old abdul article

[NYplayer]

does anyone know where i can find an old abdul article where he outlines the different thinking at different levels from 3-6 through 300-600?

thanks

[DcifrThs]

[ QUOTE ]
does anyone know where i can find an old abdul article where he outlines the different thinking at different levels from 3-6 through 300-600?

thanks

[/ QUOTE ]

it used to be on his website /images/graemlins/frown.gif .. can't find it now though

i hope this thread produces it b/c i do remember seeing it once but it was back when i was reading the archives 1 month at a time and i didn't understand SH*T back then.

-Barron

[Keres]

Link to thread at google groups (http://groups-beta.google.com/group/rec.gambling.poker/browse_frm/thread/f86b316bdadde917/872d33d19d4a1870?lnk=st&q=abdul+jalib+300-600&rnum=3#872d33d19d4a1870)

Abdul Jalib Feb 22 2000, 4:00 am

This is a tour of the layers of poker society...

$300-$600+
Here the sharks are world class players, and the fish are whales like literally Persian princes or American billionaires. Sometimes $100-$200 pros follow whales into the game but they are shark bait. These games are almost always short-handed unless there is a whale, in which case professionals and their mothers may be flying into town to get onto a long waiting list. I've never played this high, so my knowledge is a bit lacking. This limit is home to the brother-sister duo of Howard Lederer and Annie Duke.

$100-$200
This is the domain of the tournament pros and the idle rich. Someone said that the more world series bracelets in the game, the better the game, and that's generally (but not quite always) true. They all golf by day and gamble heavily on it. Usually these games are short-handed. The real ring game professionals at this limit are extremely tough, e.g., Lenny Martin.

$60-$120
Largely the same culture as $100-$200, but a $300-$600 pro will sometimes demean himself by playing $100-$200, while you almost never see them in a $60-$120, whereas $30-$60 pros will often jump into a live $60-$120 but not a $100-$200. Overall, the average $60-$120 pro is a weaker player than the grinders down in $30-$60. Tells in $60-$120 are usually reverse tells. For example, in hold'em if a $60-$120 player checks his hole cards when a third of the suit hits, then he already has the flush most of the time. The fish at this limit sometimes have no idea how to play poker and will blow off a few thousand in an hour.

$30-$60
Here live the grinders that play day in and day out, 8+ hours per day. $30-$60 is the high water mark for most professionals, and it's not uncommon for a game to be all professionals, in which case you have to wonder about their sanity. It's also possible to have a game with only one or two pros in it, which just doesn't happen at higher limits. One thing that is striking about this limit is how darned aggressive it is compared to lower limits, though $60-$120 cranks it up to an even higher pitch. This is the last limit that S&M's Hold'em for Advanced Players is of much use. A lot of these players are extremely good, such as Roy Cooke.

$15-$30
Here you'll find the common recreational gamblers, the weak/learning pros, and the Abduls who bounce between $15-$30 and $60-$120 since those games are usually better than than the $30-$60. In Vegas, these games are very weak-tight, and the players fold much too often, while in L.A. these games are very loose rammin' jammin' games.

$10-$20
This is the land of starving professionals and some truly horrendous fish. If you thought $15-$30 was weak-tight, that's nothing compared to $10-$20. The game is normally passive, in addition to weak-tight, and it's is the first limit for which S&M's Hold'em for Advanced Players is geared. Both $10-$20 and $15-$30 allow truly stunning win rates for top notch players, in excess of two big bets per hour, since a top notch player can identify when his weak opponent has no hand in a pot that is heads up from the flop. $3-$6, $10-$20, and $60-$120 are the most common limits to encounter someone who has never played poker before.

$6-$12
Land of gamb000ling fish. The contrast with $10-$20 is incredible. You'll need about as big a bankroll for $6-$12 as $10-$20, because the $6-$12 games are so much wilder and also the rake/time takes a much bigger toll.

$3-$6
Basement. Braindead beginner fish live here, making for no fold'em poker. No bluffing is allowed. The rake or time charge will make the game somewhere between difficult and impossible to beat. Although you'll sometimes see a starving professional in $6-$12, there are no pros down here, unless you want to count retirees who play to supplement their social security checks.

