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 Ever
since Doyle Brunson published Super System, there hasn't been a more
cost-effective way to learn how to play poker than reading. Where players in
the era before easily-obtained poker books might lose thousands of dollars
before they began to win, today's players have a large library to choose from
that can help them win much more quickly. Nowhere is this more true than with
limit hold'em, probably the most widely played variant of poker today. For
those players who don't have a large initial bankroll, however, there is a
slight problem: the strategies necessary for winning big at loose, low-limit
games are not those taught in the most respected books. Books such as Hold'em
Poker For Advanced Players are designed to teach their readers how to beat
$10-20 games or higher, but many of today's new players start off with a
bankroll that can only accommodate $1-2 or $2-4 games. To fill the gap in the
literature on today's low-limit hold'em games, Two Plus Two Publishing turned
to Ed Miller to write Small Stakes Hold'em. The result is a book that every
low-limit hold'em player should own.
The introduction to Small Stakes Hold'em lays out the book's mission very
clearly: it is not a book for beginners. It is written with the assumption
that the reader already understands the basic rules of the game, and also that
he understands basic strategies of winning limit poker such as playing
tightly. Rather than recommending a tight and cautious style like most
beginners' books, SSHE coaches players in how to play a tight and aggressive
style designed specifically to extract the maximum money from the mistakes
that low-limit players are prone to making. Explaining such a style in full
takes over 350 pages, so be prepared to study when you purchase this book.
SSHE begins with a 30-page introduction to some basic mathematical concepts.
Some are useful for gambling in general, but others - pot odds, implied odds,
reverse implied odds, and equity - are specific to poker. This part of the
book is necessary to underscore the fact that poker is gambling (despite what
some people will tell you). Once these preliminary thoughts are out of the
way, the book jumps straight into pre-flop play. The first portion of the
pre-flop advice is devoted to general pre-flop concepts necessary to crush
low-limit hold'em games such as domination, the importance of position,
understanding the value of suitedness, and avoiding the costly error of
cold-calling raises. The last half of the pre-flop advice consists of
descriptions of hand categories, and recommendations for what hands to play in
tight and loose games.
After pre-flop concepts and recommendations have been covered, SSHE moves into
the part of hold'em that separates the big winners from the break-even
players: post-flop play. This is where Miller's work really shines. Many other
books are great for fixing beginners' pre-flop play but descend into
generalities once they get to the last five cards of each hold'em hand. SSHE
spends nearly half its pages on post-flop play, a good portion of which is
devoted entirely to play on the river. The strength of the strategies provided
here is they teach you to extract maximum value from the later streets that
most other books gloss over. When you've finished this portion of the book and
you begin to apply the concepts contained within it, you should be able to see
a marked improvement in your win rate.
Finishing out the book are three parts: a section on miscellaneous topics, a
section composed entirely of hand quizzes, and a question-and-answer section.
The miscellaneous section contains specific advice on playing overcards,
building big pots before the flop, playing A-K, and using tells against your
opponents. These concepts are the sort that provide fine-tuning after the
first parts of the book have given your game a complete overhaul. The hand
quizzes are a great place to test how well you're applying your knowledge
before you ever sit down in a low-limit game. The question-and-answer section
is very useful for refreshing your memory after giving the book a thorough
reading, as it reiterates all the major concepts in a very short space. It's a
wonder this useful feature isn't available in more poker books.
There's a lot of money to be won in low-limit hold'em games, and there isn't a
better book out there for learning to crush these games than Ed Miller's Small
Stakes Hold'em.
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