for a player that’s holding marginal cards.  That’s why they’re marginal, as there’s a chance to succeed or fail.  For the most part, players profit most with these hands when they are playing in smaller pots, as it’s more likely that other players aren’t holding big guns, and don’t be afraid to fold.  It’s better to get bluffed off a series of smaller pots than lose your whole stack in one heroic effort.

by Bodog Poker