[Keres]

later in the thread

Abdul JalibFeb 22 2000, 4:00

robe. . . @fast. net (Bob Dainauski) writes:
> I'm wondering if it's possible, and if you would, give illustrations
> for each level. For example, at the 60-120 level you descibe a
> typical reverse tell. If you would/could I'd love to hear a concrete
> difference between each of the layers. What does a 300-600 player do
> better than a 100-200, etc.

$300-$600
Players here have an angle that allows them to rise above the rest. Some have a deep understanding of game theory, some have many decades of experience, and some (I'm sorry) cheat.

$100-$200
Maniacs are largely replaced by very tough players. Intuitive exploitive play gets replaced by defensive game-theoretic play, even if the players don't realize that's how they're playing.

$60-$120
Reverse tells, many seemingly successful maniacs, 3-betting 3-way with middle pair and overcard becomes sometimes correct, 3 or 4 bet semi-bluffs occur, bluff raises on river are the rule, play by feel and play by tells, no play by book. Good players still go on tilt at this limit, and that's how other good players make most of their money.

$30-$60
Semi-bluff-raise-on-the-turn city. Players get into stare-downs when the flop comes down (trying to get tells), until the first player gives up and looks at the board.

$20-$40
Rammin-jammin value betting/raising with big draws. They make some good laydowns when faced with calling two cold in a big multiway pot. It is a rule here that AA must always be turned face up when it is mucked prior to the showdown. If AA loses in a showdown, then a 60 second wake ceremony is required before then showing the hand and then tossing it into the muck, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

$15-$30
Players are good at hand selection, but weak at semi-bluffing, first level where you'll see many bluff raises on the river. Many players here play by the book. They love to make "good" laydowns.

$10-$20
Good players here are rocks and rarely semi-bluff or bluff. They *live* to make "good" laydowns.

$6-$12
Good players here ram-n-jam with big draws, but lack common sense. They are not able to determine when they might be drawing dead. They hold onto AA until the bitter end.

$3-$6
Players here tend to call if there is any chance in hell that they can make the runner-runner nut straight or two pair.

[obi---one]

This is good

[ike]

This sounds like a load of crap.

[DcifrThs]

[ QUOTE ]
This sounds like a load of crap.

[/ QUOTE ]

it was written for the times he wrote. before the crap we see online today.

abdul jalib (jahlib? sb?) was and is the greatest loss to this forum.

-Barron

[ike]

Sorry, I didn't realize it had a historical setting. DOesn't apply to anything I've ever witnessed.

[mike l.]

wow the game sure has changed a ton since then.

[oreogod]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
This sounds like a load of crap.

[/ QUOTE ]

it was written for the times he wrote. before the crap we see online today.

abdul jalib (jahlib? sb?) was and is the greatest loss to this forum.

-Barron

[/ QUOTE ]

Where did he go anyway? Ive only read his articles, I dont know anyhting about the man himself other than he was pretty knowledgeable and wrote some great stuff for the game.

[ACPlayer]

Still pretty good at describing B&M games (at least on the east coase).

[DcifrThs]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
This sounds like a load of crap.

[/ QUOTE ]

it was written for the times he wrote. before the crap we see online today.

abdul jalib (jahlib? sb?) was and is the greatest loss to this forum.

-Barron

[/ QUOTE ]

Where did he go anyway? Ive only read his articles, I dont know anyhting about the man himself other than he was pretty knowledgeable and wrote some great stuff for the game.

[/ QUOTE ]

he and mason had a tiff. he has not been back since.

-Barron

[Kovner]

What happened to his website? It was still up for a long time, but its down now.

[Gabe]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
This sounds like a load of crap.

[/ QUOTE ]

it was written for the times he wrote. before the crap we see online today.

abdul jalib (jahlib? sb?) was and is the greatest loss to this forum.

-Barron

[/ QUOTE ]

Where did he go anyway? Ive only read his articles, I dont know anyhting about the man himself other than he was pretty knowledgeable and wrote some great stuff for the game.

[/ QUOTE ]

he and mason had a tiff. he has not been back since.

-Barron

[/ QUOTE ]

I’m pretty sure neither of them would like to see something like this of his pasted here.

It is interesting to see how much things have changed, though. It’s as if we’ve been experiencing over 20% year inflation.

[DcifrThs]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
This sounds like a load of crap.

[/ QUOTE ]

it was written for the times he wrote. before the crap we see online today.

abdul jalib (jahlib? sb?) was and is the greatest loss to this forum.

-Barron

[/ QUOTE ]

Where did he go anyway? Ive only read his articles, I dont know anyhting about the man himself other than he was pretty knowledgeable and wrote some great stuff for the game.

[/ QUOTE ]

he and mason had a tiff. he has not been back since.

-Barron

[/ QUOTE ]

I’m pretty sure neither of them would like to see something like this of his pasted here.

It is interesting to see how much things have changed, though. It’s as if we’ve been experiencing over 20% year inflation.

[/ QUOTE ]

if you are talking about the # of new posters in this forum its definately a massive % increase each year.

as to the pasting comment, im sorry if ive upset anybody but i definately chose to keep my answer very short, very succint, yet cover the general gist. i think i did that and i guess "disagreement" would have been better than "tiff" but its the same thing. if youd like, gabe, next time i'll say "can't talk about it, i might upset abdul or mason."

if thats not what you mean, please elaborate or PM me. again, if i have upset anybody, i apologize as that is clearly not my intent.

-Barron

[Steve Giufre]

Cool article. I did find it interesting that he said the 100-200 pros that take random shots at the 300-600 when the game is good are shark bait. Ive never played quite that big so I guess I dont know but would the good 100-200 players really be that overmatched? I wonder if he thinks that top players are that much better at 300-600, or if its just the fact that the 100-200 players arnt comfortable with the money and it usually causes them to not play thier best game.

[TheWorstPlayer]

I think Gabe meant you had to inflate all the numbers to update them. So the 1/2 guys might no longer be shark bait at 3/6 but that's because now the old 30/60 guys are playing 1/2 and the old 1/2 guys are playing 3/6 and the old 3/6 guys have moved up to 1k/2k. So now to get the jist of the article you should read it as the 3/6 guys who take a shot at 1k/2k are shark bait.

[Steve Giufre]

I havent read Gabes post yet, but that does seem logical.

Steve, I do like your query. So now, let's ask again:

Assuming he had a bankroll and was comfortable with the stakes. How would a great 300-600 player be overmatched in a 1-2K game? Are the players really that superior?

What does a 1-2K player have that a 3/6 doesn't? Is it simply a pure talent issue? No matter how hard Kerry Collins works, he'll never be Brett Favre.

I really think those games are about individual match-ups and knowing who to attack. If you took a table of 10 great players, the 10th best player may have the best player's number, while the best player may destroy the top 3 players rountinely, but knows to avoid player 10. And player 5 does well against player 7, but struggles against player 8, and so on.

[Lawrence Ng]

[ QUOTE ]
it was written for the times he wrote. before the crap we see online today.

abdul jalib (jahlib? sb?) was and is the greatest loss to this forum.

-Barron

[/ QUOTE ]

Times have indeed changed...

Lawrence

[phish]

[ QUOTE ]
Steve, I do like your query. So now, let's ask again:

Assuming he had a bankroll and was comfortable with the stakes. How would a great 300-600 player be overmatched in a 1-2K game? Are the players really that superior?

What does a 1-2K player have that a 3/6 doesn't? Is it simply a pure talent issue? No matter how hard Kerry Collins works, he'll never be Brett Favre.

I really think those games are about individual match-ups and knowing who to attack. If you took a table of 10 great players, the 10th best player may have the best player's number, while the best player may destroy the top 3 players rountinely, but knows to avoid player 10. And player 5 does well against player 7, but struggles against player 8, and so on.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think one BIG edge that the 1k/2k player has is that they tend to play ALL games well, whereas the 3/6 player, while experienced in most games, may be great at one but have weaknesses in the others. Remember, in B&M, it's quite rare to find straight hold em games higher than 100/200 (except maybe during tournament times).

While I think that the best 100/200 holdem players can contest with the best holdem players anywhere, at any limit, they do become shark bait when the game then switches to Stud hi/lo. (However, at stud, the best 100/200 players become shark bait even when playing stud against the great 300/600 and up stud players. But the dynamics of holdem is different. There are structural reasons in the games for this difference, which is too complex to go into here.)

[SA125]

[ QUOTE ]
(However, at stud, the best 100/200 players become shark bait even when playing stud against the great 300/600 and up stud players. But the dynamics of holdem is different. There are structural reasons in the games for this difference, which is too complex to go into here.)

[/ QUOTE ]

phish, respect your insight and thoughts. You have to follow up here. Other than adjusting to the ante and bring-in sructure, what else can there be? I have a hard time believing a properly rolled, solid 100-200 stud man is bait for the 300-600 game.

If the ante's and bring-in is what you're talking about, I find it hard to believe the game changes so drastically every place it's spread.

[Keres]

[ QUOTE ]

While I think that the best 100/200 holdem players can contest with the best holdem players anywhere, at any limit, they do become shark bait when the game then switches to Stud hi/lo. (However, at stud, the best 100/200 players become shark bait even when playing stud against the great 300/600 and up stud players. But the dynamics of holdem is different. There are structural reasons in the games for this difference, which is too complex to go into here.)

[/ QUOTE ]

Good point. Skimming through the RGP archives reading Jalil posts I saw Sklansky wrote something similar. (A few years old, adjust for inlation.)

Sklansky's take on the difference (http://groups-beta.google.com/group/rec.gambling.poker/browse_frm/thread/117463245861ebd6/b8ff321c6d45faae?q=abdul+jalib+300-600+&rnum=1#b8ff321c6d45faae)
Dsklansky Jul 21 2001

Daniel [Negreanu] sometimes says or at least implies, that the better 300-600 players are a full notch better than the best 50-100 pros. And that the the bigger stakes is a more sophisticated game. This is not exactly correct. It is true that the 300-600 sometimes requires deeper thought and trickier plays because there is almost never any live ones in the game (the existence of live ones makes the straightforward play the normally preferable one.) It is also true that the bigger games are more often shorthanded which again requires more finesse. It is also true that high stakes requires more nerve for the underbankrolled since you are risking a car everyday.

But the thing is that the big games are now almost always multiple games. This means that the most successful players do not have to be, and in fact are not, any better in a particular type of poker than the best 50-100 specialists are in their speciality., especially in full ring games. Now this is not a knock on those big game players. The fact is that they are the best all around players. And they have slyly shut out specialists from making big money at poker by discouraging and refusing to participate in high stakes single games only.

[Keres]

[ QUOTE ]

abdul jalib (jahlib? sb?) was and is the greatest loss to this forum.


[/ QUOTE ]

Abdul's posts on RGP are interesting. For anyone bored while multitabling, might be worth checking out. On another note, while I was surfing the RGP archives for Jalib posts I was surprised at the caliber of people and threads back then. Some really good stuff.

For the poster who asked about Jalib's site, the archive can be found here (http://web.archive.org/web/20041030012530/http://www.posev.com/).

[NYplayer]

how do you check rgp archives?

[Keres]

[ QUOTE ]
how do you check rgp archives?

[/ QUOTE ]

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/rec.gambling.poker

[phish]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
(However, at stud, the best 100/200 players become shark bait even when playing stud against the great 300/600 and up stud players. But the dynamics of holdem is different. There are structural reasons in the games for this difference, which is too complex to go into here.)

[/ QUOTE ]

phish, respect your insight and thoughts. You have to follow up here. Other than adjusting to the ante and bring-in sructure, what else can there be? I have a hard time believing a properly rolled, solid 100-200 stud man is bait for the 300-600 game.

If the ante's and bring-in is what you're talking about, I find it hard to believe the game changes so drastically every place it's spread.

[/ QUOTE ]

When I say that stud and holdem are different in that the best stud 100/200 players are nowhere near the best in the world whereas the best 1/2 holdem players are, (and this also explains why holdem games rarely go above 1/2 whereas straight stud games can go 1500/3000), this is what I'm referring to: (hope I'm articulate enough to express this properly)

stud is actually a more complex game than holdem. This may sound contradictory, but there is actually both more luck to stud (at the high limits anyways) and more skill.

It has more luck because the luck in stud comes mostly at the end of a hand, after players have put a lot into the pot already and have to pay off. In holdem, the luck comes early, on the flop. The best players can read hands and board texture and get off (or find bluffing opportunities there). Analyze the variance of the truly great stud vs holdem players and you'll see that the stud players have much greater variance.
By more skill, I mean that stud is a more complex game. The presence of upcards provides extra info that the greatest players can use to his advantage, to reevaluate his opponent's possible holdings, to psych out what his opponent thinks he has, etc. There are more levels of complexity to master in stud and it gives the greatest players an extra edge over merely the great.

Because holdem is simpler, it is actually easier to master at a close to optimal level. Stud on the other hand has many more gradations of expertise, so that the greatest are significantly better than the mere great. (Compare holdem with Chinese poker or Pai Gow and you'll know what I mean.)

How does the above two facts (seemingly contradictory but not really) contribute to the feasibility of big stud games but not big holdem games?
1. Stud's higher variance makes it more likely that the fish will win, sometimes for long spells. This keeps the game going. In holdem, the big whales simply will not win enough to keep the game going.
2. Also, because the best stud players are significantly better than the merely great stud players, another source of revenue for the best are the 2nd best taking shots, moving up from 75/150 to the 400/800 after they've run good for awhile. Since all games need contributors to sustain them, these two sources of fish help sustain the game.

Holdem, on the other hand, because it is less complex and 'easier' to master, will have players at the 100/200 level that can play almost as well as anyone who may play higher. hence, when they move up and take a shot, they're not really big enough losers. Hence you will have a bunch of expert gambling with each other with no one having a big edge. Games like this don't last. And with no true fish contributing to the game (cause they don't win frequently enough), the games won't survive.
This, imo, explains why the biggest stud games are so much bigger than the biggest holdem games. And also why (because there are additional gradations of expertise) that the best 1/2 stud players are suckers to the best 4/8 stud players.

[SA125]

n/m

Very nice post. Yeah, you'll hear Ted Forrest refer to 7 stud as a "roller coaster ride."

Just curious, who is considered the best stud player these days?

A lot of players rave about Nick Frangos.

[CORed]

Thank you for the link. I had not read the article qoted above, but I consider Abdul's article on preflop stratgegy a must read for any beginning holdem player. I believe that reading that article was a turning point in my poker career. My first poker book was the first edition of WLLHE. The preflop strategy in that book was horible. It advocated raising preflop only with AA, KK AKs and maybe AK or AQ, if a raise would thin the field. At the time I read the article, I was playing $.50/1.00 an Paradise, and was, at best, a break-even player. I couldn't understand why all the "idiots" who were raising "too much" preflop were taking my money. Abdul's article, which advocated a much more agressive preflop strategy than I was using at the time opened my eyes. I realized that preflop raises in the loose-passive games I was playing weren't made for the purpose of driving people out of the pot (which they usually didn't do anyway), but for the purpose of building a bigger pot for a hand with a pot equity edge. Abdul, AFIK, never used the term "pot equity" but he certainly was familiar with the concept. Correcting my preflop strategy started me on the road to becoming a winning player. The other concept that is very valuable in Abdul's preflop article is that of thinking about postion in terms of number of seats to the right of the button. This makes adjustment to short-handed games almost automatic.
Abdul's Preflop Article (http://web.archive.org/web/20041009214724/www.posev.com/poker/holdem/strategy/preflop-abdul.html)

[phish]

[ QUOTE ]
Very nice post. Yeah, you'll hear Ted Forrest refer to 7 stud as a "roller coaster ride."

Just curious, who is considered the best stud player these days?

A lot of players rave about Nick Frangos.

[/ QUOTE ]

Probably Ted Forrest. Nick Frangos is one of those great 300/600 players who would probably get chewed up if he played at the biggest games with Forrest and Greenstein.